This Week In 90’s Wrestling: March 29 – April 4

APRIL 2

1992
All Japan continued its Championship Carnival with a show in Yokohama, where Mitsuharu Misawa and Jumbo Tsuruta wrestled to a 30-minute draw in a ***3/4 match.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f4l135POmFY

1993
All Japan Women held Dreamslam I in Yokohama before 16,500 fans, which was both the largest crowd in the history of AJW and the largest crowd for a women’s wrestling promotion in Japan. The most legendary match on the show was a ***** match between Akira Hokuto and Shinobu Kandori that played off of Kandori’s shooter reputation and Hokuto’s history of ill-timed injuries. Also on the show, Chigusa Nagayo — the biggest star in Japanese women’s wrestling in the 1980s — returned to the ring after a four-year absence to face old rival Devil Masami. Kyoko Inoue and Takako faced JWP’s Mayumi Ozaki and Cutie Suzuki in a ****1/4 interpromotional match and the main event was another interpromotional affair, as Manami Toyota and Toshiyo Yamada faced FMW’s Megumi Kudo and Combat Toyoda.

WAR held a card in Sendai which featured matches against the top stars of New Japan. In the main event, Riki Choshu and Shinya Hashimoto faced Genichiro Tenryu and Takashi Ishikawa in a ***3/4 match while Shiro Koshinaka, Kengo Kimura, Michiyoshi Ohara and Akitoshi Saito faced Super Strong Machine, Ricky Fuyuki, Ashura Hara and Koki Kitahara in a ***1/2 match.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fz36A_DVtKM

SMW held the Bluegrass Brawl in Pikeville, KY in front of a turnaway crowd of 2,000 fans. The best match on the show was a **** Tennessee Chain Match between Tracy Smothers and the Dirty White Boy. The main event was a three-way street fight, as the Heavenly Bodies and Bobby Eaton faced the Rock & Roll Express and Arn Anderson and the Stud Stable and Dutch Mantell.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nn3-S8EJ3BM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GCOo-e7mHqc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eb3tXSIowWM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8n2bdzLzWUw

1995
Weekly Pro Wrestling, Japan’s premiere wrestling magazine, sponsored an historic show of epic proportions, as over 52,000 fans packed the Tokyo Dome for a 13-match card with 13 different wrestling promotions each submitting what they thought would be their best match. The women stole the show for the evening, as the AJW and JWP matches were the best of the night. Meanwhile, Mitsuharu Misawa received the biggest ovation of the evening. No promotional effort has been attempted to the same degree since then, despite the success of the show.

The WWF aired Wrestlemania XI live on pay-per-view from Hartford, CT, in front of a sellout 15,000 fans. In the main event, Bam Bam Bigelow faced football player Lawrence Taylor in a solid, professional match that was much better than expected. Meanwhile, Diesel defended the WWF World Title against Shawn Michaels in a match that was decent, but did him no favors in getting over as champion, as Michaels greatly overshadowed him. The show did approximately 340,000 buys, and you can watch it on the WWE Network.