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On this week’s Pacific Rim, myself and Fumi Saito talk about attending the first-ever Marigold card held at Korakuen Hall. We talk about the atmosphere, the presentation, Bozilla, and Marigold’s plans for the future.
Plus, we chat about this year’s Hana Kimura Memorial Show, WWE running Japan, why Fumi thinks NXT Japan is an inevitability, Pro Wrestling NOAH, Stardom-Bushiroad, and much more.
The Big Audio Nightmare is back as Mike Sempervive & I talk about everything happening in the very busy world of Japanese wrestling.
This week’s topics include:
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Giulia is injured.
The 30-year-old headlined Marigold’s debut event, Marigold Fields Forever, on Monday in Korakuen Hall. She teamed with Utami Hayashishita in a loss to Sareee and Bozilla. On Tuesday, Marigold announced that Giulia suffered a fractured wrist in the match. She will miss the upcoming Hana Kimura Memorial Show scheduled for Thursday.
Marigold wrote:
“Giulia’s right wrist was injured in yesterday’s inaugural match. Today, her doctor examined her and diagnosed her with a fracture. Unfortunately she will miss the Hana Kimura show on the 23rd, and upcoming shows for the time being. We apologize and thank you for understanding.”
After the main event on Monday, Giulia challenged Sareee to a future singles match, possibly at Summer Destiny, which has been announced for July 13 at the Ryogoku Kokugikan. At a media event on Tuesday, Giulia reportedly said she’ll be ready for the show.
Giulia’s match on Monday was just her second since departing Stardom earlier this year. She also wrestled at NOAH Wrestle Magic 2024 on May 4. Giulia teamed with Hayashishita, Mai Sakurai, and MIRAI in a win over Great Sakuya, Miyuki Takase, Nagisa Nozaki, and Takumi Iroha on the show.
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Filthy Four Daily with Bryan Alvarez and Filthy Tom Lawlor is back with tons to talk about including the Convention this weekend, Smackdown on Friday night, the Tyson Fury fight this past weekend, the main event of the MARIGOLD debut show, and more. A fun show as always so check it out~!
Marigold ran its debut event at Korakuen Hall on Monday.
The show’s main event saw Sareee and Bozilla defeat Giulia and Utami Hayashishita in a tag team match that went just under the 30-minute time limit. Saree pinned Giulia to pick up the win for her team. The finish saw Giulia take a moonsault from Bozilla before Saree hit her with a big suplex and got the pin.
After the match, Giulia told Saree it’s up to the two of them to bring the Joshi world into the future. She challenged her to a singles match and Sareee accepted. The vacant Marigold World and National title belts were brought into the ring as well during this post-show segment, with Hayashishita putting the red belt over her shoulder at one point.
Before the show came to a close, Marigold announced Summer Destiny will take place on July 13 at the Ryogoku Kokugikan.
Marigold also posted photos of a flower arrangement sent to the organization by WWE’s IYO Sky, Akira Tozawa, and KAIRI Sane for their debut show.
Marigold Fields Forever quick results —
Other Marigold Fields Forever notes —
45-year-old Nanae Takahashi became the first wrestler ever to pick up a win in the promotion when she defeated 19-year-old Victoria Yuzuki in the opening contest with The Refrigerator Bomb. The commentary team referred to Takahashi as the last remnant of All Japan Women’s Pro Wrestling but said Yuzuki represents the future of Marigold. Takahashi offered her hand to Yuzuki after the match but she slapped it away.
The story of the second match was that Ishikawa is one of the seven founding members of Marigold while Aono is one of the ActWres wrestlers who joined at the first press conference. Ishikawa is upset that Aono has been put on Marigold’s posters and promotional materials. However, Aono would pick up the win, defeating her opponent with a Styles Clash.
The third match of the show saw former Stardom wrestler MIRAI against former ActWres wrestler CHIAKI. This match was built up as a contest between two power-based wrestlers. MIRAI picked up the win with a big lariat. After the match, MIRAI was gifted a giant bag of caramel corn, which is, evidently, a favorite snack of hers.
The fourth match was labeled the “World Beauty Showdown” and featured Nagisa Nozaki & Myla Grace against Zayda Steel & Mai Sakurai. Grace is from Northern Island and previously wrestled for NXT UK. Steel wrestles with MLW as part of the WTF stable. The match ended up going to a 15-minute time-limit draw. The two teams got into a bit of a shoving and hair-pulling contest after the bell and the commentary team played up that there was unfinished business between the two teams. Sakurai cut a promo after the match, ripping the fans for having to start their work week.
The semi-main event of the show saw Chika Goto and Kouki Amarei defeat Misa Matsui and Natsumi Showzuki in tag team action. Amarei pinned Matsui with a splash from the top and then cut a promo after the match. She said both she and Goto are only going to get better as the commentary team played up that the organization will be crowning Twinstar tag team champions at some point.
The show streamed live on the Wrestle Universe streaming service.
Marigold Dream Star Fighting has unveiled its championship belts.
On Wednesday, the promotion revealed images of its United National Championship belt and the Marigold World Championship belt. Similar to the Wonder of Stardom and World of Stardom title belts, the National title will have a white strap and the World title will have a red strap.
“For a long time, when we think of women’s pro wrestling belts, we have images of red and white. We will carry on the history of women’s pro wrestling from the Showa era,” said Rossy Ogawa.
“The United National championship is an homage to the title first worn by Antonio Inoki, and held by greats such as Jumbo Tsuruta, Genichiro Tenryu and so many more,” the promotion wrote on X.
Marigold will also have the Twinstar Championships for tag teams and the Super Fly Championship for wrestlers under 55kg (121 lbs).
Marigold Fields Forever lineup for Monday, May 20, 2024 —
The lineup for Marigold Fields Forever has been released.
Rossy Ogawa’s new promotion held a fan event on Sunday and officially confirmed six matches for its debut show on May 20 at Korakuen Hall.
The show will be headlined by Giulia teaming with Utami Hayashishita against Saree and Bozilla.
マリーゴールド旗揚げ戦
Marigold Fields Forever
5月20日（月）後楽園ホール
◆ マリーゴールド最強タッグ伝説
ジュリア＆林下詩美vs Sareee&ボジラ#pw_mg pic.twitter.com/rmmCP8C0Xb
— Marigold マリーゴールド (@DSF_Marigold) May 5, 2024
Tokyo Sports reports about 80 fans were in attendance for today’s event in Tokyo.
“We will stir up the women’s professional wrestling world, aim to be a more and brighter women’s professional wrestling, and an organization that reaches the world,” reads a translation of Giulia’s comments from today’s fan event.
The future of the new promotion was also addressed recently on Pacific Rim with our own Jim Valley and Fumi Saito. The full episode is available for subscribers here.
Marigold Fields Forever lineup for Monday, May 20, 2024 —
Yes, the Pacific Rim Pro Wrestling Podcast still exists.
Longtime wrestling journalist Fumi Saito and I discuss his trip to Philadelphia last month to see Bull Nakano inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame. He talks about how it happened, his thoughts on the ceremony, and WrestleMania 40 itself. (You might recognize him and a famous wrestler in the picture above).
From there, we talk about Rossy Ogawa, Stardom and Rossy’s new Marigold situation.
Other topics include this year’s Hana Kimura Memorial Show, Fumi’s interview with Giulia, his appearance on the John Tenta episode of Dark Side of the Ring, and much more.
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The Big Audio Nightmare is back with myself and Mike Sempervive to talk about everything happening in the very busy world of Japanese wrestling.
This week’s topics include:
Click Here to Listen (sub needed)
Former AEW World Champion and longtime Japanese star Kenny Omega made some strongly-worded comments toward Stardom founder Rossy Ogawa on Friday night, indicating some negative revelations exist about the Marigold founder that is already known by others.
During his Twitch stream Friday, Omega was asked about Ogawa and said he would caution against listening to praise “for that individual” based on what those in the wrestling industry and “government-issued press” in Japan know about him.
“I would say, ‘Don’t be so quick to listen to praise for that individual’ because someday, I’m not sure when it will be, maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but someday, people will know the truth. What they do with that truth, I don’t know. Will they share it? Maybe. A lot of the higher-ups in Japan, they know exactly what business he’s up to and what he’s been up to for decades. That’s all I gotta say,” he said.
However, that wasn’t all he had to say.
Omega was then asked about Ogawa being an “E-drone” (a backhanded reference to WWE fans on social media) since Marigold has a partnership with WWE. Omega said he didn’t care about that as it’s “not even the tip of the iceberg.”
He said there are “a lot of people” that refuse to work for Ogawa “for the very same reason” who are currently both in WWE and AEW. He then alluded to what the allegations are about without specifically making accusations.
“If you want to know along what lines they tread amongst, the dude just flat out said, ‘Hey, we’re looking for girls ages 13-to-21 that don’t have a boyfriend and aren’t married.’ We already know he puts underage girls in very revealing swimsuit calendars and books. I wish that’s all he did. Let’s put it that way,” he stated.
Despite saying all that, he then clarified that he didn’t know anything and that he was “not going on record to say anything” as he didn’t want lawyers “barking at my door.”
“I don’t have any sort of video evidence, I just have the good word of people that are very close. I’m outside of it. If those people feel like commenting or saying something, whatever. For now, I’ll say that people going to Marigold, good luck. I hope you have a great time. I hope it works out for you. For me, I would be very hesitant. I would be very hesitant. That’s it. That’s all,” he said, before saying “redact my comments” and that “I didn’t say anything” before again questioning Marigold’s desired age range and then agreeing with a commenter that he should delete the Twitch video.
He finished by saying he supports current WWE star Asuka and that “she’s got her reasons, probably the same one as mine.”
Without mentioning Ogawa by name, Asuka said in August 2023 that Stardom “was created to destroy me personally.”
To this point. Ogawa has not publicly responded.
AEW head Tony Khan was publicly happy on X (formerly Twitter) when Ogawa was fired by Bushiroad, owners of NJPW and Stardom, in February of this year.
Ogawa announced his new Marigold promotion last week with our Dave Meltzer reporting that Giulia will be part of it in addition to working in WWE NXT.
“I don't care about Rossy bring an E-Drone. That is not even the tip of the iceberg. Just you freaking wait… when it finally comes out.”
Says there are a lot of people both in WWE/AEW who refuse to work with him for that reason, and comments on the “13-30 unmarried girls”… https://t.co/ydhnwg1ldd pic.twitter.com/jrDph5n5Qt
— Drainmaker (@TheDrainmaker) April 20, 2024
In a new exclusive report for subscribers, we have details on what’s to come with Rossy Ogawa’s new Marigold promotion, including their working relationship with WWE, and Giulia’s immediate and long-term future with both companies.
The Big Audio Nightmare is back with Mike Sempervive and I to talk about everything happening in the very busy world of Japanese wrestling.
This week’s topics include:
Click Here to Listen (sub needed)
Rossy Ogawa has revealed his new promotion.
During a press conference Monday morning, Ogawa announced the formation of Dream Star Fighting Marigold, or Marigold for short. Their first show, Marigold Fields Forever, will take place on May 20 at Korakuen Hall. It will stream on Wrestle Universe with both Japanese and English commentary. The main event will feature Giulia & X taking on Sareee & X.
The start of the press conference revealed the first seven roster members: Giulia, Utami Hayashishita, MIRAI, Nanae Takahashi, Mai Sakurai, and Yuzuki (now going by Victoria Yuzuki), formerly of Stardom, and Nao Ishikawa. At the end of the press conference, Natsumi Sumikawa, Miku Aono, Misa Matsui, CHIAKI, Chika Goto, and KOUKI, formerly of Actwres girl’Z, announced they will also be part of the roster.
Ogawa was fired from Stardom in February after the promotion accused him of attempting to poach talent on his way out. Ogawa denied the accusations but did say that he was going to form a new promotion. Giulia, who appeared at NXT’s Stand & Deliver event during WrestleMania weekend, will help Ogawa with the promotion before departing for WWE.
