NEO President Tetsuya Koda announced on the NEO blog that he is creating a new championship called the High Speed Championship. I guess the best description is that it's a title for spot monkeys. The title will be awarded on the May 5 Korakuen Hall show. The match will be between Natsuki*Taiyo & Ray (pictured). Not only do those two qualify as spot monkeys but they are very familiar with each other from their days at Gtkn. So what's this about anyway? Well, it's Koda's knee jerk reaction to criticism of the state of joshi puroresu. He recently participated in an article in Kamipro (print version only) about the state of puroresu. Apparently TAJIRI was very critical of the joshi business. One of the things they talked about was how the TNA X Division created a lot of interest in junior heavyweights and high flyers in general in the US and how the Japanese wrestling business needs to inject that kind of excitement again. This is Koda's reaction to that. It's an attempt to inject an X Division style into joshi and to regain some of the excitement of the mid-90s heyday of joshi. He specifically mentioned a 1994 match between Manami Toyota & Kyoko Inoue as his inspiration. Of course part of the problem is no one on the NEO roster is a spot monkey. Koda said he tried to get Tojuki Leon for the championship match (she is on the Apr. 5 High Speed Starting Gate tag team match but that doesn't have anything to do with the title match) but JWP owner Commando Bolshoi turned him down. Like a lot of ideas i see in the joshi business these days, this seems awfully desperate and is unlikely to help much.
I guess I was sleeping when the TNA X Division was creating tons of interest in junior heavyweights and high fliers in the US.
ReplyDeleteThis title seems to be similar to the Sky High title that ARSION used as a secondary belt. What's kind of weird is that hardly anyone on NEO's official roster is appropriate for it. Maybe the injured rookies once they return and get some more experience, but everyone else is too old/too fat/too slow/too sucky.
The TNA X Division has been terribly booked for so long now. Only recently is it showing signs of improvment. Even so it was never a ratings winner on Impact. WWE is the bigger picture of US westling at the moment and we know their take on most cruiserweights. I think WCW's cruiserweight division in its heyday may be a better example.
ReplyDeleteBut since this is NEO I won't get excited. It's 2009 and it's sad how so many of these guys still have their heads in clouds. NEO just needs to go away.