Tag: DDT

DDT 1/5/24 Results

DDT began their January 2024 tour, SWEET DREAMS! 2024, today with a house show in Tokyo.

Today’s event was held at Shinjuku Face in Tokyo and can be watched on demand on WRESTLE UNIVERSE.

The announced paid attendance was 255.

Match 1: Takao Soma & Kazuma Sumi beat Kazusada Higuchi & Illusion. Soma pinned Illusion after Perfect Driver.

Match 2: Yukio Sakaguchi & Hideki Okatani beat Danshoku Dieno & Makoto Oishi. Okatani beat Oishi with a transformed dragon sleeper.

Match 3: Jun Akiyama, Yoshitatsu & Yukio Naya beat Akito. Yuki Iino & Rukiya. Naya pinned Rukiya.

Match 4: HARASHIMA beat Kazuki Hirata & Toru Owashi in a 3-way by pinning Hirata. Afterwards, Disaster Box officially disbanded.

Match 5: Daisuke Sasaki & KANON beat Tetsuya Endo & Yusuke Okada. Sasaki beat Okada with a crossface. Afterwards, Sasaki continues his efforts in recruiting Endo to join DAMNATION TA, but Endo refused. That led to a heel beatdown until Yuki Iino made the save and then joined Burning.

Main Event: Masa Takanashi, Antonio Honda, Takayuki Ueki, Mecha Mummy & Takeshi Masada beat KO-D 10-Man Tag Team Champions Yoshihiko, Shunma Katsumata, Toi Kojima, Yuni & Yuki Ueno to win the titles. Takanashi, Honda, Ueki, Mummy & Masada become the 9th KO-D 10-Man Tag Team Champions. Honda pinned Katsumata. Yuni was a late replacement as interim champion for the absent MAO (flu).

The next event is tomorrow at 176BOX in Osaka. There will be no live broadcast.

DDT News: MAO Absence Update

Following up on MAO being absent from DDT’s 1/3 event with a possible fever, it has now been revealed he will be out through the rest of this week’s events. Flu. That means MAO is also off a scheduled KO-D 10-Man Tag Team Championship defense tomorrow. The match will go on, however, with Yuni as an interim replacement for the champs. He will also miss events on 1/6 & 1/7. That means the earliest he could return is 1/14 at Tsurumi Fruit & Vegetable Market in Kanagawa, but he should be good to go for a DDT Universal Championship defense on 1/21.

More as it becomes available.

BREAKING: Japan Promotions Return To The Collective In 2024

In a social media post from US promotion Game Changer Wrestling moments ago announcing The Collective, their WrestleMania weekend series of independent events in Philadelphia, PA, there are currently 2 events from Japanese promotions on the lineup: DDT on 4/4 at 8 PM ET and Tokyo Joshi Pro on 4/5 at 11 AM ET (not the best timeslot for them because that is a Friday morning). There was one timeslot left open because one interesting item was perhaps omitted from the lineup-Stardom. They apparently have a 4/4 event at 2300 Arena fka ECW Arena planned according to Stardom’s official English Twitter. That being said, The Collective has a 2:30 PM ET 4/6 event that will be announced tomorrow, so…perhaps?

More as it becomes available.

DDT 1/3/24 Results (Updated)

DDT wrapped up the D KING GP 2023 and kicked off their 2024 today with a big year-opening event.

Today’s event was held at Korakuen Hall in Tokyo and can be watched on demand on WRESTLE UNIVERSE in Japanese. Kenta Kobashi & SKE48 member Marika Tani were guests on commentary.

The announced paid attendance was 1194, a super full house/very near sellout. Also their best Korakuen number in a long time as they normally use a smaller configuration.

During the opening wrestler entrance ceremony, Yoshitatsu, who just left All-Japan Sunday, appeared and announced he will be participating full time in DDT starting Friday.

Match 1: Daisuke Sasaki, MJ Paul & KANON beat Takao Soma, Shota & Yuni. KANON beat Soma with Cobra Twist 2.0. Shota was a last-minute replacement for Yuki Iino, who was removed from the match as a last-minute replacement in another match for the absent MAO (fever). Afterwards, Sasaki & KANON issued a KO-D Tag Team Championship challenge to Soma & Shota. That match will happen on 1/21 at Club Shinagawa eX in Tokyo.

Match 2: Makoto Oishi & Jun Akiyama beat Yusuke Okada & Kazuma Sumi. Oishi beat Sumi with a Fujiyama knee lock.

Miu Watanabe (Tokyo Joshi Pro) appeared to promote tomorrow’s (tonight US time) TJPW event .They then introduced Tsubasa Suzuki, aka Mother Con Kid, who will debut om 3/17. However, he is an intern and will continue as such so there is no guarantee he will become a full-time member, that decision will come in a few months.

Match 3: Shunma Katsumata Return Match: Shunma Katsumata & Toi Kojima beat Yukio Sakaguchi & Hideki Okatani. Kojima pinned Okatani after a deformed face buster.

Match 4: HARASHIMA, Toru Owashi & Kazuki Hirata beat Sanshiro Takagi, Akito & Antonio Honda. Hirata pinned Honda. After this, it appears Disaster Box officially disbanded, then Katsumata reappeared to issue a DDT Extreme Championship challenge to Hirata. That match will happen on 1/28.

Match 5: Jun & Rei Saito (All-Japan) beat Kazusada Higuchi & Rukiya. Rei Saito pinned Rukiya.

Impromptu Match: Kuroshio TOKYO Japan beat DDT Iron Man Heavymetalweight Champion The Christmas Tree to win the title. Kuroshio becomes the 1600th Champion.

Which led to…

Match 6: DDT Iron Man Heavymetalweight Champion Kuroshio TOKYO Japan beat Danshoku Dieno to retain the title.

In addition to what All-Japan announced earlier in the day, more crossover matches to be held in DDT were announced: Ryuki Honda & Yuma Anzai will appear on 2/7 and Konosuke Takeshita vs. Yuma Aoyagi will happen on 3/17.

Match 7: Yuki Ueno & Yuki Iino beat Masa Takanashi & Takeshi Masada. Ueno pinned Masada after Jul 2. Iino was a last-minute replacement for MAO.

Main Event: D KING GP 2023 Finals: Yukio Naya beat Tetsuya Endo to win the tournament. First victory for Naya. As a result, Naya will face KO-D Openweight Champion Yuki Ueno for the title on 1/28.

The next event is Friday at Shinjuku Face. Live streaming on WRESTLE UNIVERSE will begin at 2 AM PT/5 AM ET.

UPDATE: In post-match backstage comments, Sanshiro Takagi announced he will take a break from wrestling after the 7/21 event for health reasons. He will continue in his current managerial role for owner CyberFight Corporation.

BREAKING: Yet Another DDT Absence

DDT has just announced a last-minute change for their year-opening event in a few hours…the body count keeps unfortunately rising and the latest casualty is MAO. Fever. He just returned from the US where he defended the DDT Universal Championship Sunday. He was to have teamed with Yuki Ueno to face Masa Takanashi & Takeshi Masada. Yuki Iino is the replacement, but he was to have been in a 6-man tag that was the first match with Takao Soma & Yuno vs. Daisuke Sasaki, MJ Payl & KANON. Shota is the replacement there. MAO should mot miss any more time and hos next totle defense is scheduled for 1/21.

DDT 12/31/23 Results

DDT wrapped up 2023 in Japan with their final event of the year, a 1 day 6-man tag team tournament.

Today’s event was held at Korakuen Hall in Tokyo and will be available on demand on WRESTLE UNIVERSE at a later date. Surprisingly, given it was at Korakuen, there was no live broadcast.

The announced paid attendance was 778.

6-Man NYE Tag Tournament Round 1:
Match 1: HARASHIMA, Koji Sekifuda & Yuji Hino beat Takeshi Masada, Akira & Koji Iwamoto. HARASHIMA pinned Masada after Blue Magic Sword.
Match 2: Kazusada Higuchi, Yasufumi Nakanoue & Kyohei Kinoshita beat Takao Soma, Kazumasa Yoshida & Trans-Am*Hiroshi. Kinoshita pinned Hiroshi with a blockbuster hold.
Match 3: Yukio Naya, Hideyoshi Kamiya & Minoru Suzuki vs. Danshoku Dieno, Daichi Hashimoto & Ikuto Hidaka went to a 10 minute time limit draw. Which led to…
Continuation (no time limit, 1 count fall): Yukio Naya, Hideyoshi Kamiya & Minoru Suzuki beat Danshoku Dieno, Daichi Hashimoto & Ikuto Hidaka. Suzuki beat Dieno with a sleeper hold.
Match 4: Tetsuya Endo, Daisuke Sekimoto & Fuminori Abe beat Hideki Okatani, Yuki Ishikawa & Brahman Shu. Abe pinned Shu.

Match 5: Daimonji Sou (?), Ender Kara (?), Leighton Buzzard & Tempesta beat Kazumi Kikuta, Kazuki Hashimoto, Kazuma Sumi & Rukiya. Buzzard pinned Rukiya after a firebird splash. (Completely guessing the winners names based on translations)

6-Man NYE Tag Tournament Semifinals:
Match 6: HARASHIMA, Koji Sekifuda & Yuji Hino beat Kazusada Higuchi, Yasufumi Nakanoue & Kyohei Kinoshita. Sekifuda pinned Kinoshita after Ironman.
Match 7: Yukio Naya, Hideyoshi Kamiya & Minoru Suzuki vs. Tetsuya Endo, Daisuke Sekimoto & Fuminori Abe went to a 15 minute time limit draw. Which led to…
Continuation (same as above): Tetsuya Endo, Daisuke Sekimoto & Fuminori Abe beat Yukio Naya, Hideyoshi Kamiya & Minoru Suzuki. Sekimoto pinned Kamiya after a lariat.

Match 8: Takuya Nomura, Abdullah Kobayashi & Kankuro Hoshino beat Yuki Ueno, Kazuki Hirata & Antonio Honda. Kobayashi pinned Honda.

Main Event: 6-Man NYE Tag Tournament Finals: Tetsuya Endo, Daisuke Sekimoto & Fuminori Abe beat HARASHIMA, Koji Sekifuda & Yuji Hino to win the tournament. Endo pinned Sekifuda after Burning Star Press.

The promotion’s 2024 schedule begins Wednesday with the D KING GP 2023 Finals. Live streaming on WRESTLE UNIVERSE in Japanese will begin at 1:30 AM PT/4:30 AM ET. D KING GP Chairman Kenta Kobashi and SKE48 member Marika Tani will be guests on commentary. The first 3 matches will also be broadcast FOR FREE on YouTube.

Injury Report: One Final Year-End Last-Minute DDT

DDT is surely glad to see 2023 end when it comes to injuries and absences, and they had one more last-minute loss today-Yuya Aoki is now off tomorrow’s year-end event. Fever. He was to have been in a one-day 6-man tag team tournament with Takeshi Masada & Koji Iwamoto. Akira, who is not the former longtime wrestler AKIRA or New Japan’s Francesco Akira, is the replacement.

(Note that although the event is at Korakuen Hall, there will be no live broadcast on WRESTLE UNIVERSE)

DEVELOPING: DDT Title Match In US This Weekend

Although MAO is scheduled to defend the DDT Universal Championship next month in Tokyo, he may not make it there as champion. US independent promotion Circle 6, in a post by MAO in Japanese and translated to English by DDT on the socials, has announced MAO will defend the title against Nate Webb on Sunday in Hollywood, CA. MAO will also participate in the promotion’s 12/30 event in Los Angeles. Tickets may still be available on Circle 6’s website (this will be a 10 PM PT/1 AM ET event with no TV/streaming scheduled).

DDT 12/24/23 Results (Updated)

DDT runs their penultimate event of 2023 today and will finish up the preliminary round of the D KING GP 2023 as well. It’s gotten a little less dramatic because today’s lineup has become decimated by injury and illness and that will affect the tournament, namely Block B-Rei Saito was in a must-win situation today but got gifted a free win because opponent Chris Brookes is out doe to injury/illness (malignant tumor in abdomen). And before a must-win for both that screwed MAO because he now can’t advance to the Final even if he beats Yukio Naya because of tiebreakers (he lost to Saito). So Naya advances if he wins, Saito advances if MAO wins or it’s a draw. Yusuke Okada is also out due to illness and Yuki Ishida, just after coming back from injury, is back on the shelf again long-term. There is plenty of other stuff happening today but the focus is the tournament: In Block A, 4 still have a chance to advance so it almost certainly will come down to tiebreakers after the matches unless the simplest scenario occurs, that’s Kazusada Higuchi winning to advance. But if it’s Yuki Ueno & Daisuke Sasaki tied at the top *should both win and Higuchi lose), things get interesting because their match result was a draw.

Today’s event will be held at Korakuen Hall in Tokyo and can be watched LIVE on WRESTLE UNIVERSE in Japanese. Japanese actor Takumi Momose will be a special guest on commentary. There are 2 title matches although one is for the DDT Iron Man Heavymetalweight Championship, and I think they’ll want to be done in time for viewers to switch over to Tokyo Joshi Pro’s event later today so I anticipate the total running time being 2 1/2 to 3 hours.

Today’s lineup:
Yukio Sakaguchi & Rukiya vs. MJ Paul & KANON
Battle Royal for the DDT Iron Man Heavymetalweight Championship. Participants announced so far: Toru Owashi, Sanshiro Takagi, Kazuki Hirata, Kazuma Sumi, Akito, TBA (open recruitment slots), presumably Great Koji (current champion-supposedly is really Toi Kojima)
Rei Saito vs. Hideki Okatani
KO-D 6-Man Tag Team Champions Jun Akiyama, Danshoku DIeno & Makoto Oishi vs. Masa Takanashi, Antonio Honda & Takeshi Masada for the titles
D KING GP:
Block B: MAO vs. Yukio Naya. Naya advances with win. Otherwise Saito advances
Block A: Daisuke Sasaki vs. HARASHIMA. Sasaki must win
Block A: Yuki Ueno vs. Yuki Iino. Ueno must win
Block A: Tetsuya Endo vs. Kazusada Higuchi. Higuchi advances with win

Refresh this page occasionally for the latest results.

Updates below will begin at 6:30 PM PT/9:30 PM ET.

6:23 PM PT UPDATE: Live updates begin now…

We are LIVE from Korakuen Hall in Tokyo, Japan. Yours hosts are Haruo Murata, Kagehiro Osano and special guest Takumi Momose.

The paid attendance will be announced after the event. The crowd is still filing in but they’re using their usual reduced capacity setup opposite hard-camera and it’s Christmas Eve so that may keep the crowd down (although the Tokyo Joshi Pro event after this is now a legit advance sellout). I’ll estimate it’ll be around 500. (UPDATE: The announced paid attendance was 761, a full house/near sellout)

The matches should begin in about 15 minutes.

The matches begin at 6:33 PM PT.

Match 1: Yukio Sakaguchi & Rukiya vs. MJ Paul & KANON. 30 minute time limit
Result: MJ Paul & KANON beat Yukio Sakaguchi & Rukiya. KANON beat Rukiya with a cobra twist.

Match 2: (At least a 7 man) Battle Royal for the DDT Iron Man Heavymetalweight Championship. Staggered entry. Over the top rope elimination rules in effect. No time limit. Participants (order of entry): Kazuki Hirata, Toru Owashi, Akito, Kazuma Sumi, Sanshiro Takagi, DDT Iron Man Heavymetalweight Champion Great Koji (Toi Kojima), Poison Sawada JULIE
Order of elimination: Akito by Takagi, Sumi by Takagi, Hirata by Takagi, Takagi by JULIE, Kojima by JULIE to win the title, JULIE by Owashi to win the title
Result: Toru Owashi wins to win the title, last liminating Poison Sawada JULIE who beat Great Koji to win the title. JULIE became the 1597th Champion. Owashi becomes the 1598th Champion. And inadvertently left without the title belt so GM IMabayashi had to retrieve it and run after him.

Your new host is Ken Kato for now.

Match 3: Rei Saito (All-Japan) vs. Hideki Okatani. 30 minute time limit
Result: Rei Saito beat Hideki Okatani. Glorified squash.

Match 4: KO-D 6-Man Tag Team Champions Jun Akiyama, Danshoku DIeno & Makoto Oishi vs. Masa Takanashi, Antonio Honda & Takeshi Masada for the titles. 1 Hour time limit
Result: KO-D 6-Man Tag Team Champions Jun Akiyama, Danshoku Dieno & Makoto Oishi beat Masa Takanashi, Antonio Honda & Takeshi Masada to retain the titles. Oishi pinned Honda with a rollup after reversing a rollup. V1 for the champs.

Quick break for GM Imabayashi’s opening-at-mid-event announcements.

D KING GP 2023 Block B: Rei Saito beat Chris Brookes by forfeit (withdrawal-injury).

Match 5: D KING GP 2023 Block B; MAO vs. Yukio Naya. If Naya wins, he wins Block B and advances to the Finals. If MAO wins or it’s a draw, Rei Saito advances. 30 minute time limit
Result: Yukio Naya beat MAO. As a result, Naya wins Block B and advances to the Finals. Naya had the tiebreaker over Saito by winning their match. He will face the Block A winner on 1/4/24.

Match 6: D KING GP 2023 Block A: Daisuke Sasaki vs. HARASHIMA. Sasaki must win. 30 minute time limit
Result: HARASHIMA beat Daisuke Sasaki. Sasaki is OUT. That means Yuki Ueno can now win Block A with a win AND Kazusada Higuchi loss.

Match 7: D KING GP 2023 Block A: Yuki Ueno vs. Yuki Iino. Ueno must win. 30 minute time limit
Result: Yuki Iino beat Yuki Ueno. As a result, the main event winner wins Block A.

Main Event: D KING GP 2023 Block A: Kazusada Higuchi vs. Tetsuya Endo. The winner wins Block A (Endo would have tiebreaker with a win). If it’s a draw, Higuchi wins Block A. 30 minute time limit
Result: Tetsuya Endo beat Kazusada Higuchi. As a result, Endo wins Block A and will face Naya in the Finals.

Afterwards, Naya, who had been watching from one of the entrances, came to the ring to join Endo and GM Imabayashi in the ring. Promo time.

The Final is on 1/3.

After all this, “All I Want For Christmas Is You” by Mariah Carey is played as the roster comes out in Santa outfits, hats and more with goody bags filled with candy and goodies to be thrown into the crowd. Referee Dsiauke Kiso even brings out a small tree. Kazuki Hirata with microphone to deliver Christmas greetings & wishes to the fans. And then he attacked Toru Owashi with the tree! Which led to…
The Christmas Tree beat DDT Iron Man Heavymetalweight Champion Toru Owashi to win the title. The Tree becomes the 1599th Champion. The entire roster made the pinfall, but the tree was directly on top of Owashi and declared the champion. Takagi with microphone. He said a few year-end words before handing off to Ueno for the KO-D Openweight Champion’s send-off. He had the fans all stand and led the roster in a shout of “Merry Christmas, Thank You!” followed by a 2023 highlight video to end the event with the final sendoff: Thank You To DDT Universe And Have A Happy New Year!

The next event is 12/31 with a year-end 1-day 6-man tag team tournament. There will be no live broadcast (unusual because it’s at Korakuen). Before commentary signed off to end the broadcast, it was announced that SKE48 member Marika Tani will return as a guest on commentary for the 1/3 event.

UPDATE: In post-match backstage comments shared on the socials, Daisuke Sasaki claimed he was going to retire. Maybe in a year. We shall see if anything comes of this.

Injury Report: Another Last-Minute DDT (Updated x2)

It’s that time of the year when nasty stuff really gets going around. It’s also happening in Japan and unfortunately DDT has been forced to make another last-minute card change as they just announced Yusuke Okada is off tomorrow’s (today US time) event. Illness. He was to have been in a battle royal for the DDT Iron Man Heavymetalweight Championship assuming plans didn’t change (you never know because of the 24/7 nature of the title. Probably will be no replacement. Hopefully won’t miss any further events as there is a week until the next event.

UPDATE: Shingles per DDT’s English Twitter. Ugh, that bastion of old age. Out indefinitely.

UPDATE 2: On a related note, they also have announced Hikari Noa is now off tomorrow’s (late tonight) Tokyo Joshi Pro event. The always-vague poor health/physical condition. She was to have teamed with Toga to face Suzume & Arisu Endo. The match is now Toga vs. Suzume and Endo has been added to what was a Mahiro Kiryu vs. Haru Kazashiro match to make it a 3-way.