After another month of great joshi pro wrestling action, it is time once again for the monthly update on the RESURA Joshi Wrestling Fantasy League brought to you by me, Justin Stein. There’s no doubt about it, this has been an amazing start to the year for many of the popular joshi wrestling companies all over Japan, and I don’t see it getting any worse anytime soon.

If you’re reading this, I’m sure you have enjoyed a lot of what you’ve watched, but I’m here to break down some of the numbers behind what you watched.

In league news, first and foremost, we have a new points leader! After being in second place after the first month of the league, Dylan Murray’s team the “Mad Dog Military” has now taken the lead with a really strong month, still led by the dominance of Neo Genesis in STARDOM.

A few of the other teams that were lower down in the standings used the first month’s coverage of the league as a bit of a wake up call, which led to quite a few roster moves. Alex in particular didn’t want to be stuck in last any longer, and made a total of three roster adjustments that has helped propel them up the standings a bit by the end of February. Also we had a singular wrestler go from only two points scored in the first month, to thirty-nine this month for a total of forty-one which is one hell of a jump to say the least.

The details of all of this stuff will be covered below as I talk about each team respectively. Let’s take a look at the current team standings through February 28th.

TEAM STANDINGS

As you can see the standings changed quite a bit. The top two had a good lead on the rest of the pack going into the month of February, and they still have a bit of breathing room from third, but my team “Oedo Tai” surged their way up the rankings to start pulling in those top two teams.

Alex put together one hell of a month, gaining 163 points, which was third best to rocket their way into the top five after sitting in last at the end of January. Xavi’s “Rebel X Run” followed Alex’s team up the standings as well, now finding themselves in sixth place after being ninth going into the month. One of the biggest drops for the month of Ryan Dilbert’s team “God’s Sigh” which fell all the way down to eighth place after being in third at the end of January. After not doing the best in January, Hart Editing’s team “Fart Editing” had another rough month only scoring 96 points during the month of February, which dropped him down to last place in the league.

When it comes to the wrestlers themselves, the big winner this month was Hikari Shimizu who represents PlugPedro’s team “Outlet Wolfpack” who scored 39 points this month on the back of two title wins, and eight match wins in general, which includes five of them being tag team matches. While we all know that Hikari is planning to retire soon, she’s definitely leaving it all out there in the ring and is working a lot of matches.

The second most points for the month for a wrestler was none other than everyone’s favorite evil clown Kaori Yoneyama who scored 32 points in the month of February. Kaori might honestly be one of the hardest working women in the joshi wrestling scene with how many matches she works in a given month, and the amount of wins she’s picked up is definitely quite impressive. Starlight Kid, Miyu Amasaki and Mai Sakurai round out the top five for points scored in February. Miyu Amasaki so far is the highest point scorer in the league after two months with 56 points scored, but Starlight Kid is right behind her with 55 points, making it an interesting race for the top.

For some extra fun facts for the month, there were three wrestlers who tied for first in singles match wins with four, DASH Chiasko, Mai Sakurai, and Meiko Satomura. As you can see Meiko hasn’t been working a lot of matches leading up to her retirement, but the ones she’s wrestled, she’s been winning.

In terms of tag team matches, there was a sole leader for the month which was SAKI who won a total of seven tag team matches for the month. There were seven other wrestlers who tied for second with six tag team match wins including, HANAKO, Hazuki, Koguma, Maika Ozaki, Mayu Iwatani, Rina Yamashita and Sayaka Obihiro. In any given month, it’s expected that STARDOM will run the most shows overall, so it should be no surprise that many of their talents will pick up quite a few tag team victories in a given month.

With SAKI being a freelancer though, she has had the opportunity to wrestle in many different companies which helped her take that top spot in tag team wins. With that taken care of, let’s move onto the breakdown of each team.

POSITION: 1st | TOTAL POINTS: 351 | FEBRUARY POINTS: 169

As mentioned above, Dylan’s team has been led thus far by the strong performance of the three members of STARDOM’s Neo Genesis that he has on his team. It was probably a bit of a surprise to him that Kaori Yoneyama had such a strong month as well, scoring the second most points overall in the league for the month of February. Anytime you have the second and third highest scoring wrestler for the month, you have a good chance at moving up the rankings and that’s just what the “Mad Dog Military” did moving up into the top spot. Maya Yukihi came back for one singular match this month and scored two points for it, but overall I’m sure Dylan will be looking forward to her healing up from her injury because she is normally a wrestler who can rack up the wins on a regular basis.

So far, Kizuna Tanaka has spent the entire time on the injured reserve list, but with her return to the ring in March, there’s hope that she’ll also be able to start picking up some points for the team as well. In the middle of the pack, Sakura Hirota, Hiroyo Matsumoto and MIRAI have offered some balanced points scoring, but nothing too spectacular so far.

CURRENT POINTS – 351

POSITION: 2nd | TOTAL POINTS: 336 | FEBRUARY POINTS: 141

For the second straight month Miyu Amasaki had quite a strong month, leading Scott’s team in points with 26, Miyu is still leading the league in overall points with 56, but now that she has one less title after losing the Future of Stardom recently, it might be hard for her to keep that top spot.

Behind Miyu is the person the team was named after Mayu Iwatani who only scored 15 points this month, but still always has the chance to have a big month as the “Icon” of STARDOM. The young trio of Hanan, Victoria Yuzuki and Seri Yamaoka all scored around the same amount of points just behind Mayu, to add some solid depth scoring this month. After JTO’s Aoi scored zero points in the month of January, Scott dropped her and picked up the new STARDOM rookie Akira Kurogane, but unfortunately she only scored him three points during the month.

On top of that, NORI also scored Scott zero points this month, keeping her total down at two for the year so far. I wonder if he’ll decide to move on from her because of her inactivity in the ring.

CURRENT POINTS – 336

POSITION: 3rd | TOTAL POINTS: 310 | FEBRUARY POINTS: 171

This month was a strong month for my team, with many of my wrestlers picking up quite a few points. While Rina Yamashita was my highest point earning wrestler with 21 points, there were a total of nine wrestlers on the team who scored 10-plus points, which is pretty good for balanced scoring. Miyuki Takase, Hazuki, Hyper Misao and Saya Kamitani rounded out the top five for the team this month, all scoring 16 or more points. After scoring zero points last month, Arisu Endo and Natsu Sumire both scored six this month which definitely helps.

My rookie Yukina Uehara got her first two points of the year as well, which is nice to see from the AWG rookie. Out of all of the teams in the league my team had the most overall points scored, and I owe it to the balanced scoring by many members of the team. Hopefully it continues as I climb my way towards the top of the standings.

CURRENT POINTS – 310

POSITION: 4th | TOTAL POINTS: 299 | FEBRUARY POINTS: 152

Pedro’s “Outlet Wolfpack” had the MVP of the month on his team with Hikari Shimizu scoring a whopping thirty-nine points this month after barely scoring any the month before while coming off of an injury. Unfortunately, the good form will only last another month or two before she retires, but you gotta ride the hot hand while you can.

The next two best performers on his team were quite far behind with both Suzume and HANAKO scoring 14 and 13 points respectively. While none of the team’s wrestlers scored zero points, 10 of them scored in the single digits, which is better than nothing at all, but also not enough to make a big difference as the team tries to climb their way up the rankings. Surprisingly, the lowest scoring member of the team was actually the current Princess of Princess Champion Mizuki with four, but as long as she’s able to retain her championship in her big match against Rika Tatsumi in March, she should score more points this upcoming month.

Pedro will also be looking for a little more from the strong Marigold duo of Utami Hayashishita and Miku Aono who both only scored single digit points in February. Also props to Pedro for picking up Kirari Wakana who has been a really good fit for his team so far since she got picked up early in the month. If the big names on the team start putting together more wins, especially with titles on the line, the “Outlet Wolfpack” will be a force to reckon with in the league.

CURRENT POINTS – 299

POSITION: 5th | TOTAL POINTS: 258 | FEBRUARY POINTS: 163

Alex’s team post draft had a really interesting composition that unfortunately left them with the least amount of points after the first month. Luckily that served as a good wake-up call, because after quite a few changes like dropping Big Haruka and Aja Kong, while picking up the likes of Yoshiko Hasegawa, Kyoko Inoue and Hina things are looking up for the team after month two. So far, the big star for the team has been Manami Katsu who not only leads the team overall in points scored at 41 but also scored the most points for the team in February with 20.

Mari, DASH Chisako, YuuRi and Leon all scored over 15 points for the team during the month, which definitely helped Alex’s team move up the rankings from last up to fifth. After having a strong first month of the season Alex was hoping that Kyoko Inoue would make a big impact for the team, but unfortunately she only scored four points this month, so hopefully she’ll pick it up soon. Hamuko Hoshi and AKINO also only scored seven points combined during February, so Alex will be looking for them to improve, though their lack of matches may hinder that a bit.

All in all, it was a big turnaround for “Alex’s Warbitches,” and it will be interesting to see if they can continue to climb the rankings or if there will be a bit of a regression during the month of March. I asked Alex to comment on their team, and this is what they had to say…

“The OZ core have proved to be a letdown due to Ozaki’s injury and AKINO being paired to lose with Cohaku too much. Some moves will have to be made but a resurgent full-time Hina, top champion Manami Katsu, and Yuki Arai graduating from her idol duties soon should help me fight back.”

CURRENT POINTS – 258

POSITION: 6th | TOTAL POINTS: 256 | FEBRUARY POINTS: 137

Xavi’s “Rebel X Run” team had a bit of a rough start of the season finishing in ninth place after the first month, but with a decent output during February, the team was able to jump up a few spots to number six.

The star by far for the team has been Mai Sakurai who has led the team both months in points, this month scoring a healthy 23 points which was good enough for fifth overall in the league. Yuna Manase, Misa Kagura and SAKI have all been bright spots on the team as well, but just not up to the level of Mai Sakurai. Unfortunately, towards the bottom of the team is Mima Shimoda who still hasn’t scored a single point this year because she’s yet to wrestle a match in 2025. The injured Tsukina Umino also finished with zero points for the month, along with Chika Goto who wrestled quite a bit, but ended up on the losing end of all of her matches. Losing someone like Mio Momono to injury also didn’t help the team, as she was looked at as being a big time player on the team beforehand.

It’s also unfortunate that Chihiro Hashimoto hasn’t really turned it on yet this year, though she seems lined up for the Sendai Girls World Championship soon, which will increase the amount of points gained pretty quickly. This team has a good chance to really blow up if the big names get going, but until then, “Rebel X Run” might be relegated to the middle of the pack.

CURRENT POINTS – 256

POSITION: 7th | TOTAL POINTS: 255 | FEBRUARY POINTS: 120

From position five to nine there’s only a difference of six points, and “Casa Royale” finds themselves right in the middle of it at the moment. February wasn’t exactly kind to the team, but even being behind around 100 points from first place overall is not a terrible thing. Koguma was the top performer from the team this month scoring 20 points, followed by Mei Suruga and Mika Iwata who both scored 15 points.

Unfortunately for Fernando, his first round pick Iyo Sky only scored two points this month, bringing her overall total to just four points, which is a lot less than expected most likely. Natsupoi, Yuki Kamifuku and Saki Kashima all had rough months scoring four or less points during the month of February after having a pretty good first month of the season.

The overall makeup of the team is quite good, but there are certain members that will need to pick it up in March to help the team make their way up the standings. With so many teams so close in overall points, a big month from any of the wrestlers could help the team jump quite a few others, so it will be interesting to see how things play out during the next month.

When I asked Fernando to comment on his team, this is what he had to say…

“The Bear curse lives on as Koguma has been my MVP, scoring the most points for my team. Just below her are two aces who secured a couple of wins overseas as Miyu Yamashita and Mei Suruga were triumphant in Chile and the US, respectively. Natsupoi losing her title was sad, but Mika winning one more than makes it up. Plus, something tells me that Iyo Sky is set for big things in WWE this year.”

CURRENT POINTS – 255

POSITION: 8th | TOTAL POINTS: 255 | FEBRUARY POINTS: 103

After having a strong first month that saw “God’s Sigh” sitting in third place, the team had the ninth worst amount of points scored for the month of February which has landed the team down in eight place after two months. While there are quite a few big name talents on the team, none of them have been scoring the big points that you’d might expect.

The team leader in points for the month was Ryo Mizunami which is understandable, but with only 16 points scored, you’re left looking for a bit more. Shoko Nakajima, Maika and Natsuko Tora were the only three others who scored 10 points or more for the month, which can definitely be blamed for the team’s poor scoring. Someone who would no doubt score quite a few points Haruka Umesaki has been on injured reserve so far this entire season, so with her due back soon, that should help a bit.

Emi Sakura scoring zero points definitely didn’t help though, and the first overall pick in the draft Sareee only scoring two points is no doubt a surprising disappointment for the team.

The secret to success for this team will have to lean on the best wrestlers truly being the best and scoring a lot more points. If that doesn’t happen, then they may find themselves slipping down the rankings even more. When I asked Ryan for a quote about his team, this is what he had to say…

“My no. 1 pick will pay off. My no. 1 pick will pay off. He told himself with manufactured confidence. Sareee has done very little for my squad, but I am holding our hope she has a big spring. I’m very pleased with Chi Chi and Ryo Mizunami who are both nabbing wins in multiple promotions. Haruka Umesaki is coming back too to hopefully help me get closer to the top of the league.”

CURRENT POINTS – 255

POSITION: 9th | TOTAL POINTS: 252 | FEBRUARY POINTS: 109

Dave’s team “TCS 4 Life” has a good overall roster, but so far the team simply hasn’t put it all together for a big month yet.

In February, there were only three members of the team who scored over 10 points, and the surprising leader of that team is the last round pick Sumika Yanagawa who leads the overall team with 34 points and the monthly points with 18 which was top-15 for the month in the league. Kakeru Sekiguchi and Azusa Inaba were the other two who scored over 10 points for the month.

Dave’s first round pick Giulia had a good first month but unfortunately only scored nine points in February, so you know he’ll be looking for a bit more from her. Unfortunately, Mina Shirakawa has been out all month with injury causing her to not pick up points, and Momo Tani also was held off the score sheet for the entire month.

With a lot of his roster being made up of freelancers and smaller promotions, it will be important for them to wrestle more matches to earn those points. Someone from STARDOM for instance you know will have a lot of opportunities each month to pick up points since they run so many shows, but wrestlers outside of that company could either wrestle more or less depending on their bookings, so it’s a bit of a gamble. Hopefully the spirit of Hana Kimura will push these wrestlers forward in the coming month to help Dave’s team move up the standings.

When I asked Dave if he had any comments about his team to share, this is what he had to say…

“TCS 4 LIFE has Giulia leading the way in NXT. But the top performer is actually my final draft pick Sumika Yanagawa, who has been killing it and picking up championships for my team. One of my other MVPs Unagi Sayaka has not been doing so well, dealing with an injury early in the year. But I’m still counting on her to start racking up points later in the year. Still, Tokyo Cyber Squad was always unpredictable and the team hasn’t been picking up points the way I tought we were. Maybe TCS original Konami can help get us back on track. I thoroughly have faith in my unit. Because… Everybody’s different, everybody’s special. That’s Tokyo Cyber Squad. Yes Sir!“

CURRENT POINTS – 252

POSITION: 10th | TOTAL POINTS: 225 | FEBRUARY POINTS: 96

The first month wasn’t exactly great for Hart Editing’s team “Fart Editing” and unfortunately February was even worse causing the team to fall down to last place in the standings, many points behind the next best team.

Unlike a few of the teams ahead of “Fart Editing,” Hart had five wrestlers who scored 10 or more points, but the top of that was Nanae Takahashi who only scored 15f. The likes of Risa Sera, Meiko Satomura, Bozilla and Lady C rounded out that top ten, and all had a pretty good month, just nothing spectacular to help drive the team in the right direction. The big thing that hampered Hart’s team was the fact that there were five members of the team who scored zero points this month, which is not what you’re looking for at all.

YUU was on hiatus the entire time, so that’s excused, but unfortunately someone like Tsukasa Fujimoto has wrestled a match since last August, so her taking a roster spot has hurt this team thus far. Mari Manji was picked up for YUU’s hiatus, but she also failed to pick up any points this month. HIMAWARI normally would get you a few points as a TJPW mainstay, but her injury issues also caused her to come up with the goose egg. The last one who scored zero was Yuka Sakazaki who works for AEW, so you never know how much she’ll actually get used. T

here’s probably some changes that Hart will need to make with his team to improve things, and he’ll also need to get more out of someone like Miu Watanabe who only scored three points this past month. All in all, it’s been a bad start, but it’s still early in the season as we have 10 months still left to go.

Hopefully, Hart will be able to make a few changes to improve things going forward, because if all of the teams end up being somewhat close, it makes for a more exciting league.

CURRENT POINTS – 225

FREE AGENTS

In terms of free agents in the league, there was one wrestler in particular who had a really good month which was Akane Fujita who scored 17 points this month. I wouldn’t be surprised if one of the teams picks her up for the upcoming month.

Yappy and Tokiko Kirihara both scored 13 points this month, which was pretty strong. Sae and Sayaka Obihiro both scored 12 points rounding out the top-five for the free agents available. A few other interesting wrestlers down in the free agents pool is the likes of Rina Amikura who has been working a lot since coming back from her serious knee injury that kept her out for over a year, and Konami who is sometimes used as a big time wrestler in STARDOM, so you know she’ll get booked at least for many matches.

TOP 5 IN OVERALL POINTS (FREE AGENTS)

As you can see, the month of February was kinder to some teams than others, but there were a lot of points scored and a lot of great joshi pro wrestling that we all got to enjoy watching. There are definitely some teams that need to make some adjustments to move up the rankings, but I feel confident that some of the lower teams may use this article as a bit of a wakeup call just like Alex did last month.

It will also be interesting to see if Scott and Dylan continue to lead the way, or if another challenger can get closer to their point totals to attempt to wrestle away the lead in the league.

Tune in next month for the monthly update to see what happens, and make sure to check out all of the awesome members of the fantasy league down below.