Multiple performers from the Japanese wrestling scene retired or announced their retirement this week. Both Dragon Gate and Stardom are set to lose popular and skilled performers in 2020.
In women’s wrestling promotion Stardom, the twenty-two-year-old Hazuki had her last match on December 24, losing a singles match with her Oedo Tai stablemate Natsuko Tora. Later on the same show, faction leader Kagetsu failed to win the World of Stardom Championship from Mayu Iwatani, and her impending retirement was announced soon after. Kagetsu is twenty-seven years old and has been wrestling since 2008, when she dropped out of school to pursue pro wrestling and started training with Meiko Satomura. Her last match will be on January 26, 2020.
https://twitter.com/we_are_stardom/status/1210452829971742720
Speculation abounds as to why these two retired, especially since Hazuki and Kagetsu are friends and retired in such quick succession. The simplest explanation for Kagetsu is a history of neck issues, but there are rumors connected to her position as the Stardom dojo’s head trainer, Bushiroad’s purchase of the company, and confusion around the Stardom hiring former Ice Ribbon wrestler Giulia around the time the joshi promotion’s acquisition by Bushiroad was announced.
On the men’s wrestling side of things, Masato Yoshino announced at Dragon Gate’s December 26 event in Kobe that he will retire this year. Yoshino, 39, started his career in Toryumon at the beginning of the century, remained with the promotion after it became Dragon Gate, and has wrestled for the organization for almost twenty years. He’s also known by wrestling fans outside of Japan for his work in PWG, TNA, and Wrestling Society X.
Yoshino explained that he’s retiring because of, in the words of Dragon Gate’s English Facebook page, “the lingering effects of a neck injury” he suffered in 2017. During his announcement after a main event tag team match, he told the Kobe audience that because of the injury “even now I have numbness in my arm and can’t put any strength into it.”
Yoshino continued:
This is not a sudden decision. It’s something I accepted several years ago. The doctors told me that if I reduce my schedule and change my style I would be able to go for a few more years. But my nickname is Speed Star. A Speed Star that can’t move is not a Speed Star at all. I’ve known that since I chose to wrestle this style.
No date has been set yet for Yoshino’s last match and according to the wrestler, it could be any time in 2020. He tied his announcement in with Dragon Gate’s current storylines to close his speech and told the locker room “There’s no need to hold back. You are more than welcome to come and try and retire me early. I won’t let you do it.”
