Yvan eht nioj.
MIRAI, the 26-years-old Michinoku Pro Wrestling wrestler, current TJPW International Princess Champion, current JTO Girls Champion, and former member of both Dream Star Fighting Marigold and World Wonder Ring Stardom, had a banner month in January. She wrestled twelve matches in:
- Tochigi Pro Wrestling
- P.P.P. Tokyo
- Tokyo Joshi Pro Wrestling
- LLPW-X
- Michinoku Pro Wrestling
- Ladies Legend Pro Wrestling-X
- SEAdLINNNG
and managed to have four matches ranked in the top 200 matches of January. Naturally, we had to check out MIRAI’s matches as we explore matches that may have gone under the radar in January.
Sareee vs. MIRAI
Tochi Pro Happy New Year & Shinjiro Otani Aid ~ Stand Up Again And Again 2026
January 1, 2026
Cagematch ranking as of 2/1/26: 36
MIRAI came from a judo background and started her wrestling career in Tokyo Joshi Pro, where she wrestled from May 2019 to September 2021. She made her debut in Stardom in January 2022 and was a part of Giulia’s Donna del Mondo faction before leaving it for Syuri’s God’s Eye group. In her two years in Stardom, MIRAI rose to prominence, holding the Goddesses of Stardom Championship, the Wonder of Stardom Championship, and the Artists of Stardom Championship by the age of 24.
Then, MIRAI jumped to Marigold in the initial wave of departures and eventually won the Twin Star Championship with Mai Sakurai. MIRAI left Marigold after 17 months to return to Iwate, her home prefecture, and joined Michinoku Pro, which is based in Iwate, in November. In the complicated world of joshi wrestling politics, this seemed to me like a step to the side, if not a step downward, but MIRAI seemed happy with her choice.
In this new phase of her career, MIRAI wrestled Mayu Iwatani, Jinsei Shinzaki, TAKA Michinoku in Michinoku Pro and Tomoka Inaba and Azusa Inaba in JTO. After winning the JTO Girls Championship from Azusa Inaba on December 28, MIRAI headed into this match against Sareee (still my choice for the best wrestler in the world) ready to show out.
By this point, we know what to expect from Sareee: the match will be a hard-hitting, serious, gritty affair where Sareee and MIRAI will throw their biggest bombs at each other. The crowd started on MIRAI’s side, and Sareee didn’t seem to mind. Rather than locking up at the collar and elbow, Sareee and MIRAI opted to vie for control of each other’s arm. I appreciated that MIRAI showed that she had scouted Sareee by dodging Sareee’s usual running dropkick and stomping on Sareee’s back and neck. Sareee’s also added some new weapons to her war crate, such as the hair toss, which she seems to be reclaiming from the basic WWE Divas moveset, and an arm stretch to her Muta Lock.
Despite her cheerful exterior, MIRAI kept up with Sareee’s focus and intensity. MIRAI targeted Sareee’s neck with a neck twist that, to no one’s surprise, looked a lot better than what Giulia and Charlotte Flair attempted.
Meanwhile, Sareee did her best to wrench MIRAI’s arm out of its socket on this abdominal stretch.
Later, MIRAI’s grunting made it clear that she wasn’t going to let Sareee win the battle on the top turnbuckle, even when Sareee headbutted her, and her determination paid off when she hit Sareee with a superplex that she then leveraged into a facelock. Later still, MIRAI laid into Sareee with some elbow strikes to the neck and face, but they only fired Sareee up to respond in kind. I really enjoyed the look on Sareee’s face as she geared up to smash MIRAI’s collarbone.
That kicked off a game of one-upmanship, and again MIRAI matched Sareee’s intensity, even grabbing Sareee by the jaw to push her back when Sareee stood over MIRAI as she recovered from an elbow strike. Despite all of MIRAI’s gumption, she still ended up at the wrong end of two of Sareee’s dropkicks and a bunch of Sareee’s double stomps. MIRAI persevered and chased down Sareee to grab her for a wheelbarrow suplex, which stunned Sareee for a two count, and a Miramare Shock driver, which still couldn’t finish Sareee. Unfortunately for MIRAI, she ran into Sareee while trying to lariat her and got dumped on her head by Sareee’s backdrop driver, which finished MIRAI off.
The match’s end came too suddenly, but it was still a very entertaining sprint. MIRAI was a great opponent for Sareee, and I hope that we get a rematch soon. MIRAI was impressive because she kept up with Sareee’s pace and energy, which led to some fun interactions, like MIRAI chasing Sareee down to grab her for the wheelbarrow suplex.
Unfortunately, you can no longer watch the show on Wrestle Universe, but you may be able to find it in the Internet wilderness.
Chanyota vs. MIRAI
P.P.P. Happy New Party 2026
January 2, 2026
Cagematch ranking as of 2/1/26: 45
In this new stage of her career, MIRAI made hay while the sun was shining in December 2025 and January 26. She wrestled on
- December 26 and 28 and
- January 1, 2, 4, 7, 10, 11, 13, 18, 24, 25 (twice), and 31.
Wrestling twelve matches in a month, including three sets of matches on back-to-back days, was impressive, and it’s especially so if the output was at a high quality. (For comparison, Mayu Iwatani wrestled eight matches in January, five of which were tag or trios matches. Four of MIRAI’s matches were tag or trios.)
MIRAI was an honorable mention in the 2025 30 Under 30 list, and voter John Carroll highlighted MIRAI’s unusual career trajectory in their blurb. The 29-years-old Chanyota was also an honorable mention, and voter Chris Gascoigne ranked Chanyota in their personal list at #16. In their blurb for Chanyota, Gascoigne wrote, “She has a great presence, has good power and there is room for improvement to become a better wrestler over the next months and years.”
From the outset, Chanyota reminded me of another powerful joshi wrestler, Reika Saiki, the Muscle Idol and former TJPW Princess of Princess Champion. It’s not just because Chanyota and Saiki both wore blue tights and have impressive physiques. They’re similar in presence and personality too, though Saiki came off a little friendlier than Chanyota. There’s wildfire in Chanyota’s eyes.
I expected this to be a battle between powerhouses, similar to another match from January that we’ll cover later. As you would expect from a battle between two strong wrestlers, Chanyota and MIRAI started with a collar and elbow struggle and some shoulder ramming contests. (P.P.P. Tokyo’s handheld camera operator was unsteady, and the footage made me yearn for Kyushu Pro’s high quality production and steady camera operation.)
Later, Chanyota and MIRAI brawled around TOKYOSQUARE in Itabashi, and I wish that they had capped the brawl with a powerslam or something more remarkable than the clubbing blows to the back that they used to tease the count-out. Of course, I have to acknowledge that landing on the hard floor would have sucked; in that case, maybe Chanyota and MIRAI should have chosen to forego the count-out tease?
Back inside the ring, Chanyota and MIRAI proved that I’m just a simple person with simple tastes: I am a fan of two people hitting each other as hard as they could with their elbows on their opponent’s chest. MIRAI’s elbow strike produced a great thud from its on impact on Chanyota’s body.
They wailed on each other for a while to approval from the fans at TOKYOSQUARE and me. Chanyota knocked MIRAI down with a diving shoulder block and, as a powerful wrestler must, paraded with MIRAI in the torture rack before dropping her with a Samoan Drop.
MIRAI mounted a short comeback, but Chanyota did not stay down for long despite MIRAI’s superplex that got some fans to start a “Holy shit” chant. (Chanyota’s avalanche Samoan drop later got those same fans to repeat their chant.) Back on even footing, MIRAI and Chanyota launched lariats at each other with Chanyota coming out on top after a very pretty running lariat, which got her a two-count.
MIRAI then got to show off her submission grappling, which she wasn’t able to do against Sareee. I appreciated the struggle that Chanyota demonstrated in her fight to survive MIRAI’s hold and that MIRAI didn’t just give up on the hold.
From here, MIRAI and Chanyota shifted the match to its next gear as they threw their highest powered offense at each other. MIRAI landed a wheelbarrow suplex (that did not look as tight as it did in the Sareee match), so Chanyota cut her off with a flying lariat. MIRAI landed a bridging German suplex, and Chanyota escaped MIRAI’s attempt at the Miramare Shock driver and countered it with the Erotic Hammer. When Chanyota started to lift her, I had hoped that she would use a Jackhammer, so I was pleased to see Chanyota go for it.
It still wasn’t enough to put MIRAI down. Instead, MIRAI plopped Chanyota down with a fast Death Valley Driver. Chanyota burned her meter and got up at the one count, so MIRAI blasted her with a couple of lariats to put Chanyota down for three.
That was rad.
There are small gripes, like how loose MIRAI’s bridging German suplex was, how the brawl in the crowd didn’t have a climax, or how the camerawork was shaky enough to be headache-inducing. The headline is that Chanyota and MIRAI had a really entertaining slugfest. MIRAI was able to show aspects of her wrestling that she didn’t get to show the day before against Sareee, and Chanyota made a strong impression. I’ll have to keep tabs on her after this match.
You can watch this match on P.P.P. Tokyo’s YouTube page if you are a subscriber.
Arisu Endo (c) vs. MIRAI
TJPW Tokyo Joshi Pro ’26
January 4, 2026
Cagematch ranking as of 2/1/26: 39
MIRAI last challenged for the International Princess Championship at TJPW Positive Chain in 2021 against Yuki Kamifuku, which was practically a whole career ago for MIRAI. So, two days after the rough-and-tumble with Chanyota, MIRAI returned to TJPW to challenge the 27-years-old Arisu Endo, the ninth longest reigning International Princess Champion, for the title. (Alex Windsor was the secret power in women’s wrestling in 2025, so it should not be a shock to learn that her power extended as far back as 2022, when she was also the International Princess Champion for 92 days.)
MIRAI and Endo last battled in a singles match in February 2021; MIRAI was still going by Mirai Maiumi at the time, and it was so long ago that it’s practically irrelevant to who MIRAI and Endo are in 2026. Nonetheless, I appreciated that TJPW included footage from that match to place this match in context of where these two wrestlers were and where their journeys have led.
At 5’4″ tall and billed at 132 pounds, MIRAI is no hulking monster. (She’s shorter than Chanyota, who’s 5’5″, for instance. Compared to Chihiro Hashimoto, who’s billed at 5’2″ and 194 pounds, MIRAI would seem almost dainty.) Nonetheless, she towered above Endo, who is 4’11” tall. These physical differences dictated a different match template than what MIRAI had wrestled so far in 2026. Whereas she could play the underdog who stood blow for blow against Sareee and play the more experienced powerhouse against another powerhouse in Chanyota, MIRAI would be slotted to play the monstrous challenger against Endo. In theory, Endo would have to dodge MIRAI’s offense in order to survive and find a weakness to exploit against MIRAI in the hopes of keeping her title.
To emphasize her otherness to this TJPW crowd at Korakuen Hall, MIRAI was accompanied in her entrance by Manabu “Manjimaru” Murakami and Kenichi “Ken45°” Sakai, two Michinoku Pro wrestlers. The sight of two male wrestlers appearing at a TJPW show was shocking.
Like in the Sareee match, MIRAI and Endo started by attacking each other’s arm with arm wringers. The difference here was that MIRAI and Endo sped through that sequence, emphasizing their speed over the intensity of the encounter. This made the movements feel more choreographed; if one were to create a production triangle for professional wrestling, we’d probably replace “Time, Quality, and Money” with something like “Speed, Verisimilitude, and Tightness.”
Given that MIRAI was bigger than Endo, she couldn’t land her offense with the same force that she could use against Sareee and Chanyota to preserve Endo’s health and safety. For example, her shoulder block on Endo seemed much less impactful than the charges she used against the other opponents. To my surprise, Endo tried to engage MIRAI on MIRAI’s terms, standing to exchange blows with MIRAI rather than hitting and running. Then, she switched it up on MIRAI while they were jockeying for positioning for a lariat.
MIRAI changed tactics and slowed the match down while Endo switched to wrestling defensively, rolling a charging MIRAI into a pin and attempting to trip her with a backslide into a pin. MIRAI continued to focus on Endo’s back with an Alpamare Water Slide, but Endo still had enough in the tank to block MIRAI’s lariat, flip her over with a suplex, and sap her strength with a Camel Clutch. Endo realized that she could target MIRAI’s back, and she capitalized on this when MIRAI exposed her back while failing to lift Endo for the Miramare Shock. Endo kicked MIRAI in the back and tried to lock MIRAI in the Camel Clutch. MIRAI had to crash her head on to the bottom rope to force Endo to break the hold.
Despite her back pain, MIRAI went back on the offensive with a wheelbarrow suplex. Now that I’ve seen MIRAI try the wheelbarrow suplex several times, I think I that the move’s setup’s a little too complicated, but the suplex itself looked impactful.
Endo, still trying to stand toe to toe with MIRAI, went to hoist MIRAI to her shoulders, but that just gave MIRAI a chance to slip out and pick Endo up for a Death Valley Driver. After staggering Endo, MIRAI made her one good shot at Endo count by wrecking her with a lariat for the victory.
I preferred the Sareee and Chanyota matches to this one, but it was good to see MIRAI adapt her hard-hitting style to meet where Endo was. Endo tried a couple of different gameplans, standing to fight MIRAI before switching to exploit MIRAI’s back injury since it synergized with her Camel Clutch. Instead, that allowed MIRAI to call on her strength advantage and land devastating blows on Endo. One must wonder how the other TJPW wrestlers and fans felt about MIRAI returning to TJPW after years away in Stardom and Marigold to win the championship that she couldn’t in her first run with the company. As JamieOD pointed out, MIRAI became the first person to have held a title in Stardom, Marigold, and TJPW.
You can watch the show and the match on Wrestle Universe.
MIRAI & NORI vs. Miku Kanae & Rin
LLPW-X Hono Emaki ~ Shinshun Tatakai Hajime
January 7, 2026
Cagematch ranking as of 2/1/26: 36
After its dormancy during the lockdown period of the COVID-19 pandemic, Ladies Legend Pro Wrestling, Rumi Kazama and Shinobu Kandori’s offshoot from Japan Women’s Pro Wrestling, returned in 2022. LLPW-X held only one show in 2022 and 2023, but it ramped up its output to two shows in 2024 and six shows in 2025. Recently, Sareee shared footage of her visit to LLPW-X’s training school and asked Kandori to appear at Sareee’s 15th anniversary show. So, LLPW-X seems to be readying itself to re-enter the conversation about joshi wrestling.
Since Kandori and MIRAI shared a judoka background, it made some sense that MIRAI found her way to LLPW-X too. Here, MIRAI teamed with the 27-years-old NORI, aka Rina, which will definitely not cause any confusion with Stardom’s Rina or even Rin, her opponent in this match. NORI began her wrestling career in April 2017 in Ice Ribbon, but she stepped away in November and wouldn’t return until 2023. In parallel to her wrestling career, NORI also had a mixed MMA career, accruing a 6-7 record between 2015 and 2024 per Sherdog. NORI participated in Marigold’s DREAM STAR Grand Prix in 2024, where she scored wins over Kouki Amarei, Chika Goto, and Natsumi Showzuki; she wrestled MIRAI in that tournament to a draw.
Miku Kanae was 25-years-old, and she began wrestling in 2022 with Actwres girl’Z. After a pitstop in SEAdLINNNG, she wrestled in Ice Ribbon in 2024 and even wrestled in DEADLOCK Pro’s first show in Japan against Miyuki Takase. Late in 2025, she teamed with Sareee to wrestle in the Stardom’s Goddesses of Stardom tournament, scoring wins against Rian & Waka Tsukiyama, Akira Kurogane & Bozilla, Osita & Teotleco, and Natsupoi & Saori Anou. During the tournament, she also challenged YUNA for the Sendai Girls Junior title. In 2025, she expanded her profile by wrestling in OZ Academy, ZERO1, WAVE, and Marvelous.
Rin (Kadokura) was a 32-years-old wrestler who began her career in 2016 with Marvelous. She bounced around the secondary joshi companies (Marvelous, WAVE, Sendai Girls, Diana, SEAdLINNNG, Ice Ribbon, and PURE-J), and she was Aja Kong’s first round opponent in AEW’s World Women’s Title Eliminator Tournament in 2021. She teamed with Mayu Iwatani to wrestle in the 2021 Goddesses of Stardom tournament and scored wins against Maika & Syuri, Ruaka & Starlight Kid, and Lady C & Waka Tsukiyama. EVE also brought her to England in 2022 to wrestle Yuu and Maria in Wrestle Queendom 5.
NORI leaned into her MMA experience by demonstrating a cool roundhouse kick in her introduction, and she used her height advantage to plaster Kanae with some kicks to open the match. We got the usual standoffs that paired NORI with Kanae and MIRAI with Rin. MIRAI combined the collar-and-elbow battle from her Chanyota match with the arm and wrist control battle from her Sareee match, and I really enjoyed how MIRAI used the ropes and turned the table on Rin.
Rin tagged out to Kanae, and I also enjoyed how MIRAI used her size advantage against Kanae in an inventive way.
NORI, meanwhile, preferred to kick her opponents as hard as she could.
MIRAI showed some creativity again by tossing Kanae from the side headlock six consecutive times before trying for a pinfall. It was a unique use of a basic wrestling move to make it impactful.
She then went for the pin on Kanae three consecutive times, pinning Kanae a little differently each time, which won a ton of points with me. NORI also won a ton of points with me when she stomped on Kanae’s outstretched hands while she was stuck in MIRAI’s single leg crab. It was petty, nasty, and spiteful, and I respected it as a way of stopping Kanae from reaching the ropes to break MIRAI’s hold.
Kanae was valiant in the face of the beating she took from NORI and MIRAI, hitting a dropkick here and pushing back with elbow strikes there to build the heat for Rin’s tag. When it came, Rin’s hot tag sequence wasn’t particularly explosive, but it did the job of flipping the match’s momentum. My interest flagged when Rin was in control of NORI, though NORI got me locked back in when she tenderized Rin’s chest with many kicks. Rin responded by battering NORI with elbow strikes, but she couldn’t press her advantage because NORI cut her down with an enziguri.
NORI and Rin each awkwardly retreated to their respective corners to tag in their partners, and the match’s pace picked up again. MIRAI and Kanae each whiffed on a dropkick before Kanae hit a five dropkick combo and locked MIRAI in with a variation of the Rings of Saturn. The match broke down slightly as NORI and MIRAI tried to double team Kanae, but Rin was able to knock them down with a double lariat. That brought the match back to just MIRAI and Kanae, and while Kanae got some close pinfalls on MIRAI, MIRAI just kept coming for Kanae with her wheelbarrow suplex and Samoan Drop. Kanae would not stop either, fighting for every inch to break MIRAI’s submission hold on her with her outstretched foot.
I thought the match was over after Kanae popped up from MIRAI’s back suplex to drop MIRAI with a German suplex. That was Kanae’s last burst, and MIRAI walloped Kanae with a lariat and planted her with the Miramare Shock. To my surprise, Rin popped back into the match to break MIRAI’s pin, which caused NORI to return and kick Rin in the head again. With Rin dispatched, NORI kicked Kanae again, and MIRAI pinned her after one more lariat.
The ending felt anticlimactic, and the match felt like it dragged when Rin was in the ring. I liked that NORI seemed to draw a nastier side out of MIRAI; since they were positioned to be subtle heels, we got to see MIRAI play the bully in a way that she didn’t against Endo. NORI also played the bully well, and her kicks looked painful. Kanae was really impressive as the resilient face; she took a great beating from MIRAI and NORI, and her comebacks always felt energetic and fiery.
You can watch the match on LLPW-X’s YouTube page.
Hiroyo Matsumoto (c) vs. MIRAI
SEAdLINNNG Shin-Kiba Series 2026 Vol. 1
January 13, 2026
Cagematch ranking as of 2/1/26: 13
Because MIRAI chose to leave national touring companies like Stardom and Marigold and opted to wrestle in the promotion in her home prefecture, one might think that MIRAI might have been sick of being a road warrior in Japan. Instead, MIRAI has traveled even more intensely since leaving Marigold, zipping from Takizawa and Sendai in northern Japan to Tokyo. One of those stops in her very busy January was Shin-Kiba 1st RING in Tokyo, where she challenged Hiroyo Matsumoto for the SEAdLINNNG Beyond the Sea title in a first round match in SEAdLINNNG’s Saikyo Tournament.
Hiroyo “Lady Destroyer” Matsumoto should require no introduction. She’s been in the game for 19 years, and if wrestler want to fight her, they fight can these tears (What) because she puts in work and it’s all for the kids. The list of singles, tag team, and trios titles that Matsumoto has held over the years is too long to mention, so suffice it to say that she is one of the great joshi wrestlers of her generation. Unlike Meiko Satomura, Matsumoto didn’t get sucked into the sports entertainment retirement vortex after participating in the 2018 Mae Young Classic. With Nanae Takahashi and Satomura at rest in retirement, she, Aja Kong, DASH Chisako, Emi Sakura, and Jaguar Yokota (who still wrestles occasionally at 64 years old) may be the remaining active joshi legends of their generations. (I hope I’m not forgetting someone painfully obvious.)
From the opening lock-up, Matsumoto smartly targeted MIRAI’s arm to try to neutralize her lariat, but MIRAI used the same trick that she used on Rin to reverse Matusmoto’s elbow lock. After they each showboated a little, as a treat, they butted each other’s shoulder. MIRAI’s attempts to bowl Matsumoto over with her shoulder block formed the metaphor for the match; MIRAI was not just trying to beat Matsumoto, but she’s also trying to beat the history that Matsumoto represented. Matsumoto could stand with her feet planted because she had cemented her legacy; MIRAI, as the younger wrestler, still had to hustle to take Matsumoto down.
Chanyota presented MIRAI with a contemporary who was about as strong as she was, but Matsumoto presented a different style of powerhouse wrestling because she had experience on her side. Though I didn’t love the setup since it required MIRAI to hold herself in in the corner for Matsumoto’s charge, I could also see it that as Matsumoto using the ring to her advantage in a way Chanyota, Endo, and even Sareee didn’t.
Matsumoto followed the charge with a stalling suplex and slowed the match down, daring MIRAI to prove her mettle in a chop battle. MIRAI turned the tide with a missile dropkick and made the best of a missed jump onto the ropes in the corner by pretending that her leg hurt. MIRAI tried to end the match quickly a couple of times with the Miramare Shock, but Matsumoto blocked it each time and made MIRAI pay for her hastiness.
Matsumoto regained control with a crushing lariat and assaulted MIRAI with a bunch more short lariats before crushing her with a kneedrop from the middle rope. She tried to pop MIRAI’s lid with a headlock on the mat, and I respected how tight that headlock looked.
With the crowd behind her, MIRAI tried to start her comeback with a Samoan drop. She opted to get into another slugfest with Matsumoto, and Matsumoto proved her veteran savvy again by using her reach advantage to grab the back of MIRAI’s head on her swings to block her elbow strike.
MIRAI kept going back to elbow strikes to try to prove a point to herself and to Matsumoto, and it was enough to draw Matsumoto in to chase when MIRAI created space for a running lariat. MIRAI used Matsumoto’s momentum to bring her to the ground for her Rings of Saturn + Stretch Muffler variant. Matsumoto survived the hold; a Death Valley Driver only got MIRAI a one count, and the Miramare Shock only got a two count. Low on options, MIRAI tried a German suplex and her lariat, but Matsumoto countered them and riposted with big lariats of her own, including that made me raise my eyebrows. Though the crowd was behind her, MIRAI could not reach refuge in the ropes and instead got dumped on her head again by another, slightly less wince-inducing backdrop driver than the one in the Sareee match.
The match’s closing was high octane and full of the stiff violence that made high level joshi matches spectacular. It provided yet another role for MIRAI to play in the match, and she aced the assignment. Matsumoto was intense and engaging in her no-nonsense brutality. This was solid and an easy recommendation.
You should be able to watch the match on SEAdLINNNG’s streaming service soon.
We’ve learned that MIRAI is a highly versatile wrestler who can play many different roles. Do you need her to be a plucky challenger? Do you need to play the bully? Do you need her to be stiff with her opponents, or do you need her to be a little gentle? She’s able to do all of that and deliver an engaging sense of intensity and seriousness. Her war crate is entertaining and creative, and she can emote well when she needs to convey pain and suffering.
Since we’ve seen a number of wrestlers under the age of 30, let’s continue to build the list.
1. Sareee
2. MIRAI
3. Jet Wei
4. Miku Kanae
5. Chanyota
6. Arisu Endo
7. Kodai Nozaki
8. Kohei Kinoshita
9. Kuro
10. NORI
Next time: “Friday night, they’ll be dressed to kill
Down at Dino’s Bar and Grill
The drink will flow and blood will spill
And if the boys wanna fight, you better let ’em”
– Thin Lizzy, “The Boys Are Back in Town”
We took our time to admire the fine work that MIRAI did in January. However, the boys are back in town, and it’s time to see them fight.
