DDT Pro-Wrestling

**DDT Pro-Wrestling** (DDTプロレスリング, *DDT Puroresuringu*) or **DDT**, also written as D2T, stands for **Dramatic Dream Team**, which was its official name from 1997 to 2004 is a division of CyberAgent's professional wrestling promotion CyberFight. Founded in March 1997 by Shintaro Muto, DDT was bought by Shoichi Ichimiya until December 2005, when Sanshiro Takagi took over as the new president, who later sold it to CyberAgent, but still retained his position, while Takahiro Yamauchi took over as the new DDT director.

DDT became one of the top names in Japanese indie wrestling by creating a unique Sports Entertainment style with a Japanese puroresu flair to the matches. DDT has had agreements with various MMA and professional wrestling promotions around the world, including Pancrase sub-brand Pancrase MISSION, New Japan Pro Wrestling, Pro Wrestling NOAH, All Japan Pro Wrestling, Consejo Mundial de Lucha Libre, Dragon Gate, Fight Club: Pro, Wrestle-1 and Big Japan Pro Wrestling. DDT runs several sub-brands and offshoots, regularly experimenting with the different ways wrestling can be done and presented. DDT's biggest event is Peter Pan, held each year since 2009.

Since January 2020, DDT became a sister promotion Pro Wrestling Noah (Noah), following CyberAgent's acquisition of the promotion. However, DDT and Noah were merged into a new company, CyberFight in September 2020, but still operated as a division within CyberFight.

## Overview

### History

The promotion was founded by Shintaro Muto, after Muto, Sanshiro Takagi, Kyohei Mikami and Kazushige Nosawa left Pro Wrestling Crusaders. The promotion was named "Dramatic Dream Team", its first event took place on January 31, 1997, in Tokyo. In 1999 DDT started producing pay-per-view digests of its product on DirectTV.

DDT became one of the top names in Japanese indie wrestling by creating a unique Sports Entertainment style with a Japanese puroresu flair to the matches.

The cards' matches tend to be a mixture of Japanese lucharesu (a mix of lucha libre and traditional puroresu), worked shoot-style, hardcore brawling and comedy matches. DDT is in many ways a parody of American pro wrestling, particularly WWE, using over-the-top gimmicks (most notably Danshoku Dino) as well as unique match types including a hardcore match in a campsite (which featured use of bottle rockets as weapons), an "Office Deathmatch" (where the ring was set up to resemble a section of an office building, complete with cubicle walls and computers), and a "Silence Match" (where wrestlers were forbidden to make loud noises, resulting in slow-motion chops and punches and featuring the commentary team speaking in a faux-whisper).

The promotion then established their own governing body in 2000, the King of DDT, shortened as KO-D, creating the KO-D Openweight Championship, Ironman Heavymetalweight Championship and the KO-D Tag Team Championship. DDT also created their own tag team tournament the DDT Tag League. Later in 2003 Shoichi Ichimiya became the new president of DDT. Later in 2004 DDT rebranded to DDT Pro Wrestling kabushiki gaisha renaming the promotion to "DDT Pro Wrestling". In October DDT got a timeslot on Fighting TV Samurai, Japan's premier combat sports channel which shows professional wrestling from both Japan and the United States, creating their regular broadcast program "DDT Dramatic Fantasia".

On December 28, 2005, Ichimiya retired from professional wrestling, in the process, he announced his departure from DDT. This led in January 2006, Sanshiro Takagi taking over the promotion as the new president. Then the company focused on the feud between the face stable Italian Four Horsemen and the heel stable Disaster-Box. Then in November DDT announced the creation of their fourth active title the DDT Extreme Division Championship. Later in 2007, DDT announced a working relationship with Dragon Gate. DDT and Dragon Gate held their first co-promoted show, Dramatic Dream Gate on April 18 in Shinjuku FACE in Tokyo, Japan. Then DDT became a member of the Global Professional Wrestling Alliance. The group was established as a means to aid the many competing wrestling promotions in Japan. In 2009 DDT announced that they were going to become a stock company, turning their industry private to public. In March 2010, DDT announced a working relationship with Big Japan Pro Wrestling. Later in March, the DDT48 (later renamed Dramatic Sousenkyo) program, which is a fan poll where the winner receives a shot for the KO-D Openweight Championship, was started. Later that month, Michael Nakazawa stepped down as the CEO of DDT and Amon Tsurumi became the general manager of the promotion. In 2011 the program of Fighting TV Samurai Indie's Job elected DDT for having the best show the year, winning the Best Box Office Award.

In March 2012, DDT ended their DDT Dramatic Fantasia program. Later on April 2, DDT started to broadcast to NicoNico creating the program "DDT Wrestling Hour". On June 4 DDT formed another sub-brand Tokyo Joshi Pro Wrestling, which was exclusive to women's wrestlers. DDT celebrated its 15th anniversary on August 18, 2012, by holding its first-ever event in Nippon Budokan. On December 23, 2012, DDT announced the creation of its fifth active title, the KO-D 6-Man Tag Team Championship. On January 17, 2013, DDT announced that Daisuke Sasaki had signed a contract to officially make DDT his home promotion, ending his days as a freelancer. On April 17 DDT formed another sub-brand Ganbare☆Puroresu. On May 3 DDT's pay-per-view, Max Bump was broadcasted live by Samurai TV. After that DDT launched an every week program "DDT Pro Wrestling Banzai", which was also broadcasted by Fighting TV Samurai. On November 28 DDT announced a new project named DDT New Attitude which would be another sub-brand of DDT.

On January 14, 2015, DDT opened a women wrestling school with Makoto Oishi and Cherry as instructors. Later DDT announced the creation of their sixth active title, the King of Dark Championship. On June 23 DDT opened the Dropkick Bar which is a professional wrestling, boxing and mixed martial arts-themed sports bar. Professional wrestling personalities make appearances at the bar. On August 17 it was announced that Union Pro would be folding after its 10th anniversary event on October 4. Three days after its folding, Union was replaced by a new promotion named Pro Wrestling BASARA, which launched in January 2016.

In October 2016, DDT announced "DDT Universe", a new streaming service for events held by DDT, DNA, BASARA, Tokyo Joshi Pro, and Ganbare☆Puroresu. The service launched on January 23, 2017. On April 30, 2017 DDT ,announced the creation of their seventh active title, the KO-D 10-Man Tag Team Championship, meant for teams of five wrestlers, the title is believed to be the first of its kind in professional wrestling.

On July 5, 2017, it was announced that DDT had entered into a partnership with Canada's Canadian Wrestling’s Elite promotion. On August 20, it was announced the creation of a new tournament called "D-Oh Grand Prix". On September 1, all of DDT's shares were sold to Japanese Internet advertising company CyberAgent. Sanshiro Takagi remained as the DDT president, while CyberAgent director Takahiro Yamauchi took over as the new DDT director.

On February 17, 2018, DDT announced “DDT LIVE! Maji Manji”, that is a broadcast consisting of six shows between April and May, with the goal of attracting a younger audience by airing live pro wrestling during the prime time schedule. On June 11, it was announced that the DNA sub-brand would be suspended on August 10, only to DDT to focus more on the LIVE! Maji Manji shows, most of the talent in DNA was transferred to the DDT main roster. On September 25, it was announced that DDT would run a show in the United States during WrestleMania weekend as part of the WWNLive Experience.

On January 3, 2019, DDT announced a working relationship with British promotion Fight Club: Pro. On June 11, it was announced Pro Wrestling BASARA would be splitting up from DDT and start its own promotion on January 1, 2020. Five days later, DDT announced they would run Peter Pan at Saitama Super Arena for the first time in the event's history and the third event to be held at that venue for the third time. On December 28, 2019, during the finals of the 2020 D-Oh Grand Prix, DDT Assistant Producer Hisaya Imabayashi announced the creation of the DDT Universal Championship. The title is part of an international expansion plan, which DDT had made public in the months prior to the announcement. Plans had been made in 2019, to expand DDT's international attention in 2020.

In January 2020, following CyberAgent's acquisition of Pro Wrestling Noah, it was announced Noah would become a subsidiary of CyberAgent and Takagi would become DDT and Noah's President and Representative Director, with Takagi focusing on Noah's business side, while the in-ring product would be run by the previous Noah's staff. It was also announced that all Noah's shows would be streamed on DDT's internet streaming service DDT Universe, starting with the finals of the 2020 Global Junior League and both Noah and DDT's television deal would remain the same with Noah being with NTV G+ and DDT at Fighting TV Samurai.

On April 23, it was announced that 2020 Wrestle Peter Pan would be postponed, due to the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, following Japan's declaration of State of Emergency. Afterwards, DDT and their sister promotion, NOAH started to promote shows at an empty TV studio being broadcast on DDT Universe under DDT TV Show! name. On May 12, it was announced that DDT Universe would be renamed **Wrestle Universe** following the inclusion of Pro Wrestling NOAH and other DDT sub-brands including BOYZ. On May 15, DDT announced that they would start to hold shows on videotelephony and online chat platform Zoom, starting with a session with 100 fans on May 15, being the first promotion in the world to promote shows on Zoom. The following day, DDT announced that the Wrestle Peter Pan would be rescheduled to take place on June 6 and June 7, with the event being moved to the DDT TV Show Studio in Tokyo, without an audience and the event would be broadcasted live on AmebaTV and CyberAgent's streaming service Wrestle Universe. On June 21, DDT held their first show with fans in attendance since the Coronavirus pandemic. On July 27, during a press conference, it was announced that DDT and Noah alongside DDT's sub-brands Ganbare☆Puroresu and Tokyo Joshi Pro Wrestling would be merging into a new company, CyberFight, which would go into effect on September 1. Despite the merging, it was announced that both would continue to operate as separate brands within CyberFight similar to WWE's brand extension, while the management of both promotions also remained unchanged. DDT and Noah's president Sanshiro Takagi revealed that the merging of both promotions was a result of the COVID-19 pandemic and the need to streamline costs. Takagi also established a plan to overtake New Japan Pro-Wrestling as the largest promotion in Japan, which would include holding a show at the *Tokyo Dome*.

On May 7, 2021, despite the Japanese government announced an extension to the state of emergency currently in place in Tokyo and other prefectures, DDT announced that they would promote shows with an audience between May 15 and May 30. On March 20, 2022, DDT announced a working relationship with American promotion All Elite Wrestling (AEW) who has already has working relationship with DDT's sister company Tokyo Joshi Pro Wrestling.

On December 15, 2023, DDT was announced as one of the founding members of the United Japan Pro-Wrestling alliance, as part of a joint effort to further develop professional wrestling through promotion and organization, with Seiji Sakaguchi being named as the chairman of the project.

## Broadcasters

**Domestic:**

* Fighting TV Samurai (2004–present, currently broadcasting live specials, retrospective shows and magazine show *DDT Pro Wrestling Banzai*)
* AbemaTV (2017–present, online linear television service, live-streaming episodes of *DDT Pro Wrestling Banzai*)
* Nico Nico Douga (2012-present, currently broadcasting live specials, *DDT Wrestling Hour* streaming untelevised spot-shows and interviews)

**Worldwide**:

* Wrestle Universe (streaming service, broadcasting most DDT shows live, as well as on-demand classic, as well as content from other promotions, beginning with DDT sister promotions Pro Wrestling NOAH, Ganbare☆Puroresu and Tokyo Joshi Pro Wrestling)
* FITE TV (2020–present, streaming service, broadcasting most DDT big shows live, as well as on-demand classic)

## Championships

### Current

#### Tag Team

 KO-D 6-Man Tag Team Championship | Eruption(Hideki Okatani, Saki Akai and Yukio Sakaguchi) | July 23, 2023
 KO-D 10-Man Tag Team Championship | MAO, Shunma Katsumata, Toi Kojima, Yuki Ueno and Shinya Aoki | June 25, 2022

#### Miscellaneous

 O-40 Championship | Makoto Oishi | March 21, 2023

## Events

### Marquee events

* Peter Pan
* Judgement
* Max Bump
* Saitama Super DDT
* Osaka Octopus
* Non-Fix
* God Bless DDT
* Never Mind
* Who's Gonna Top?
* Into The Fight
* Sweet Dreams
* Ultimate Party

### Collaborated events

* Dramatic Dream Gate (with Dragon Gate)
* New Year’s Eve Shuffle Tag Tournament (with Big Japan Pro Wrestling and 2AW)

## Sub-Brands

DDT run several sub-brands and offshoots, regularly experimenting with the different ways wrestling can be done and presented.