Michael Dante (wrestler)

Michael Dante is an Dutch professional wrestler currently working as a freelancer.

He is best known for his time in Westside Xtreme Wrestling (wXw), Progress Wrestling and Combat Zone Wrestling (CZW), but also for his tenures with various promotions from the European independent scene.

Dante made his professional wrestling debut at FCW Open Air Onslaught, an event promoted by Freestyle Championship Wrestling on June 13, 2004, under the ring name of Anthony Zeus, where he defeated Jason Seth in singles competition.

In the first couple of years of his career, Dante also competed in promotions such as Pro Wrestling Holland, Flemish Wrestling Force, Dutch Pro Wrestling and many others.

Between 2005 and 2018, he shared a long-term tenure with the German promotion Westside Xtreme Wrestling (wXw), after which he returned to the Dutch promotions where he currently performs, being less active than in his primal years.

Dante made his debut in Westside Xtreme Wrestling at wXw Full Force III on May 27, 2005, where he teamed up with Tommy End in a losing effort against The Hellvetics (Jamie Gardner and Steve Allison).

During his time in the company, Dante won the wXw World Tag Team Championship on two separate occasions alongside "Summerian Death Squad" tag team partner Tommy End.

First, they succeeded at CZW Back In Germany on October 1, 2011, by defeating The Wanderers

(Jason Hendrix and Jay Skillet).

In BJW, he made his debut at BJW Pro-Wrestling Festival In Sapporo on October 9, 2011, where he teamed up with Tommy End to defeat Yankee Two Kenju (Isami Kodaka and Yuko Miyamoto).

Dante competed in the 2011 edition of the Saikyo Tag League where he teamed up with End and placed themselves in the block A of the competition in which they scored a total of six points after going against the teams of Jun Kasai and Jaki Numazawa, Daisuke Sekimoto and Yuji Okabayashi, Abdullah Kobayashi and Masashi Takeda, Shadow WX and Kankuro Hoshino, and Shinya Ishikawa and Ryuichi Kawakami, failing to qualify for the finals.

At New Year's Eve Pro-Wrestling 2012, Dante and End competed in a Gauntlet match won by Get Wild (Takao Omori and Manabu Soya) and also involving the teams of From The Northern Country (Antonio Honda and Daisuke Sasaki), The Brahman Brothers (Brahman Shu and Brahman Kei), Menso-re Oyaji and Golden Pine, Speed Of Sounds (Tsutomu Oosugi and Hercules Senga), Team Dream Futures (Shigehiro Irie and Keisuke Ishii) and Abdullah Kobayashi and Sanshiro Takagi.

One of them is the Shortcut To The Top in which he made his first appearance at the 2013 edition held at wXw Broken Rulz XIII where he competed in the traditional battle royal disputed for the number one contendership for the wXw Unified World Wrestling Championship won by John Klinger and also involving various notable opponents such as Axel Dieter Jr., Axel Tischer, Da Mack, Doug Williams, Karsten Beck and many others.

Next year, Dante competed in the same battle royal, this time held under a 25-person format won by Big Daddy Walter and also involving Absolute Andy, Ivan Kiev, Sasa Keel and others.

At a house show from January 2, 2013, Dante and End unsuccessfully challenged Isami Kodaka and Yuko Miyamoto for the BJW Tag Team Championship.

Dante shared brief tenures with several of the promotios from the British independent scene such as International Pro Wrestling: United Kingdom, Insane Championship Wrestling and Revolution Pro Wrestling.

Dante unsuccessfully competed for the wXw Shotgun Championship at wXw 14th Anniversary Tour: Fulda on November 29, 2014, against reigning champion John Klinger.

Dante competed in several of the promotion's signature events.

In ICW, Dante won the ICW Tag Team Championship on one occasion alonsgide Tommy End at ICW Still Smokin on March 30, 2014, by defeating The Bucky Boys (Davey Boy and Stevie Boy) and The New Age Kliq (BT Gunn and Dickie Divers) in a three-way ladder match to win the vacant titles.

At the 2015 edition of the event, in the same battle royal, he unsuccessfully competed against winner Grado and the likes of Jurn Simmons, Laurance Roman, Lucky Kid, Marius Al-Ani, Marty Scurll, Sha Samuels, The Rotation and others.

He made his debut at PROGRESS Chapter 18: The Show We Can't Call PROGRESSleMania For Legal Reasons on March 22, 2015, where he teamed up with Tommy End and defeated Sweet Jesus (Chuck Mambo and Pastor William Eaver) to become the number one contenders for the PROGRESS Tag Team Championship.

Two months on the second night of PROGRESS Chapter 19: Super Strong Style 16 Tournament Edition 2015 from May 25, Dante and End succeeded in winning the titles by defeating the reigning champions The Origin (El Ligero and Nathan Cruz).

They dropped the titles at PROGRESS Chapter 23: What A Time To Be Alive! on November 29, 2015, to Ligero and Cruz in a three-way tag team match also involving The London Riots (James Davis and Rob Lynch).

Secondly, they won the titles on the first night of Superstars Of Wrestling III from April 22, 2016, by defeating Cerberus

(Ilja Dragunov and Robert Dreissker).

At PROGRESS Chapter 27: The Lost Art Of Suffering on March 27, 2016, Dante teamed up with Tommy End in a loser unit must disband match in which they fell short to The London Riots (James Davis and Rob Lynch).

Dante and End would only retire their tag team of "Sumerian Death Squad" one month later at wXw More Than Wrestling Tour 2016: Finale on June 4, 2016, to form the new stable of "Legion" as they teamed up with stablemate Mikey Whiplash to drop the wXw World Tag Team Championship to Cerberus (Dirty Dragan, Ilja Dragunov and Julian Nero) in a freebird rule six-man tag team match.

Dante competed in the inaugural tournament of the Progress Atlas Championship where he placed himself in the block B of the competition in which he scored a total of two points after competing against Joe Coffey, Rampage Brown an Damian O'Connor, failing to qualify for the finals.

As for IPW:UK, Dante and End competed as a tag team in several bouts, scoring their last performance at IPW:UK Royale Rewards 2016 on July 8, 2016, where they defeated War Machine (Hanson and Ray Rowe).

Dante wrestled his last match in wXw at the 2018 edition of the Shortcut To The Top where in the traditional battle royal he faced the likes of the winner Bobby Gunns, David Starr, Emil Sitoci, Oliver Carter, Timothy Thatcher and many others.

Due to wXw's business partnerships with various promotions, Dante shared a brief tenure with Progress Wrestling as a developmental talent sent by wXw.

Dante wrestled his last match for the promotion at PROGRESS Chapter 72: Got Got Need on June 24, 2018, where he unsuccessfully challenged Doug Williams for the Atlas title.

On a three-year span, Dante sporadically competed in several promotions of the Japanese independent scene as a wXw talent, mainly due to the promotion's cross-over events hosted alongside Big Japan Pro Wrestling and Combat Zone Wrestling.