Taiyō Kea

Maunakea Mossman (born November 18, 1975) is an American semi-retired professional wrestler, better known under his stage name Taiyō Kea (太陽ケア).

Best known for his work in All Japan Pro Wrestling (AJPW), he is the only wrestler in AJPW's history to have held the Triple Crown Heavyweight Championship, the World Tag Team Championship and the World Junior Heavyweight Championship.

Kea trained with and debuted for AJPW as a junior heavyweight in 1994, and won the World Junior Heavyweight Championship once in 1997, vacating the championship upon his graduation to heavyweight the following year.

Mossman began training 4 days later, and debuted in November 1994 as a junior heavyweight under his real name.

Mossman was pushed as a babyface almost immediately, and defeated Yoshinari Ogawa to win the World Junior Heavyweight Championship in August 1997.

He vacated the title in 1998, after graduating to the heavyweight division.

Upon his graduation, he took part in a series of 7 matches designed to test his mettle as a heavyweight competitor, dubbed the Mossman Trial Series.

Mossman won three of the matches, defeating Johnny Smith, Wolf Hawkfield and Giant Kimala, but lost to Toshiaki Kawada, Akira Taue, Kenta Kobashi and Mitsuharu Misawa.

On October 25, 1999, Mossman and Johnny Smith unsuccessfully challenged for the vacant All Asia Tag Team Championship, losing to Masao Inoue and Tamon Honda.

Following Baba's death in 1999, Mitsuharu Misawa became the new head booker of AJPW and chose to postpone Mossman's push.

Following the 2000 exodus, Kea remained with the promotion and was pushed as one of its top gaijin throughout the 2000s, winning the Triple Crown Heavyweight Championship once, the Champion Carnival twice (in 2006 and 2012), the World's Strongest Tag Determination League three times (in 2001, 2002 and 2004), as well as being a 7 time and longest-reigning World Tag Team Champion, a record he shares with partner Minoru Suzuki.

Mossman was a Hawaiian state amateur wrestling champion, and after he graduated high school, was persuaded by his uncle King Curtis Iaukea to write an athletic resume, which Iaukea gave to Lord James Blears, who then gave it to Giant Baba.

Mossman met with Baba, his wife and referee Kyohei Wada during a trip to Hawaii, where Baba offered Mossman a job as a trainee with All Japan Pro Wrestling.

In 2000, Misawa and all but two native talent left All Japan in a mass exodus to form Pro Wrestling Noah.

Mossman was one of the few who chose to remain in All Japan Pro Wrestling, aiding in the rebuilding process along with Toshiaki Kawada, Masanobu Fuchi, Hiroshi Hase, Stan Hansen, the returning Genichiro Tenryu, Nobutaka Araya and Shigeo Okumura.

In an effort to make him more marketable to Japanese fans, Mossman stopped using his real name and was given the semi-Japanese ring name "Taiyō Kea" (太陽ケア) (from taiyo, sun, and the Polynesian word kea, also derived from the last three letters of his first name).

Kea was pushed as a strong loyalist and won the World Tag Team Championship with Johnny Smith in January 2001.

In April, Kea took part in the 2001 Champion Carnival, finishing with 15 points and advancing to the final where he lost to Genichiro Tenryu.

In 2001, Kea also began appearing in New Japan Pro-Wrestling where he became a member of Keiji Mutoh's BATT stable, and by October 2001, he would form a successful tag team with Mutoh as they made history twice in one week by winning both the World Tag Team Championship and New Japan Pro-Wrestling's IWGP Tag Team Championship, which made them the first team to not only win both titles, but also the first to hold them simultaneously.

The team also would win the 2001 World's Strongest Tag Determination League.

In 2002, Kea briefly competed for Major League Wrestling (MLW), where he appeared at the company's inaugural event Genesis, where he competed in the tournament to crown the first MLW World Heavyweight Champion, where he defeated The Wall in the quarter-finals, wrestled Vampiro to a draw in the semi-finals and lost in the final to Shane Douglas in a 3-Way Dance (which also featured Vampiro).

Kea would compete for MLW again on September 26 at Reload, where he defeated Sabu to become the #1 contender for the World Heavyweight Championship, but Kea never returned to the promotion to claim the opportunity.

In 2003, Kea joined Taka Michinoku's RO&D stable as second-in-command, and proceeded to win the World Tag Team Championship for a fourth time with Jamal.

On April 20, 2006, Kea won AJPW's Champion Carnival, defeating Minoru Suzuki in the semi-finals and Suwama in the finals.

On July 3, 2006, he won the Triple Crown Heavyweight Championship for the first time in his career after defeating Satoshi Kojima.

He made one successful defence, defeating Toshiaki Kawada on August 27.

He lost the championship to Minoru Suzuki on September 3 after two months.

He participated in the 2006 World's Strongest Tag Determination League with Taka Michinoku as his partner, finishing fourth in their block with two wins and 5 points.

On January 4, 2007, Kea challenged Hiroshi Tanahashi for the IWGP Heavyweight Championship at NJPW's Wrestle Kingdom, losing after falling to Tanahashi's High Fly Flow.

On February 17, Kea and Toshiaki Kawada defeated Suwama and RO'Z to claim the vacant World Tag Team Championship.

From March 26 to March 30, Kea competed in the 2007 Champion Carnival, finishing with 1 win and 4 points.

In August 2007, Kea and Kawada lost the championships to the Voodoo Murders (Satoshi Kojima and TARU).

In 2008, Kea and Minoru Suzuki formed the Gurentai stable along with Tokyo Gurentai's Mazada, Nosawa Rongai, and Takemura.

He and Suzuki defeated Joe Doering and Keiji Mutoh to win the World Tag Team Championship on June 28 during the Crossover tour.

On August 31, Kea wrestled Suwama to a time limit draw for the Triple Crown Heavyweight Championship.

In early 2009, Kea and Suzuki successfully defended the titles against Suwama and Shuji Kondo.

The two proceeded to team mostly with Yoshihiro Takayama, before Kea injured his knee, taking him out of action for 5 months.

Kea returned during the Taiwan Cup, where he was eliminated in the first round by Masayuki Kono.

After over a year as champions, Kea and Suzuki lost the titles to Masakatsu Funaki and Keiji Mutoh on January 3, 2010.

Later in 2010, Kea formed a tag team with Akebono known as Partisan Forces.