Toshiaki Kawada

Toshiaki Kawada (川田 利明) (born December 8, 1963) is a Japanese semi-retired professional wrestler.

He is best known for his work in All Japan Pro Wrestling (AJPW), whom he worked for from his debut in 1982 up until 2008.

In All Japan Pro Wrestling, he was a 5 time Triple Crown Heavyweight Champion, a 9 time World Tag Team Champion, three-time winner of the Real World Tag League and a two-time winner of the Champion Carnival.

Making his professional debut against Hiromichi Fuyuki on the 4th of October, 1982.Kawada was then sent to North America for a year in November 1985, where he gained experience as a professional wrestler in Fred Behrend's Texas All-Star Wrestling (San Antonio, Texas), Stu Hart's Stampede Wrestling (in Calgary) and Frank Valois' International Wrestling (in Montreal); despite having no Korean heritage, Kawada was billed as "Kio Kawata" from Seoul, South Korea in Stampede Wrestling for a very short time around June 1986.

Reportedly unhappy with his time overseas, Kawada has rarely spoken about his experiences in America in subsequent years.

His first major break came in 1987 when he joined his mentor Genichiro Tenryu's Revolution group.

Kawada was paired with Hiromichi Fuyuki, forming a tag team known as "Footloose".

The duo held the All Asia Tag Team Championship on three occasions between March 9, 1988, and October 20, 1989; their standout rivalries were against Shunji Takano and Shinichi Nakano, as well as against the Can-Am Express (Dan Kroffat and Doug Furnas).

When Revolution stable mate Ashura Hara was expelled from All Japan in 1988 for gambling debts, Kawada was promoted to team with Tenryu in that year's World's Strongest Tag Determination League, losing a memorable final match to Stan Hansen and Terry Gordy.

His matches against Mitsuharu Misawa, Jun Akiyama, and Kenta Kobashi in the 1990s are argued by many fans and experts in the industry as some of the greatest professional wrestling matches of all time.

He is known for his extremely stiff wrestling style and martial arts strikes, which earned his nickname.

He also has the distinction of having competed in 21 matches that were given a perfect 5-star rating by Dave Meltzer of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter, and three Tokyo Sports Match of the Year awards, which too brought him the distinction of being nicknamed the "Best Match Machine" (名勝負製造機).

Kawada was very active during his high school years in amateur wrestling, becoming a national champion in his senior year after defeating Keiichi Yamada (who later became Jyushin Thunder Liger in professional wrestling) in the finals.

Kawada attended the Ashikaga University High school, which happened to be the same high school as Misawa, who was one year Kawada's senior.

Towards the end of Kawada's last year of junior high school, he had made an introductory test at the New Japan Pro-Wrestling dojo, however his mother told him that it would be better for him if he graduated from high school, before beginning his pro wrestling career.

Thus when Kawada was about to meet the end of his high school days, his close friend Mitsuharu Misawa who had already been recruited in the All Japan Pro Wrestling dojo, a year prior, advised Kawada to try out for the rival company, AJPW instead.

In the summer of 1990, after Tenryu and a number of other All Japan wrestlers had left the promotion to join Tenryu's newly formed Super World of Sports, Kawada became Mitsuharu Misawa's main partner in the Jumbo Tsuruta vs Misawa & Co. feud, pitting Tsuruta's "Tsuruta-Gun" against Misawa's "Super Generation Army".

As part of the feud, Kawada began a heated rivalry with Tsuruta's main partner Akira Taue, stemming over Taue defecting to Tsuruta's side.

He earned his first Triple Crown Heavyweight Championship opportunity on October 24, 1991, unsuccessfully challenging Tsuruta, and was also turned back in the following year in Triple Crown challenges to Stan Hansen (June 5, 1992) and Misawa (October 21, 1992); the match with Hansen was named Match of the Year by Tokyo Sports, and finished second behind the Misawa match in Weekly Pro Wrestling's year end fan poll for Match of the Year.

Misawa and Kawada would win the World Tag Team Championship twice, as well as the 1992 World's Strongest Tag Determination League.

In early 1993, after it became apparent that Tsuruta's days as a competitive wrestler were over, All Japan promoter Giant Baba asked Kawada to form a tag team with his rival Akira Taue.

Kawada agreed, signalling the end of his alliance with Misawa.

Kawada and Taue went to a draw in the 1993 Champion Carnival and ended their feud with a handshake.

In their first title match as a team, Kawada and Taue, named "The Holy Demon Army", defeated World Tag Team Champions Terry Gordy and Steve Williams.

Shortly afterward, they successfully defended the title against Misawa and Kenta Kobashi on June 1, 1993, in a match that Baba (at the time) regarded as the greatest match he'd ever seen; it was the first of nine legendary matches between the sides, and Kawada would hold the World Tag Team Championship with Taue six times.

Kawada's greatest achievement to that point came when he won the 1994 Champion Carnival by defeating Steve Williams on April 16.

Kawada followed by losing his third straight Triple Crown challenge against Mitsuharu Misawa in the June 3, 1994.

Their 36-minute bout was highly acclaimed by journalists and magazines, being called the greatest match of the decade in later years.

After Williams lifted the Triple Crown from Misawa, Kawada defeated Williams on October 22, 1994; his title reign lasted one successful defense, as he went to a one-hour draw with Kenta Kobashi in Osaka on January 19; it has been called the greatest one hour match in pro wrestling history by Wrestling Observer's Dave Meltzer.

Stan Hansen ended Kawada's Triple Crown reign on March 4, 1995.

Kawada pinned Misawa for the first time on June 9, 1995, when he teamed with Taue to face Misawa and Kobashi, but Misawa and Kobashi came back to defeat them in the Tag League Final in the last straight tag meeting of the two teams.

Kawada spent much of 1996 in Giant Baba's doghouse for publicly questioning All Japan's isolationist promotional policy at a time when rival New Japan drew record business running interpromotional matches; he watched Taue and Kobashi win the Triple Crown in the place of what looked to be the time for "his push".

Kawada worked one interpromotional match on a major UWFi show, but All Japan chose not to follow up on either a promotional feud with UWFi nor on the sudden attention Kawada drew.

He was allowed out of the doghouse in time for Kawada & Taue to break through in 1996 to win the World's Strongest Tag Determination League for the first time, beating Misawa and Jun Akiyama.

Kawada pinned Misawa for the first time in a singles match in the 1997 Carnival Finals mini-round robin, then followed up to pin Kobashi the same night to win the Carnival championship for the second time; neither win had quite the impact one would expect given the results.

Kawada and Taue would take their second straight World Tag League championship to close out year that saw both spend much of it in the shadows of Misawa and Kobashi.

The crowning moment of Kawada's career came on May 1, 1998, as he pinned Misawa for the second time to win the Triple Crown at All Japan's first Tokyo Dome show AJPW 25th Anniversary.

However, he was promptly defeated by Kobashi on June 12, 1998, in his first title defense.

He was also recognised as the ace of the promotion from 2000 to 2005.

Known by fans and his contemporaries as "Dangerous K" (デンジャラス K), he is widely considered one of the greatest wrestlers of all time.