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NEVER Openweight Champion
The is a professional wrestling championship owned by the New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW) promotion. NEVER is an acronym of the terms "New Blood", "Evolution", "Valiantly", "Eternal", and "Radical" and was an NJPW-promoted series of events, which featured younger up-and-coming talent and outside wrestlers not signed to the promotion. The project was officially announced on July 12, 2010, and held its first event on August 24, 2010. On October 5, 2012, NJPW announced that NEVER was going to get its own championship, the NEVER Openweight Championship. The current champion is WWE Raw wrestler Karl Anderson, who is in his first reign. The title was originally scheduled to be defended exclusively at NEVER events, but this plan was quickly changed and since its foundation, the title has been defended on the undercards of NJPW events. The original concept of having younger workers wrestle for the title has also not been realized with the first seven holders of the title having been in t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Karl Anderson
Chad Allegra (born January 20, 1980), better known by the ring name Karl Anderson, is an American professional wrestler currently signed to WWE where he performs on the Raw brand. He also makes appearances for New Japan Pro Wrestling (NJPW), where he is the current NEVER Openweight Champion in his first reign. Anderson is known for his work as a tag team specialist, most notably in New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW), where he is a former four-time IWGP Tag Team Champion. He also holds the record for the longest reign and most defenses with the title, achieved on his first reign with former partner Giant Bernard. Anderson and Bernard also held Pro Wrestling Noah's GHC Tag Team Championship, and were voted tag team of the year by the ''Wrestling Observer Newsletter'' in 2011. Anderson is a founding member and the second leader of the Bullet Club stable, and a three-time winner of NJPW's top tag team tournament, the G1/World Tag League, having won it in 2009 with Bernard, in 2012 wit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Katsuyori Shibata
is a Japanese professional wrestler, mixed martial artist and professional wrestling trainer. In professional wrestling, he is known for his hard hitting offense. He is currently working for New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW). In NJPW, he is a former three-time NEVER Openweight Champion, a one-time IWGP Tag Team Champion (with Hirooki Goto), and the winner of the 2017 New Japan Cup. He is also a former holder of Revolution Pro Wrestling's British Heavyweight Championship. Since March 2018, Shibata has served as the head coach of NJPW's dojo in Los Angeles. Early life Shibata attended Kuwana Kogyo High School in Kuwana, Mie, where he was classmates with Hirooki Goto. The son of former Japan Pro Wrestling Alliance and New Japan Pro-Wrestling competitor Katsuhisa Shibata, Katsuyori was an amateur wrestler during his school days and was competing at national level in 1997. Professional wrestling career New Japan Pro-Wrestling (1999–2005) Shibata made his professional wrestlin ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ryuichi Sekine
is a Japanese professional wrestler, currently working as a freelancer and is best known for his time in the professional wrestling promotion Kaientai Dojo (K-Dojo). Professional wrestling career Independent circuit (2008–present) Sekine is known for his tenures with various promotions. He worked for All Japan Pro Wrestling (AJPW), making sporadic appearances starting with ''AJPW Chiba Extra Dream'' from March 16, 2013, where he competed in a losing effort against Atsushi Aoki. At while later, on July 20, 2014, on the fourth night of the ''AJPW Summer Action Series 2014'' event, he fell short to Yoshinobu Kanemaru. He scored some notable participations in Wrestle-1 (W-1), where on the second night of the ''Wrestle-1 Tour 2017 Shining Winter'' from December 3, he competed in a 11-man royal rumble also involving Kaz Hayashi, Seiki Yoshioka and Masayuki Kono. On the same night, he teamed up with Daigoro Kashiwa in a losing effort to Manabu Soya and Nosawa Rongai. At ''Gatoh M ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kengo Mashimo
is a Japanese professional wrestler currently working for Active Advance Pro Wrestling (2AW). His style is a combination of submission wrestling and hard, martial arts style strikes. Professional wrestling career Kengo Mashimo debuted in Puerto Rico in 2001 as one of the first Kaientai Dojo (K-Dojo)'s students. Once Kaientai Dojo arrived in Japan in April 2002, Mashimo started as a wrestler using a grappling and shoot style, finishing his opponents quickly by KO or TKO before starting a short series of matches with Isami which Mashimo lost 3-1, but in doing so, won a lot of crowd support for his fire and spirit. Mashimo did not affiliate with any units in the early years, instead choosing to fight anyone. 2003 also saw Mashimo have his biggest match in his career since debuting as a wrestler, taking on NJPW junior legend Jyushin Thunder Liger in an impressive match which opened eyes to him. He also travelled to some other promotions that year, including Riki Choshu's World J ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Daisuke Sasaki
is a Japanese professional wrestler. He is signed to DDT Pro-Wrestling (DDT), where is a former two-time DDT Universal Champion. In addition to that, in DDT, he is also a former three-time KO-D Openweight Champion, one-time DDT Extreme Champion, four-time KO-D Tag Team Champion, three-time KO-D 6-Man Tag Team Champion and a three-time Ironman Heavymetalweight Champion. Sasaki has also made several appearances for New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW), working in the promotion's junior heavyweight division. Professional wrestling career Early career (2005–2007) Trained by Dick Togo, Sasaki made his professional wrestling debut on October 22, 2005, facing Yuki Sato at a Super Crew event, which was promoted by Togo and mainly featured his trainees facing each other in matches. In early 2006, Sasaki took part in Kaientai Dojo's 2006 K-Metal League, where he won two of his five matches and failed to advance to the finals. In June 2006, Sasaki left for a year-long learning excursion t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Freelancer
''Freelance'' (sometimes spelled ''free-lance'' or ''free lance''), ''freelancer'', or ''freelance worker'', are terms commonly used for a person who is self-employed and not necessarily committed to a particular employer long-term. Freelance workers are sometimes represented by a company or a temporary agency that resells freelance labor to clients; others work independently or use professional associations or websites to get work. While the term ''independent contractor'' would be used in a different register of English to designate the tax and employment classes of this type of worker, the term "freelancing" is most common in culture and creative industries, and use of this term may indicate participation therein. Fields, professions, and industries where freelancing is predominant include: music, writing, acting, computer programming, web design, graphic design, translating and illustrating, film and video production, and other forms of piece work that some cultural the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tetsuya Naito
is a Japanese professional wrestler signed to New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW), where he is the leader of the ''Los Ingobernables de Japón'' faction. Tetsuya Naito began training for a professional wrestling career in 2000, initially under Animal Hamaguchi before joining NJPW in 2004, where he underwent further training. He is a former NEVER Openweight Champion, and a former IWGP Tag Team and IWGP Junior Heavyweight Tag Team Championship with former No Limit partner Yujiro Takahashi. In addition, Naito is the winner of the 2013 and 2017 editions of the G1 Climax, NJPW's premier singles tournament, and of the 2016 New Japan Cup. Regarded as one of the most popular and successful wrestlers in NJPW history, In 2016 and 2017, ''Tokyo Sports'' awarded Naito with the MVP Award, the publication's highest honor. In 2020, Naito became the first person to hold both the IWGP Heavyweight and Intercontinental Championships at the same time, accomplishing that feat twice, becoming a three-t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Single-elimination Tournament
A single-elimination, knockout, or sudden death tournament is a type of elimination tournament where the loser of each match-up is immediately eliminated from the tournament. Each winner will play another in the next round, until the final match-up, whose winner becomes the tournament champion. Each match-up may be a single match or several, for example two-legged ties in European sports or best-of series in American pro sports. Defeated competitors may play no further part after losing, or may participate in "consolation" or "classification" matches against other losers to determine the lower final rankings; for example, a third place playoff between losing semi-finalists. In a shootout poker tournament, there are more than two players competing at each table, and sometimes more than one progressing to the next round. Some competitions are held with a pure single-elimination tournament system. Others have many phases, with the last being a single-elimination final stage, often c ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Nikkan Sports
is the first-launched Japanese daily sports newspaper founded in 1946. It has a circulation of 1,661,000, and is an affiliate newspaper of the ''Asahi Shimbun''. Companies and regions ;Nikkan Sports News (Tokyo) :Tokyo HQ: 5-10, Tsukiji Sanchome, Chuo, Tokyo, Japan ;Hokkaido Nikkan Sports News (Hokkaido) :Hokkaido HQ: KN Building, 1-30, Kita-Sanjo-Higashi Sanchome, Chuo-ku, Sapporo, Japan ;Nikkan Sports News West Japan (Osaka, Nagoya, Kyushu) :Osaka HQ: Hanshin Diamond Building, 14-24, Fukushima Sanchome, Fukushima-ku, Osaka, Japan :Nagoya HQ: Asahi Kaikan, 3-3, Sakae Itchome, Naka-ku, Nagoya, Japan :Seibu HQ: Fukuoka Asahi Building, 1-1, Hakata Ekimae Nichome, Hakata-ku, Fukuoka, Japan See also * Nikkan Sports Film Award * Nikkan Sports Drama Grand Prix The Nikkan Sports Drama Grand Prix is an award given by the Nikkan Sports newspaper to Japanese television dramas. The 14th Nikkan Sports Drama Grand Prix was canceled due to the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cruiserweight (professional Wrestling)
In professional wrestling, a cruiserweight is a wrestler who competes in a Cruiserweight division. The term was first coined in United States in 1996 by World Championship Wrestling. Prior to this, the terms "Light Heavyweight" and "Junior Heavyweight" were more commonly in use. The older term junior heavyweight is still favored in Japan, where many titles for lighter-weight competitors are called junior heavyweight titles. Prominent titles include New Japan Pro-Wrestling's IWGP, Pro Wrestling Noah's GHC, and All Japan Pro Wrestling's World championships. The weight limit used by World Championship Wrestling (WCW) and Japanese promotions is "up to 225 lbs" (100 kg), while WWE currently uses 205 lb (93 kg) as its weight limit. Due to the scripted nature of professional wrestling and that the billed weight of wrestlers can be changed, weight classes usually are not strictly enforced as they are in professional boxing and mixed martial arts. New Japan and Noah also hav ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Openweight
Openweight, also known as Absolute, is an unofficial weight class in combat sports and professional wrestling. It refers to bouts where there is no weight limit and fighters with a dramatic difference in size can compete against each other. It is different from catch weight, where competitors agree to weigh in at a certain amount without an official weight class. Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu The "Absolute" division has been a long staple of sports BJJ competition, it has been practiced since the beginning of the sport and it is covered by all major BJJ governing bodies such as IBJJF. All weight categories are welcome inside the Absolute Division and smaller competitors must rely on skill and techniques over larger opponents. The absolute category has also made its way to more general submission grappling competitions such as the ADCC and NAGA. Lethwei In International Lethwei Federation Japan Dave Leduc is the Openweight Champion. Mixed martial arts The sport of mixed martial arts origi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
IWGP Intercontinental Championship
The was a professional wrestling championship owned by the New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW) promotion. "IWGP" is the acronym of NJPW's governing body, the . The title was officially announced on January 5, 2011 and the Inaugural Champion MVP was crowned on May 15, 2011 during NJPW's first tour of the United States. On March 4, 2021, the championship was retired by NJPW after being unified with the IWGP Heavyweight Championship to form the IWGP World Heavyweight Championship. The final champion was Kota Ibushi, who was in his second reign at the time of the title's retirement. The title formed what was unofficially been called the "New Japan Triple Crown" (新日本トリプルクラウン, ''Shin Nihon Toripuru Kuraun'') along with the IWGP Heavyweight Championship and the NEVER Openweight Championship. History Inaugural championship tournament On October 3, 2010, American promotion Jersey All Pro Wrestling announced that it had reached an agreement with NJPW to co-promote NJPW's ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
