Taka Michinoku

Takao Yoshida
Born	(1973-10-26) October 26, 1973 Morioka, Iwate, Japan
Professional wrestling career
Ring name(s)	Taka Michinoku Taka The Great Taka Blue-K Pepe Michinoku
Trained by	The Great Sasuke
Debut	1991

Takao Yoshida (吉田 貴男, Yoshida Takao, Yoshido Takao) (born 26 October 1973), better known by his stage name Taka Michinoku (Taka is written in all caps in Japanese script), is a professional wrestler who has wrestled all over the world. Michinoku is highly skilled in high-flying, lucha libre, martial arts and technical wrestling. He has revolutionized the cruiserweight divisions of many promotions. Michinoku is most famously known in North America for his work for the WWF where he had the first ever WWF Light Heavyweight Championship reign recognised by the North-American promotion.

Having held championship titles in Japan, North America, Mexico and Europe, Yoshida is known for his long title reigns. He held the FMW Independent World Junior Heavyweight Title for a combined duration of more than 15 months, the WWF Light Heavyweight Title for a then record-setting 10 months and the WEW Six-Man Tag Team Title for almost a year.

Yoshida has held the AJPW World Junior Heavyweight Title, Michinoku Pro Tohoku Junior Heavyweight Title and Kaientai Dojo Strongest-K Title simultaneously for almost 10 months. During his reign, he has defended his titles against both AJPW and independent circuit talent to increase his base of opponents, and thus has increased the reach of the AJPW World Junior Heavyweight Title which was closed off to outside competition in the late 1980s and throughout the 1990s.

Career

Taka Michinoku took his name as a sign of respect for his mentor The Great Sasuke, who was the owner of Michinoku Pro Wrestling and had been the first to use Michinoku as part of his ring name. He debuted in North America with Extreme Championship Wrestling in a six-man tag team match at their debut pay-per-view Barely Legal. He made his WWF debut on July 6, 1997 at a WWF Pay-Per-View entitled "Canadian Stampede." On December 7, 1997, Michinoku defeated Brian Christopher to become the first WWF Light Heavyweight Champion recognized by the WWF. Taka successfully defended the WWF Light Heavyweight Title at WrestleMania XIV against Aguila.

Taka ended up entering a feud with the Kai En Tai faction that he was once a part of in Japan, until he betrayed Val Venis in a tag team match and rejoined his friends against Venis. When all the members of Kai En Tai left the Federation except for Taka and Shoichi Funaki, the two teamed up as Kai En Tai. Taka even challenged Triple H for the WWF Championship on the April 10th, 2000 edition of Raw, coming up short despite interference on his behalf from Funaki and the Acolytes Protection Agency. However, they were mostly limited to being comical jobbers for the rest of Taka's time in WWF, during which many fans , particularly the vocal internet groups, felt he was not being used to his full potential (the first English words Yoshida said on WWF television were "You, Jackass!" to Jerry Lawler). To further this belief, Mick Foley has been quoted "If the WWF was all about who was the most talented, then Taka Michinoku would be the WWF Champion."

After departing from the WWE in early 2002, Michinoku returned to Japan to rehabilitate a serious shoulder injury. He later published his diary of his WWE days in December 2002. In it, he detailed his thoughts on every important match he had in the organization, his gimmicks, as well as giving his opinions of many WWE stars.

He now promotes his own promotion, Kaientai Dojo (often shortened to K-DOJO) in small venues around the Tokyo area and often appears in All Japan Pro Wrestling cards, where he and Taiyō Kea lead the foreign-oriented faction Roughly Obsess & Destroy.

Pepe Michinoku (Taka Michinoku), El Nosawa Mendoza (Nosawa-Rongai), and Miguel Hayashi Jr (Kaz Hayashi) formed a team during the AJPW Champion's Carnival called Mexico Amigos. El Hijo del Araya Segundo (Nobutaka Araya) joined the team after Six-Man Action between Mexico Amigos and Araya/Fuchi/Hirai at the Carnival's final show.

After multiple bouts against Minoru Suzuki, Nosawa (NOSAWA Rongai) offered Suzuki an invitation into Mexico Amigos, to which he declined. This resulted in the group changing multiple assets. Their name was changed to Mexico Amigos Black, the previous worn Mexican Flag attire became Black and Gold attire, and Nobutaka Araya was kicked out of the group. The groups is currently in a heated rivalry with Mazada's Samurai New Japan group, Minoru Suzuki, and Voodoo Murders.

At the AJPW's December 16, 2007 "Fan Appreciation Day" show, The Mexico Amigos teamed with "Ray Suzuki" and defeated Ryuji Hijikata, Kikutaro, T28 & Ryuji Yamaguchi. After the match, Ray Suzuki reveled himself as Minoru Suzuki and stated the starting next year he would throw his Amigos tights away and return to Nosawa Rongai, then kidnapped him to start early training. This led to Pepe and Miguel stating they would return to Mexico, but Kaz and Taka would return come the new year. After one last "Viva Mexico" Mexico Amigos disbanded.

In wrestling

• Finishing and signature moves
  • Michinoku Driver II, sometimes while using an inverted facelock for support – Innovated
  • Just Facelock (Bridging crossface)
  • Dick Killer (Arm trap bridging cobra clutch)
  • Spaceman Plancha (Running no-handed springboard plancha)
  • Spaceman Quebrada (Twisting springboard moonsault to an opponent outside the ring)
  • Straight jacket lift dropped into a sitout powerbomb
  • Overhead belly to belly suplex
  • Over the shoulder belly to back piledriver
  • Asai moonsault
  • Springboard missile dropkick
  • Springboard knee drop
  • Hurricanrana
  • Superkick
  • Tornado DDT
  • Corkscrew dropkick
  • Back to back double underhook piledriver
  • Double foot stomp, sometimes while doing a backflip from the top rope
  • Death Valley driver
  • Moonsault
  • Powerbomb

• Managers
  • Yamaguchi-san

Championships and accomplishments

• All Japan Pro Wrestling
  • AJPW World Junior Heavyweight Championship (1 time)
• Frontier Martial Arts Wrestling
  • FMW Independent World Junior Heavyweight Championship (2 times)
• Independent Wrestling World
  • IWW Junior Heavyweight Championship (1 time)
• Kaientai Dojo
  • Strongest-K Championship (1 time)
  • Strongest-K Tag Team Championship (2 times) - with Handsome Joe
  • UWA/UWF Intercontinental Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Ryota Chikuzen
  • WEW Hardcore Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Tomoka Nakagawa
  • Strongest-K Tournament winner (2007)
• Michinoku Pro Wrestling
  • Tohoku Junior Heavyweight Championship (1 time)
• New Japan Pro Wrestling
  • IWGP Junior Heavyweight Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Dick Togo
• World Entertainment Wrestling
  • WEW Six Man Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Tetsuhiro Kuroda and Gosaku Goshogawara
• World Wrestling Federation
  • WWF Light Heavyweight Championship (1 time)
• Pro Wrestling Illustrated
  • PWI ranked him # 191 of the 500 best singles wrestlers during the "PWI Years" in 2003.
• Tokyo Sports Grand Prix
  • Best Technical Wrestler (2005)
• Other titles
  • UWA World Trios Championship (1 time current) with Dick Togo and Antonio Honda

External links

• Profile at The Accelerator's Wrestling Rollercoaster
• Profile at Jujigatame Puroresu
• Online World Of Wrestling Profile