Toshiaki Kawada
| Toshiaki Kawada | |
|---|---|
Kawada (left) shaking hands with Zeus following a match in 2008.
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| Born |
December 8, 1963 , Japan |
| Professional wrestling career | |
| Ring name(s) | Black Mephisto Hustle K Kio Kawada Monster K Mr. Toshiaki Toshiaki Kawada |
| Billed height | 1.83 m (6 ft 0 in) |
| Billed weight | 105 kg (231 lb) |
| Trained by | Genichiro Tenryu |
| Debut | October 4, 1982 |
| Retired | August 15, 2010 (last match to date) |
Toshiaki Kawada (川田 利明 Kawada Toshiaki?) (born December 8, 1963) is a Japanese semi-retired professional wrestler who is most known for his work in All Japan Pro Wrestling (AJPW). In 2005, he started freelancing in other promotions.
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 widely known for his extremely stiff wrestling style, martial arts strikes and has the distinction of having competed in 18 matches that were given a 5-Star Rating and one match which received a 6-Star rating by Dave Meltzer of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter.
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 Jushin Thunder Liger in professional wrestling) in the finals. He made his professional wrestling debut at the age of 18 on October 4, 1982 for All Japan Pro Wrestling (AJPW), competing against (future partner) Hiromichi Fuyuki. 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); Kawada was billed as "Kio Kawada from Seoul, South Korea" in Stampede Wrestling for a very short time around June 1986. He was under adverse circumstances, and rarely has he talked about his days in American/Canadian wrestling.
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