The Daily Mail was one of the first online publications to post a story about the Sept.30 death of Antonio Inoki, the founder of New Japan Pro Wrestling.
Desperately seeking a sports figure to compare Inoki, the Mail called him “Japan’s Dennis Rodman.” Other than using their respective sports for ill-advised diplomacy to North Korea, the two had nothing in common. Rodman had taken a group of basketball players to North Korea in a diplomatic move, which was against advisement of the US government. Inoki ran a joint show in the country with WCW and New Japan in the 90s in front of 300,000 people.
There’s no one in Western life comparable to Inoki, someone who became as influential as any major politician and celebrity. His own life story and resume would make for a great museum exhibit.
His childhood was fraught with family tragedy and athletic accomplishment. His own ambition got him fired twice from Japan’s biggest promotion. His starpower led to a fight with Muhammad Ali when the heavyweight champion was the most famous person in the world. He saved pro wrestling in Japan and grew it to massive heights – then nearly killed it years later.
Inoki was born on Feb. 20, 1943, just weeks after the last Japanese soldiers retreated from Guadalcanal, the tipping point of the war. His father died when he was 5. In the 1950s, with Japan’s economy still reeling from the war, he moved with his mother, grandfather and family to Brazil. His grandfather didn’t survive the trip. In South America, he continued to excel in sports, mainly track and field. He met Rikidozan – the father of Japanese wrestling – when he was 17 years old and returned to Japan to train with the master himself and Karl Gotch. Among his fellow students was Giant Baba. The two were the clear standouts, and the trajectory of wrestling in Japan was set for the next half century.
When Rikidozan died in 1963, Inoki found himself on the outs with his mentor’s promotion, Japanese Pro Wrestling Alliance (JWA). In 1966, he went to the U.S for nearly two years, wrestling in high profile matches throughout many of the of the top NWA territories at the time. Houston, Central States in St. Louis, Southwest Sports in Texas, Dallas, WWA in California among numerous others. He won the NWA Texas title wrestling for Fritz Von Erich in Dallas and two versions of the NWA World Tag Team titles, once in Dallas with Duke Keomuka (an innovative judo practitioner and father of 80s and 90s AWA, NWA and WWF star Pat Tanaka) and in Tennessee with Hiro Matsuda, who trained Hulk Hogan.
By late 1967, he returned to Japan and was wrestling tag matches with Baba. Their list of opponents included American names that would fill a Hall of Fame – including Dick Murdoch, Harley Race, Terry Funk, Dory Funk Jr. Baba and Inoki lost the NWA International Tag titles to the Funk Brothers in July 1971, according to cagematch.net. He opened New Japan a year later, defeating his former trainer Karl Gotch, on the Opening Series card.
The fight against Ali began with a flippant remark at a banquet, when he was introduced to a Japanese amateur wrestling official and said he would pay any “Oriental” fighter $1 million if they could beat him. .
The statement sparked headlines in Japan. Inoki accepted, with financial backers in Japan offering Ali millions for the fight. The two sides came to a deal in the spring, with Inoki famously giving Ali a crutch and it billed as The War of the Worlds. Gene LeBell was picked as the referee. Ali supposedly trained with The Sheik leading up to the fight, and took on pro wrestlers in two televised exhibition fights. Reaction to the fight was split between fans, reporters and fighters, with some deriding it as a fix and others seeing it as a true martial arts test. The fight later became known as a precursor to mixed-martial arts.
One factor was Inoki’s technique of laying on his back and swinging kicks at Ali’s legs, which he did constantly during the fight. This sparked outrage from people who watched the fight, but the same strategy was employed for years in the UFC whenever grapplers faced opponents with strong standup and boxing backgrounds. An estimated 1.4 billion people watched the fight on television, according to The Japan Times, in article published after Ali’s death in 2016.
The fight was a draw, which sparked a riot at Budokan and at several arenas worldwide where the event was being broadcasted. Ali suffered blood clots in his legs, which hampered his famous agility the rest of his career. The fight was considered a blemish on both men, with the draw and the negotiated rules of the fight giving both outs. Many blasted Inoki for laying on his back, accusing him of being fearful of approaching Ali, but he blamed the rules that were negotiated that didn’t allow him to exercise chops, tackles and other offensive moves.
Inoki held the WWF title after a 1979 win over Bob Backlund in Japan, but the win was never acknowledged by the company. He also remained active as a trainer. His students include The Great Muta, Shinsuke Nakamura, Akira Maeda, Satoru Sayama (the original Tiger Mask) among dozens of others.
New Japan became the birthplace for the light heavyweight and cruiserweight style that became popular in the United States in the late 1990s in WCW. The style is now the default for wrestlers of all sizes in the U.S. A series of matches between Tiger Mask and Dynamite Kid from 1981 to 1984 brought the style to prominence in Japan and to the WWF, when the two wrestled for the company in the U.S. Jushin Liger became one of the most traveled and influential wrestlers in the world as the IWGP Jr. Heavyweight champion.
By the mid 1990s, New Japan was a powerhouse, running the Tokyo Dome four times a year. By this time, Inoki was also in politics and was elected to office in 1989. He met with Saddam Hussein to negotiate for the release of Japanese hostages prior to the beginning of the Gulf War. Ironically, Ali was also in Iraq during this period asking for the release of U.S. hostages who were working in the country.
The promotion was working regularly with WCW during the period, including the Collision in Korea card. The show was broadcast on PPV in the U.S., but hasn’t been made available since. The show had many near-misses for talent who came into the country. North Korean officials wanted Ric Flair to read off a propaganda card claiming that North Korea was superior to the U.S. and could easily defeat them. He instead said the country was beautiful. Many of the WCW talent felt the show was an attempt by Inoki to push his political career, and weren’t ready for the circumstances they were going to deal with inside the country. They were monitored almost constantly and several incidents between security and wrestlers resulted. The show was the subject of an episode of Dark Side of the Ring.
Inoki’s last blast in pro wrestling led to him selling his company. With the emergence of MMA in the mid 1990s and the success of Pride Fighting Championships, Inoki began pairing pro wrestlers against shoot fighters in New Japan and in his own UFO fighting promotion. What resulted was a disaster for New Japan, with many of its top stars getting injured or having their images wrecked in shoot fights they weren’t trained. By 2002, many of New Japan’s top stars began leaving the company over “Inokism,” which was the name given to Inoki’s obsession with mixing pro wrestling and MMA and Inoki sold the company to Yuke’s – a video game maker – in 2005. Inoki would remain on commentary for many of New Japan’s shows, but he was no longer booking them. His brother remained involved until Yuke’s moved tag wrestled Gedo to the role in the late 2000s.
Gedo’s booking brought the company back to pro wrestling and into the present. Relying on Hiroshi Tanahashi, who brought the company back to profit and sellouts, starting with his first IWGP World title run in 2006. Emphasizing traditional Japanese wrestling, along with Gedo’s love of American NWA territory style storytelling, the company began to boom. One of Inokism’s biggest victims – Shinsuke Nakamura – would become one of New Japan’s new faces, as he dropped his MMA sports style and adopted a new style based on his love of rock stars Freddie Mercury and Michael Jackson and became the company’s leading heel.
Inoki returned to politics in 2013, winning election to the Diet again. He stayed in office before retiring in 2019 from politics, around the time his second wife died. He would appear at an event for the ZERO-1 promotion that year.
Despite the achievements as a promoter and politician, Inoki’s most memorable moments were in the ring.
While his fight with Ali is still his most memorable bout – whether booked or shoot – it was two matches that have kept in the conscious of the modern wrestling fan. A match against The Great Antonio – turned into an actual fight. He began stiffing Inoki with shots and no-selling his offense. Inoki returned the favor by stomping his head repeatedly before the fight was called by the refs.
The other was the debut of Big Van Vader in 1987. Inoki was looking to create a hot gaijin, and Vader fit the role with his massive size and athletic ability. When the rookie Vader debuted against Inoki in 1987 at Sumo Hall, Inoki lost in mere minutes – his first defeat in years. Fans were so shocked by the loss they began rioting and tore the ring apart – similar to what happened after his fight with Ali.
