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Kazushi Sakuraba
Photo: ゾーヒョー, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons15

Kazushi Sakuraba

Japanese professional wrestler and mixed martial arts fighter

Kazushi Sakuraba (Japanese: 桜庭 和志, Sakuraba Kazushi; born July 14, 1969) is a Japanese professional wrestler, submission wrestler and former mixed martial artist. He is performing as a freelancer, primarily appearing for Pro Wrestling Noah, where he was formerly one-half of the former GHC Tag Team Champions with Takashi Sugiura.2

From Wikipedia’s article on Kazushi Sakuraba (this version), CC BY-SA 4.0.

Born Jul 14, 1969.1

About

He has also competed in traditional puroresu for New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW) and shoot-style competition for UWFi and Kingdom Pro Wrestling (KPW). He has fought in MMA competition in the Ultimate Fighting Championship, Pride Fighting Championships, Hero's, Dream and most recently Rizin Fighting Federation. He is known as the Gracie Hunter or the Gracie Killer due to his wins over four members of the famed Gracie family: Royler Gracie, Renzo Gracie, Ryan Gracie, and Royce Gracie. Sakuraba is famous for beating 15 champions of different top MMA organizations; opponents who were often many weight-classes above him.

Known for his excellent skills in catch wrestling and unorthodox fighting style, he is considered one of the greatest mixed martial art fighters of all time, and holds notable victories over seven UFC champions, three Pancrase Champions, a DREAM champion, a King of the Cage champion and Battlecade Extreme Fighting champion; former Welterweight Champion Carlos Newton, two former Light heavyweight champions Vitor Belfort and Quinton Jackson, former Heavyweight Champion Kevin Randleman, three-time UFC Tournament champion Royce Gracie, former Superfight champion and King of Pancrase Ken Shamrock, former UFC Tournament champion and King of Pancrase Guy Mezger, former King of Pancrase Masakatsu Funaki, DREAM Super Hulk Tournament Champion Ikuhisa Minowa, former King of the Cage Light Heavyweight champion Vernon White, and former Battlecade Extreme Fighting champion Marcus Silveira. He is also the first of only two Japanese UFC champions. Sakuraba's Pride fights routinely drew over 20 million viewers in Japan. Sakuraba is the founder of the submission wrestling promotion Quintet, where he has competed since 2018.

From Wikipedia’s article on Kazushi Sakuraba, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.2

Companies

Early life and education

  • Date not recordedChuo University3

Sakuraba became a fan of Japanese professional wrestling during childhood thanks to the Tiger Mask manga, with the eponymous New Japan Pro-Wrestling wrestler Tiger Mask being his favorite. After being convinced not to drop out of high school to pursue professional wrestling, Sakuraba began a career in amateur wrestling at age 15, hoping to gain a useful background to achieve his childhood dream. A high school stand-out, he finished as high as second in the nation before joining the freestyle wrestling squad of Chuo University, a team which had counted Olympic gold medalists Shozo Sasahara and Osamu Watanabe amongst its ranks. He won the East Japan Freshman championship in his first year and served as their team captain thereafter. In his senior year, he finished fourth in the All-Japan tournament. Amongst his notable wins was one over future Olympic bronze medalist Takuya Ota. Upon graduating from college, Sakuraba considered remaining with Chuo University as a coach. However, at the last minute, he decided to continue his road to professional wrestling.

Background

Having weighed 68 kg (150 lb) for most of his amateur wrestling career, Sakuraba was encouraged by his peers to gain weight, as it would be difficult to compete as a smaller fighter in pro wrestling. After working to gain the weight needed to compete, he never wanted to lose it anymore, something that would be reflected in his MMA career. Finding himself attracted by the shoot wrestling movement, which had been by his childhood idol Sayama, Sakuraba considered joining the mixed martial arts organization Pancrase, but he ultimately chose the promotion Union of Wrestling Forces International, a professional wrestling league that was nonetheless known for its highly technical and realistic-looking bouts.

From Wikipedia’s article on Kazushi Sakuraba (this version), CC BY-SA 4.0.

Career

Occupation: mixed martial arts fighter, professional wrestler.4

Union of Wrestling Forces International (1993–1996)

His time in the UWF-i proved to be a formative experience for Sakuraba. He received his initial instruction in grappling and striking under main trainer Yoji Anjo, later honing his catch wrestling skills under the tutelage of Billy Robinson. He also trained in muay thai under master Bovy Chowaikung, the main UWF-i striking teacher. Those disciplines served as the base of the unorthodox game that later lead him to success in the Pride Fighting Championships. Over time he became one of Takada's four main trainees, along with Kiyoshi Tamura, Yoshihiro Takayama and Masahito Kakihara.

In spite of his amateur pedigree, Sakuraba was forced to work his way up from the bottom of the UWFi's rungs, as is traditional in puroresu. He lost his debut on August 13, 1993, to Steve Nelson and went winless through his rookie year with the league. It is also popularly alleged that under the eye of Kiyoshi Tamura, he was made to perfectly perform menial chores about the dojo. Still undeterred, Sakuraba steadily built a working knowledge of submission holds upon his freestyle wrestling base until his efforts were at last rewarded with a win over Mark Silver in October 1994.

Though his record remained below.500, Sakuraba continued to edge his way closer to mid-card status through the rest of the year. Then, in 1995, the UWFi began an inter-promotional feud with New Japan Pro-Wrestling. The vast majority of UWF-i workers came out on the losing end of the booking to the larger and more mainstream promotion and Sakuraba was no exception. He was defeated in high-profile bouts to Tokimitsu Ishizawa, Koji Kanemoto and Shinjiro Otani, bringing Sakuraba a new level of exposure to the public. The ring psychology and technical prowess he displayed in the bouts also impressed the management of the UWF-i enough that he was finally pushed towards main event status.

New Japan's dominance in the feud injured the marketability of the UWFi promotion, which had pressed the perception that their athletes boasted legitimate skill in real fighting. In a bid to regain credibility, Yoji Anjo travelled to California to perform a dojo challenge on Rickson Gracie, only to be swiftly and brutally defeated before the assembled Japanese press that had followed him there. With the UWFi's formerly fearsome reputation in tatters, its attendance numbers swiftly decreased, with the federation closing its doors once and for all in December 1996. In their final show it was Sakuraba who at long last headlined, defeating Anjoh by submission.

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Kingdom Pro Wrestling (1997–1998)

Following the close of the UWFi, Nobuhiko Takada, the most popular UWFi workers amongst the mainstream public founded Kingdom Pro Wrestling, taking in Sakuraba and most of his fellow UWFi alumni. In the vein of its predecessor, Kingdom was primarily a league devoted to shoot-style realistic-looking works. Having by now established his ability, Sakuraba was this time booked as a main-eventer from the outset. However, unlike the UWFi, Kingdom struggled from the beginning to draw substantial crowds. Mixed martial arts was growing in popularity, and the dominance of the Gracie family and their fellow Brazilian jiu-jitsu practitioners over the field and more specifically over professional wrestlers, left the Japanese public ever more unconvinced as to the fighting ability of Kingdom's stable of athletes.

Inoki Bom-Ba-Ye (2000)

On New Year's Eve 2000, Sakuraba defeated Kendo Kashin at Inoki Bom-Ba-Ye in Osaka.

Inoki Genome Federation (2011)

Eleven years later on New Year's Eve 2011, Sakuraba teamed with Katsuyori Shibata as they defeated Atsushi Sawada and Shinichi Suzukawa at Inoki Genome Federation in Saitama, Japan.

New Japan Pro-Wrestling (2012–2016)

On August 12, 2012, Sakuraba, alongside Katsuyori Shibata, started appearing in New Japan Pro-Wrestling. It was Sakuraba's first work for the company since 1995, and the first ever as a free agent instead of a representative from another promotion. Sakuraba and Shibata wrestled their first match on September 23, defeating Hiromu Takahashi and Wataru Inoue in a tag team match. Sakuraba and Shibata, collectively dubbed Laughter7, continued their winning ways at the following two pay-per-views, King of Pro-Wrestling on October 8 and Power Struggle on November 11, both times defeating the team of Togi Makabe and Wataru Inoue. Also at Power Struggle, Shinsuke Nakamura nominated Sakuraba as the next challenger for his IWGP Intercontinental Championship. On December 2, Sakuraba won his first exchange with Nakamura, when Laughter7 defeated Nakamura and Tomohiro Ishii in a tag team match to remain undefeated since their return. On January 4, 2013, at Wrestle Kingdom 7 in Tokyo Dome, Sakuraba suffered his first defeat since his return to professional wrestling, when he unsuccessfully challenged Shinsuke Nakamura for the IWGP Intercontinental Championship. Sakuraba and Shibata returned to their winning ways at the following pay-per-view, The New Beginning on February 10, where they defeated Hirooki Goto and Wataru Inoue in a tag team match. On April 7 at Invasion Attack, Sakuraba and Shibata suffered their first tag team loss, when they were defeated by Hirooki Goto and Yuji Nagata via referee stoppage, when Sakuraba injured his right elbow, after taking a belly-to-back suplex from Nagata, and unable to continue the match. New Japan later announced that Sakuraba would be sidelined for two to three months. Sakuraba wrestled his return match on July 20, defeating Yuji Nagata via submission. On September 8, Sakuraba and Shibata took part in the Wrestle-1 promotion's inaugural event, defeating Masakatsu Funaki and Masayuki Kono in a tag team match. Sakuraba continued his rivalry with Yuji Nagata at the September 29 Destruction pay-per-view, where he and Shibata defeated Nagata and Manabu Nakanishi with Sakuraba pinning his rival for the win.

On October 14, Sakuraba was defeated by Nagata in a singles rematch between the two. Following the match, Sakuraba and Nagata came together to accept a challenge issued by Daniel and Rolles Gracie On January 4, 2014, at Wrestle Kingdom 8 in Tokyo Dome, Sakuraba and Nagata defeated the Gracies via disqualification, after Nagata was choked out with a gi. A rematch between the two teams took place on February 11 at The New Beginning in Osaka and saw Rolles submit Sakuraba for the win. Sakuraba suffered another loss against the Gracies on May 3 at Wrestling Dontaku 2014, where he teamed with Shinsuke Nakamura. On May 25 at Back to the Yokohama Arena, Sakuraba ended the Gracies' win streak by defeating Rolles in a singles match. Sakuraba then started a new rivalry with Minoru Suzuki, while also forming a partnership with Toru Yano, who was also involved in his own rivalry with Suzuki's Suzuki-gun stable. The partnership led to Sakuraba becoming an associate of Yano and Nakamura's Chaos stable, eventually becoming a full-time member. The rivalry between Sakuraba and Suzuki culminated in a match on January 4, 2015, at Wrestle Kingdom 9 in Tokyo Dome, where Sakuraba was defeated.

On April 5 at Invasion Attack 2015, Sakuraba submitted Katsuyori Shibata in a tag team match, where he and Yano defeated Shibata and Hiroshi Tanahashi, igniting a rivalry between the former Laughter7 partners. The two faced off on July 5 at Dominion 7.5 in Osaka-jo Hall in a match, where Shibata was victorious.

Pro Wrestling Noah (2019–present)

After wrestling sporadically for independent promotions for a few years, Sakuraba returned to wrestling full-time for Pro Wrestling Noah, aligning himself with the Sugiura-gun faction headed by Takashi Sugiura. On 30 August 2020 Sakuraba and Sugiura defeated AXIZ (Go Shiozaki and Katsuhiko Nakajima) for the vacant GHC Tag Team Championship, Sakuraba's first ever pro-wrestling title. In September Sakuraba entered the annual N1-Victory tournament as a singles competitor, finishing on 4 points with 2 wins and 3 losses. As of 22 November Sakuraba and Sugiura have successfully defended the GHC tag titles on two occasions.

Early career

Though sources often cite Sakuraba's match with Kimo Leopoldo on July 14, 1996, as his first experience with mixed martial arts, there is debate about whether it was a shoot or a worked match. Sakuraba himself stated that he doesn't remember it. However, his first contact with MMA can be traced to his different style fight at 26 June 1996 against Dutch kickboxer Rene Rooze, which Sakuraba won by ankle hold.

Professional wrestling

Kingdom

Kingdom One Million Yen Tournament (1997)

Nikkan Sports

Outstanding Performance Award (1999)

Wrestler of the Year (2000)

Pro Wrestling Illustrated

Ranked No. 238 of the top 500 singles wrestlers in the PWI 500 in 2017

Pro Wrestling Noah

GHC Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Takashi Sugiura

Tokyo Sports

Best Tag Team Award (2020) – with Takashi Sugiura

From Wikipedia’s article on Kazushi Sakuraba (this version), CC BY-SA 4.0.

Personal life

  • BornJul 14, 1969, Katagami5
  • CitizenshipJapan6

Sakuraba is married and has a son. He is an atheist.

He has never cared much about diet and admits to drinking alcohol and being a smoker.

Regarding the notable differences in weight between himself and his opponents throughout his career, as well as the banning of IVs for rehydration (and potential PED usage), Sakuraba has stated through an interpreter that "it doesn't matter if they [the opponent] use a pill or medicine to get bigger or smaller, I just train hard, eat healthy, fight at my weight and try my best to beat them. For me it doesn't matter if they use drugs, but I would not use it. I'm sure it's bad if they use it to win."

About his proneness to fight outside his weight class, Sakuraba declared "the more impossible the fights got, the more willing to accept them I became". Although he once desired to fight him, he later cited Fedor Emelianenko as the only fighter he ever refused to fight.

In June 2021, Sakuraba was a torch bearer for the 2020 Summer Olympics.

From Wikipedia’s article on Kazushi Sakuraba (this version), CC BY-SA 4.0.

Awards

  • Date not recordedWrestling Observer Newsletter Hall of Fame7

Sources

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