Thursday, March 28, 2024
Kazuchika Okada

Kazuchika Okada

Born:
11/08/1987
,
Anjō, Aichi, Japan
Birthname:
Kazuchika Okada
Height & Weight:
6'3"
,
236 Ib

Titles Won:

  • IWGP World Heavyweight Championship (2 times)
  • IWGP Heavyweight Championship (5 times)
  • NEVER Openweight 6-Man Tag Team Championship – with Hiroshi Tanahashi and Tomohiro Ishii
  • G1 Climax (2012, 2014, 2021)
  • New Japan Cup (2013, 2019)
  • Best Bout (2017) vs. Kenny Omega on June 11
  • AEW Continental Championship

As of March 2024, he is signed to All Elite Wrestling (AEW), where he is a member of The Elite stable and is a 1-time AEW Continental Champion. He is best known for his 18-year tenure in New Japan Pro-Wrestling where he was a five-time IWGP Heavyweight Champion, with his fourth reign being the longest in the company’s history at 720 days.

He also holds the record for most successful title defenses with 12. After the title was unified into the IWGP World Heavyweight Championship, Okada went on to hold the new championship a record two times.

Initially trained by Último Dragón and making his debut in August 2004, Okada spent his first years in professional wrestling working in Mexico, before returning to Japan and making NJPW his home promotion in mid-2007. Originally working as a junior heavyweight, Okada graduated to the heavyweight division in April 2008, with limited success.

In February 2010, NJPW sent Okada on a learning excursion to American promotion Total Nonstop Action Wrestling (TNA), where he spent the next twenty months, mainly performing on the promotion’s secondary television program, Xplosion. From January to March 2011, he performed under the name Okato on TNA’s primary television program, Impact!, as Samoa Joe’s sidekick in his rivalry with D’Angelo Dinero.

Okada’s run with TNA ended in October 2011 and he returned to NJPW in January 2012, repackaged as “Rainmaker”, complete with a new look and a villainous persona. Just a month later, Okada defeated Hiroshi Tanahashi to win NJPW’s top title, the IWGP Heavyweight Championship, which he would hold for four months before losing it back to Tanahashi. The following August, Okada won NJPW’s premier tournament, the G1 Climax.

At the end of the year, the Tokyo Sports magazine named Okada the 2012 MVP in all of Japanese professional wrestling. The following year, Okada first won the New Japan Cup in March and then regained the IWGP Heavyweight Championship from Tanahashi in April. After a thirteen-month reign, Okada lost the title in May 2014.

Three months later, he won his second G1 Climax. Okada went on to win his third G1 Climax in 2021 and his fourth in 2022, which makes him the wrestler with the second-most wins in the tournament with four, just behind Masahiro Chono who has five. Okada has since won the IWGP Heavyweight Championship three more times and headlined NJPW’s biggest annual event—Wrestle Kingdom—eight times (7, 9, 10, 11, 12, 14, 16, and 17). Okada left NJPW in March 2024 and signed with AEW shortly thereafter.

Widely considered one of the greatest professional wrestlers of all time, he became the first Japanese wrestler to top Pro Wrestling Illustrateds list of the top 500 wrestlers in the world in 2017. Readers of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter named him as the most outstanding wrestler of the 2010s in March 2020.

Okada’s match with Kenny Omega at Dominion 6.9 in Osaka-jo Hall in June 2018 is regarded as one of the greatest professional wrestling matches of all time, and received a rating of seven stars by journalist Dave Meltzer, the highest rating Meltzer has ever awarded a wrestling match. Okada was inducted into the Wrestling Observer Newsletter Hall of Fame in 2021 (his first year of eligibility).

Notable Feuds: vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi, vs. Kenny Omega, vs. Jay White

Other Notable Achievements:

  • Nikkan Sports
    • MVP Award (2012, 2013, 2015, 2017)
    • Match of the Year Award (2012) vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi on February 12
    • Match of the Year Award (2014) vs. Shinsuke Nakamura on August 10
    • Match of the Year Award (2017) vs. Kenny Omega on January 4
    • Match of the Year Award (2018) vs. Kenny Omega on June 9
    • Outstanding Performance Award (2012)
  • Pro Wrestling Illustrated
    • Ranked No. 1 of the top 500 singles wrestlers in the PWI 500 in 2017
    • Match of the Year (2017) vs. Kenny Omega at Wrestle Kingdom 11
    • Match of the Year (2018) vs. Kenny Omega at Dominion 6.9 in Osaka-jo Hall
    • Feud of the Year (2017) vs. Kenny Omega
  • Tokyo Sports
    • Best Bout Award (2012) vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi on June 16
    • Best Bout Award (2014) vs. Shinsuke Nakamura on August 10
    • Best Bout Award (2015) vs. Genichiro Tenryu on November 15
    • Best Bout Award (2016) vs. Naomichi Marufuji on July 18
    • Best Bout Award (2017) vs. Kenny Omega on January 4
    • Best Bout Award (2018) vs. Kenny Omega on June 9
    • Best Bout Award (2019) vs. Sanada on October 14
    • Best Bout Award (2020) vs. Tetsuya Naito on January 5 at Wrestle Kingdom 14
    • MVP Award (2012, 2013, 2015, 2019)
  • Toryumon Mexico
    • Young Dragons Cup (2005)
  • Wrestling Observer Newsletter
    • Best Wrestling Maneuver (2012, 2013) Rainmaker
    • Feud of the Year (2012, 2013) vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi
    • Feud of the Year (2017) vs. Kenny Omega
    • Most Improved (2012)
    • Most Outstanding Wrestler (2017)
    • Pro Wrestling Match of the Year (2013) vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi on April 7
    • Pro Wrestling Match of the Year (2016) vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi on January 4
    • Pro Wrestling Match of the Year (2017) vs. Kenny Omega on January 4
    • Pro Wrestling Match of the Year (2018) vs. Kenny Omega on June 9
    • Wrestler of the Year (2017)
    • Japan MVP (2019)
    • Most Outstanding Wrestler of the Decade (2010s)
    • Best Matches of the Decade (2010s)
    • Wrestling Observer Newsletter Hall of Fame (Class of 2021)