Tatsumi Fujinami

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Tatsumi Fujinami
Statistics
Ring name(s) Tatsumi Fujinami
"Honoo no Hiryū"
Dr. Fujinami
Billed height 183 cm (6 ft)
Billed weight 104 kg (228 lb)
Born December 28, 1953
Kunisaki, Ōita
Trained by Karl Gotch
Antonio Inoki
Debut May 9, 1971 vs. Kanji Kitazawa

Tatsumi Fujinami (Fujinami Tatsumi, 藤波辰巳) is a Japanese professional wrestler who is famous for his gimmick as "The Dragon". He is the one who is credited for inventing the Dragon Sleeper and the Dragon Suplex.

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Fujinami started in the old Japanese Wrestling Association under Antonio Inoki's wing. When Inoki was fired from JWA in 1971, Fujinami and a few others followed him in forming a new promotion, New Japan Pro Wrestling. Inoki, Fujinami, Osamu Kido and Kōtetsu Yamamoto are recognized as NJPW's founding fathers.

In those early days he served as opponent for debuting rookies, such as Mr. Pogo, Yoshiaki Fujiwara and Gran Hamada. Fujinami, Fujiwara, Hamada and three other rookies competed in the 1974 Karl Gotch Cup (a tournament for rookies, forerunner to the later Young Lions Cup).

In the late 1970's Fujinami was sent abroad, to Mexico's Universal Wrestling Association and to Jim Crockett Promotions in the U.S. In the late 1970's he went to the WWWF, where he won the WWWF Junior Heavyweight Championship[1] and brought it back to Japan, establishing it as the premier junior heavyweight title in Japan. Fujinami would be the first wrestler to be successful in both the junior heavyweight and heavyweight divisions.

His "most remembered" match in the U.S. was when he defended his NWA World Heavyweight title against Ric Flair in a title vs. title re-match at the first ever WCW SuperBrawl in Florida after a controversial match in Japan. Flair retained his WCW Championship and regained Fujinami's title by a school boy pin with a handful of tights.

In recent years Fujinami has decreased his work load upon being named President of NJPW in 1999 (he was nevertheless ousted in 2004). His last title reign in NJPW was a IWGP World Tag Team Championship with disciple Osamu Nishimura in October 2001, and his last title shot ever was a AJPW Triple Crown bout against Keiji Mutoh in December of the same year (Mutoh had not affiliated himself exclusively with AJPW at the time). Recently he and Nishimura began running their Muga promotion again, focusing on pure catch wrestling which seems to have been relegated by NJPW.

Main finishing move early on in his career when he wrestled as a junior heavyweight.
Adapted as a finishing move early on in his career after injuring his neck and being forced to stop using the Dragon Suplex.

  • CWA Intercontinental Heavyweight Championship (1 time)
  • National
  • Regional
  • PWI ranked him #31 of the 500 best singles wrestlers during the "PWI Years" in 2003

  1. ^ http://www.pwi-online.com/pages/wrestlingyears.html
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org../../../t/a/t/Tatsumi_Fujinami_14bc.html"
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