5-Star BOOK Reviews: Jushin Liger’s Books, Part VIII

Welcome back to my coverage of Jushin Liger’s three-book autobiography. We’re still in the first book and today we’ll cover a period of about two years, from the start of 1995 to the end of 1996. A lot happens to Liger during this period: he suffers an injury that sidelines him for almost a full year, he discovers he has a brain tumor, and his booking skills are put to the test in another ambitious junior heavyweight gambit. How does he deal with all of these challenges? Read on to find out.

You can read part 1 here, parts 2 & 3 here, parts 4 & 5 here, and parts 6 & 7 here.

Chapter 8: Long-Term Absence

Liger opens with a discussion on Tiger Mask III, played by Koji Kanemoto. Liger describes Kanemoto’s run with the mask as a setback which motivated him to improve. Liger uses Kanemoto as an example of an important philosophy: that it’s okay to fail when you’re young as long as you learn from those failures. He compares himself to Kanemoto, how, as the one and only Jushin Liger, he was able to enjoy the process of trial and error whereas Kanemoto had to fight against the shadow of the original (APOD: And, indirectly, the second iteration, played by Mitsuharu Misawa, as well).

Next Liger talks about Shinjiro Otani and puts him over huge and calls him “a bundle of talent from a young age.” Liger recalls advocating for Otani to have a rocket strapped to his ass and booking him for the Best of the Super Juniors tournament only a year after his debut under a “strike while the iron is hot” mentality. Otani is described as having outstanding innate pro wrestling sense, which is something one cannot improve with practice alone (APOD: The best Liger/Otani match took place in February 1997. It’s one of the best matches you’ll ever see and it’s part of a chain of world class matches all throughout that year that includes New Japan, All Japan, WWF, WCW, and lucha).

Despite his lack of amateur credentials, Otani had the ability to convince viewers he was born to do pro wrestling. Liger compares pro wrestling to Japan’s national sports, baseball. In baseball, trainees and rookies are usually given three years to show promise before they’re cut. NJPW, from Liger’s observations, only gave trainees one year. Pro wrestling was indeed that strict when he was around. Liger also compares Otani to one of his contemporaries Tatsuhiko Takaiwa, who was a power wrestler described as hardworking yet clumsy. Takaiwa would often get scolded by guys like Riki Choshu but still went on to have a solid enough of a career to earn the nickname “The Super Dragon” of NJPW’s juniors (APOD: not to be confused with the other, more infamous Super Dragon of professional wrestling). Liger waxes nostalgic over this period, how these guys, along with El Samurai and Kendo Kashin, were the focus of the junior division and their singles and tag matches created many long-term fans.

As another surprise, Liger describes his first encounter with Genichiro Tenryu, whom he calls one of his benefactors. Inoki had taught Liger what fighting is, Fujiwara taught him techniques, but Tenryu taught him how to think about his career. As Liger put it, Tenryu convinced him to continue wrestling until he felt 100% full and satisfied, and if he quit before that point he would be embarrassed and make multiple failed and unsatisfying comebacks (APOD: Tenryu wrestled all the way until 2015, despite his career peak being between the mid-80s and the mid-90s). The key out of all of this was for Liger to understand that a career must have finality and a beautiful conclusion, which is something he observed in Tenryu’s retirement match with Kazuchika Okada. Liger summarizes Tenryu thusly:

“Tenryu had an image like a “rocky mountain.” His strength lies in his rugged offense; he’s not the type of wrestler who is particularly skillful or technical. But precisely because of that, he created an aura that resonated with the fans. He was a wrestler who embodied not technique or logic, but “This is professional wrestling! This is fighting!”

Talk of Tenryu leads Liger into his next wrestler, Satoru Sayama, a.k.a. Original Tiger Mask, whom Tenryu faced in 2010 and Liger faced in a ten-minute special exhibition in 1994. Fans had wanted to see Liger face the mask star but Sayama wrestled as himself instead since, at the time, he was fully invested in his shooto style. Despite being bulkier than his peak days revolutionizing wrestling opposite Dynamite Kid, Sayama was still a skilled and challenging opponent.

As we get into 1995, Liger talks about that year’s version of the Super J Cup (APOD: Scott covered that here, Mike covered it here, and Maffew covered it here). Liger originally wanted it to occur every four years like the Olympics, and agrees on rotating hosting. WAR hosts this tournament instead of New Japan, which Liger says was done to continue the mutually beneficial relationship between NJPW and the smaller indies around it. Liger believes that having wrestlers from other organizations appear in New Japan was a good way to stimulate fans and revitalize the product (APOD: A lesson that rival All Japan figured out WAY too late). However, unlike the first one, this time Liger isn’t involved in the booking whatsoever. Liger also jokes that being solely focused on his matches helped him win this version while attributing Ultimo’s loss to him being booker this time around.

Liger turns the clock back for a moment to his dream match with Gran Hamada in August 1994.He recalls Hamada being another fundamentally sound wrestler with an incredible training regimen that included, among other things, doing push-ups and squats in the sauna. In keeping with this theme of big matches and memorable events, Liger explains why he hasn’t held any big anniversary shows. To him, all the backstage stuff is “troublesome” and he’d rather avoid doing all of that and stick to wrestling (APOD: Yet somehow he’s fine with booking the Super J Cup and the J-Crown. I guess he’s more comfortable booking shows not centred on himself).

Then September 1995 rolls around and Liger suffers his first major injury in the form of a left ankle fracture. Liger goes for a simple baseball slide under Keiji Muto’s legs and his left ankle bends sideways in the process. In a split second Liger gets up, takes one step, and then collapses as the injury sets in. Liger recalls not feeling pain but numbness, and then when he looks down he’s shocked to find his toes aren’t where they’re supposed to be. Muto’s about to work the leg when he realizes Liger’s legit hurt so Liger rolls to his partner Choshu, who tags in and kicks Liger out of the ring, because, Choshu. This injury couldn’t happen at a worse time since Liger was scheduled to face Muta two days later then defend his IWGP Junior Heavyweight title against Hamada three days after that. This injury had more, wider repercussions as well: NJPW was looking to create a special event with partner company AAA, something resembling CMLL’s current-day Fantastica Mania event. Liger isn’t bitter about these events, however: events at the time were proceeding “too smoothly” and says, “Stumbling a bit is just like me and maybe just right”.

Liger’s injury puts him on the shelf for 11 months. During the first three he spends time in a hospital overseeing Ryogoku Kokugikan, which allows him to tell when NJPW is hosting shows. As it turns out, that particular hospital is frequently used by other athletes, including sumo wrestlers and soccer players. Because of the intense and at times limiting rehab schedule, Liger has to get around by hopping on his good foot and stayed in relatively good shape by doing weight training in his room. When not training, Liger has many people visiting him, and since he has a private room when he couldn’t sleep he’d keep busy by playing with clay. Liger also notes that plans for the 1994 year-end Super Grade Tag League were for him to team with Black Tiger (i.e. Eddy Guerrero), but with his injury Liger is replaced by The Great Sasuke.

Chapter 9: U-Inter and J-Crown Unification

Liger returns to wrestling in August 1995 and about two months later NJPW begins its famous UWFi Invasion angle (APOD: the one that drew so much money Eric Bischoff used it as a template for The Outsiders). The first effect this angle has on Liger is that it allows him to reunite with Naoki Sano after five years. But even though Liger recognized and remained familiar with several of the names involved – Nobuhiko Takada and Kazuo Yamazaki in particular – the relationship between promotional offices was a different story. Masahiro Chono had once publicly expressed his wish to face Takada but nothing ever came of it. Then there’s the 100 Million Yen incident I touched on in my Mitsuharu Misawa book reviews, which angered AJPW and NJPW by putting their respective challenged champions in a corner. Liger himself shows much interest in the NJPW/UWFi angle, but the only person he’s interested in facing is Sano since he’s was the only junior heavyweight from Liger’s training class still active. Liger gets his wish and wrestles Sano at the October 1995 Tokyo Dome show, and despite losing he considers himself the victor because he gets Sano to pull off a Tope Suicida, which is outside the UWFI style and closer in line with Liger’s junior style. This specific idea is reinforced with the finish, a three-count following a Tiger Suplex, since UWFi didn’t do pinfalls.

Around the same time, something really simple sets off an argument about a match that, in Liger’s words, leads to irreconcilable differences. Liger teams with Muto against Sano and Takada, and in that match Takada refuses to break up a pin attempt on his own partner. This angers Liger because he’s supposed to help his partner since this is in line with NJPW’s rules. But Takada, wanting to focus on his own style, remains defiant in pursuit of his own ideals. This is considered a difference in ideology and it conjures up another reference to a famous quote by Nick Bockwinkel: “If the opponent dances the waltz, I dance the waltz; if they dance the jitterbug, I dance the jitterbug.” Liger says the first thing a wrestler needs to think about is making the match work. In this regard, he considers Sano a great wrestler who could blend well, while Takada…not so much.

Liger shifts back towards other promotions like WAR and Michinoku Pro, and how wrestlers like Gedo and Dick Togo stand out so much. While those guys might not be in line with MPW’s typical image of flashy techniques, they both had good physiques and could take hits well enough (APOD: Both Gedo and Togo would end up booking NJPW starting in 2011, with Gedo having the longest booking tenure and Togo coming in years later). Over time, these impressive juniors started appearing more on NJPW undercards and brought with them various belts. Then in June 1996 an event takes place called Skydiving J, which features seven junior heavyweight title matches. After Liger beats Togo to win the MPW British Commonwealth Junior Heavyweight Championship, he decides to unify all of these belts a few weeks later during the 1996 G1 Climax.

Looking back Liger considers this to have been a “forceful proposal” but found it appropriate since, at the time, the boundaries in the junior heavyweight division were becoming less distinct compared to the heavyweight division. His original idea was meant to echo Inoki’s IWGP concept of the IWGP (International Wrestling Grand Prix): gather champions from each region and organization to decide the strongest man in the pro wrestling world. He also saw it as a means of adding clarity and organization to a subset of wrestling muddied by dubious and inconsistent definition: junior heavyweight, light heavyweight, welterweight, etc. And since Liger was having fun putting this together, he thought the fans would too. At the same time he does recall getting some pushback from some of the participants, mainly over them relinquishing their recently-won belts for an unproven dream idea conjured up by an outsider in the big company.

The ’96 G1 begins and eight titles are up for grabs in a series of tournament matches. Liger understands the importance of this event, especially since NJPW is gracious enough to put these matches alongside G1 tournament matches, which are the flagship of the company’s annual touring schedule. However, Liger loses in the first round to Ultimo Dragón in 2:38, eliminating him from competition. Even his wife scolds him half-jokingly, asking him why he’s losing since he’s the one who suggested this. Ever the philosopher, Liger attributes this loss to the old adage, “If you chase two rabbits you’ll lose them both”, arguing that his concentration was split between wrestling and booking. In the end Great Sasuke defeats Ultimo for the J-Crown, meaning that a tournament orchestrated by NJPW had no NJPW wrestlers in the final, which Liger claims is akin to lending your house to tenants and them taking it over.

Things take another turn as a few days later, on the last day of the G1, Liger learns he has a brain tumor. He turns the clock back about a year when he first returns from his broken leg. At some point during one of his first matches back he falls out of the ring, hits his head, and loses consciousness. An MRI is done which reveals a shadow “the size of four pachinko balls” deep behind his left ear. Initial talks mention a craniotomy, but after a bit of discussion the doctors opt for a surgery with a Gamma knife (used for stereotactic radiosurgery) which enables Liger to return to wrestling within a week. Liger laughs off the whole thing as a fortunate misfortune since the tumor was benign and caught early. Since he wasn’t showing any symptoms, there was no need for immediate surgery. So he put it off for a bit, not realizing the “matter” was growing bigger. Still, there’s never this sense of major worry or peril as Liger’s wife tells him that right after she and their kids are done talking to him post-operation she’s taking the kids to Disneyland. Liger concludes this chapter reminding people that the story of “Jushin Liger returns to wrestling after a brain tumor” isn’t anywhere near as big of a deal as it sounds.

APOD: This was another interesting section with some fascinating details and opinions. Liger playing down his brain tumor was interesting since the narrative surrounding it has been that, while benign, it forced Liger to change his wrestling style away from high-flying. From his own recollections it didn’t affect him that much so maybe he just decided to slow down and stick to the mat more 1997-onwards, which ended up being a great idea since he had several amazing matches without being pigeonholed into flying around. At the same time, while Liger never really comes off as angry or bitter, he’s far from angelic. His argument with Takada over styles and doing what’s best for the match made sense to an extent, but I don’t think it was worth framing as a matter of irreconcilable differences. Lastly, I think it’s clear that Liger as a booker really deserves credit for making important and historic decisions. The differences between the J Cup Liger booked and the one he didn’t were fairly pronounced, at least in terms of talent and flow. Liger can also be credited with the J-Crown, which led further elevated the junior heavyweight scene both locally and internationally. It’s clear that Liger handled these challenges well enough, so let’s see how he deals with other challenges as we approach the end of the decade and NJPW’s infamous MMA-centric downward spiral.

As always, thanks for reading.