Hiroshi Hase

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Hiroshi Hase
Born (1961-05-05) May 5, 1961 (age 63)
Oyabe, Toyama, Japan
Professional wrestling career
Ring name(s)Hiroshi Hase
Billed height186 cm (6 ft 1 in)
Billed weight106 kg (233 lb)
Trained byRiki Chōshū
Stu Hart
DebutFebruary 28 1986
RetiredAugust 27 2006

Hiroshi Hase (馳 浩, born on May 5 1961 in Oyabe, Toyama, Japan) is a retired Japanese professional wrestler who worked for New Japan Pro Wrestling and All Japan Pro Wrestling, prior to transitioning to a position in the Japanese parliament. He currently holds the position of chairman for the PWF, which is the governing body for all championships in All Japan Pro Wrestling. [1]

Career

Hase started his career as an amateur wrestler, representing Japan at the 1984 Summer Olympics. He placed ninth in the Greco-Roman wrestling tournament. He began his professional wrestling career in Calgary, under a mask, in a tag team known as the Viet Cong Express with Fumihiro Niikura. When he returned to Japan, Hase wrestled for NJPW's junior heavyweight division, winning the IWGP Jr. title twice in the late 1980s. He is one of a handful of wrestlers, Japanese or American, to successfully graduate from the junior to heavyweight class. In the 1990s, Hase had many memorable encounters with famous Japanese talents first in New Japan, and later All Japan. Hiroshi Hase was involved in a classic 1992 encounter with Great Muta, in which the "Muta Scale" was created, due to the incredible amount of blood shed by Muta.

Hase and Muta were also regular tag team partners; they won the IWGP Tag Team Championship twice, including a victory over the Steiner Brothers, and won the annual tag team tournament twice. As Muta became established as a singles wrestler through his holding of the IWGP Heavyweight Championship, however, Hase was left behind, and was only able to win the WCW International World Heavyweight Championship (which briefly replaced the NWA World Heavyweight Championship) for two weeks in 1994. In July 1995, Hiroshi Hase was elected into the Japanese House of Councillorsas the Senior Vice Minister of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology. Hase is one of a number of professional wrestlers to transition into politics, other notables being predecessor Antonio Inoki, and later Atsushi Onita and Great Sasuke. The following year he announced retirement from New Japan, only to jump to the rival All Japan Pro Wrestling. His last New Japan bout was against Tadao Yasuda (the retirement announcement was most likely done to avoid a loss to Yasuda, which would have been the outcome had he actually announced a withdrawal rather than a retirement).

In All Japan, Hase did not contend for titles again despite his name recognition, as he made politics his full-time job. In 2001 he was reelected by his constituency in Ishikawa Prefecture. The same year he founded the multipromotional Bad Ass Translate Trading stable with Muto, Taiyō Kea and Jinsei Shinzaki; Hase and Muto reformed their team to battle Jun Akiyama and Yuji Nagata on October 8, the rising stars of their respective promotions (NOAH and NJPW), and were defeated in a ceremonial passing of the torch match that highlighted the advancement of professional wrestling in Japan since it was permanently established in 1951. When Muto (along with Satoshi Kojima and Kendo Ka Shin) jumped to All Japan the following year, Hase was seen as having influenced them (if not Muto at least) in their decision. Antonio Inoki, who had once preceded Hase to the Japanese Diet, blasted Hase and suggested that he resign his position in the Diet, but nothing came out of this.

Hase's final match occurred on August 27, 2006. He tagged with Katsuhiko Nakajima & Satoshi Kojima to face TARU, Kohei Suwama, & "brother" YASSHI of the Voodoo Murderers. He pinned YASSHI with a Northern Lights Suplex for the victory. A week later, he was elected into the Wrestling Observer Newsletter Hall of Fame. On July 10, 2007, Hase took over the duty of the PWF chairman, after Stan Hansen (who held the position since 2000) voluntarily resigned from the position. [2]

In wrestling

Championships and accomplishments

References

  1. ^ "Stampede Wrestling Hall of Fame (1948-1990)". Puroresu Dojo. 2003. {{cite web}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |month= (help)

External links

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