is a Japanese professional wrestler. He is signed to New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW).
Considered to be one of the greatest Japanese professional wrestlers of the 21st century and of all-time, he was the first wrestler to hold NJPW's IWGP Heavyweight Championship and All Japan Pro Wrestling (AJPW)'s Triple Crown Championship simultaneously, the fourth to win the three major heavyweight championships in Japan with the Triple Crown Heavyweight, IWGP Heavyweight, and Noah's GHC Heavyweight Championship, and one of three wrestlers to hold the IWGP Heavyweight Championship, Triple Crown Championship, and NWA Worlds Heavyweight Championship (the other two being Keiji Mutoh and Shinya Hashimoto), and is an overall eight-time world champion in major professional wrestling promotions.
As a team, he and Hiroyoshi Tenzan are six-time IWGP Tag Team Champions and became the first team to win G1 Tag League and World's Strongest Tag Determination League in the same year. He and Tenzan are also former NWA World Tag Team Champions. Between the NWA, AJPW, NJPW, and Noah, Kojima has held 20 total championships.
Early life Like many Japanese wrestlers, Kojima has a background in judo, but he chose not to continue the sport when he went to college. He got his start loading trucks for New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW), and after some months of persuasion finally convinced head trainer Animal Hamaguchi to accept him into the dojo.
Professional wrestling career
New Japan Pro-Wrestling (1991–2002) Kojima entered the NJPW Dojo in February 1991. He debuted as a wrestler on July 16, 1991 in a match against future tag team partner Hiroyoshi Yamamoto (later to be known as Hiroyoshi Tenzan) where Yamamoto won. In 1994 he defeated Manabu Nakanishi in the Young Lions Cup finals, winning the tournament. In the end of that year he went to Europe, including a spell in Orig Williams' British Wrestling Federation as face-painted Suzuki Karimoto (including appearances on Williams 's Welsh language TV wrestling show on S4C, Reslo and for Brian Dixon's All Star Wrestling as heel Mean Machine, and returned to NJPW in January 1996. When he returned, he formed The Bull Powers with Nakanishi, who had returned from WCW. In May 1997 he defeated Riki Choshu and Kensuke Sasaki with Nakanishi to become an IWGP Tag Team Champion for the first time. At the end of 1998 he joined nWo Japan, by Keiji Mutoh's leadership. Kojima and Tenzan (known together as Tencozy, a portmanteau of their last names) formed a tag team and ended up holding the IWGP Tag Team title together twice.
Major League Wrestling (2002–2003) On September 26, 2002, Kojima defeated Jerry Lynn to win the vacant MLW World Heavyweight Championship in New York. Kojima successfully defended the title five times in both MLW and All Japan Pro Wrestling. Kojima held the championship for a then record 267 days, before losing the title to Mike Awesome on June 20, 2003.
All Japan Pro Wrestling (2002–2010) In January 2002, in opposition to Antonio Inoki focusing the IWGP title on unreliable shoot style wrestlers such as Kazuyuki Fujita and Tadao Yasuda, as well as Inoki debuting his controversial "Inokiism" era where NJPW relied heavily on MMA shoot match crossovers, Kojima left NJPW with his mentor Keiji Mutoh, and joined All Japan Pro Wrestling where he was finally able to receive the push of a top star. One of Kojima's early feuds in AJPW was against "Dr. Death" Steve Williams and Mike Barton (Bart Gunn), who as AJPW loyalists didn't take kindly to Kojima's and Muto's "invasion" of the company. Kojima also fought against Genichiro Tenryu at this time, who would also become an AJPW loyalist.
In promos throughout 2002, Steve Williams often mentioned Satoshi Kojima as someone he would like to beat. Kojima and Williams would cross paths multiple times in tag-team matches, where on the March 23, 2002 edition of AJPW TV, Williams surprise attacked and suplexed Kojima when Kojima was cutting a promo on Tenryu. Kojima later turned babyface by December 2002, where on the December 6, 2002 pay-per-view Kojima and Taiyo Kea won the Real World Tag League of that year. Williams would watch the celebration somewhat jealously while reluctantly shaking Kojima's hand, looking down at the title on his shoulder. On the January 2, 2003 edition of AJPW TV Williams aggressively slapped Kojima in the corner of the ring during the New Year's Battle Royal before being eliminated, which Kojima went on to win. In January 2003, Williams and his partner Mike Rotunda defeated Kojima and his team three times in tag-team house show matches, but Williams ultimately left AJPW after its sale finalized. As a result a singles match between Williams and Kojima heading into 2003 never materialized.
Kojima would later hold both of the company's tag team titles, the World Tag Team Championship twice. On February 16, 2005, he won the Triple Crown Heavyweight Championship, AJPW's unified heavyweight championship from Toshiaki Kawada. Only four days later he won NJPW's heavyweight championship, the IWGP Heavyweight Championship, from his former tag team partner Hiroyoshi Tenzan in a cross-promotional double title match. The match had a unique finish designed to fool fans in attendance. The idea was to make it look like the match was going to end in a 60-minute time limit draw. However, with just seconds before the match would be declared a time limit draw, Tenzan, who was known to have a legitimate back injury, could not continue, resulting in Kojima being declared the winner and becoming the new IWGP Heavyweight Champion. NJPW officials had come up with the finish, which was designed to look like a "mistake", having agreed with AJPW that it would be better if Kojima won the match, but not wanting the match to end in a standard pinfall or submission. On May 14, 2005, Tenzan won the IWGP title back, but not the Triple Crown.
Upon joining AJPW, Kojima began to use the Great Koji (copying The Great Muta) and Great Kosuke (copying The Great Sasuke) personas for special matches.
On July 3, 2006, Kojima lost the Triple Crown to Taiyō Kea. Three days later it was revealed that Kojima would return to New Japan to compete in the 2006 G1 Climax, where he would go to lose in the finals against former tag team partner and rival Hiroyoshi Tenzan.
In October 2006 it was announced that Tencozy would reform for the upcoming World's Strongest Tag Determination League tournament. On December 2, 2006, the reformed Tencozy won the World's Strongest Tag Determination League defeating Kohei Suwama and RO'Z in the finals when Kojima used a lariat on RO'Z. The duo next faced Masahiro Chono and Keiji Mutoh at NJPW's Wrestle Kingdom in Tokyo Dome. They lost when Chono forced Tenzan to submit.
In July 2007, Kojima shocked the All-Japan Army when he betrayed them and joined the Voodoo Murders, where he was quickly made the group's co-leader along with TARU. Soon after joining, Kojima and TARU won the World Tag Team Championship from Toshiaki Kawada and Taiyō Kea. Kojima left the group in 2008 after returning from injury to side with his sworn friend Hiroyoshi Tenzan and to feud with the alliance of Great Bash Heel (Tenzan's former group) and the VooDoo Murders.
In 2008, Tenzan and Kojima became the first tag team to ever win G1 Tag League and World's Strongest Tag Determination League in the same year. Later he started his 1st stable named F4 (Friend Fight Fan and Future) with young proteges YAMATO and KAI. A 4th member in Zodiac joined later in 2009. On September 26, 2009, a few days after his 39th birthday Kojima lifted the All-Japan Triple Crown off of Yoshihiro Takayama, returning the titles to All-Japan and winning them for the 2nd time. He lost the title on March 21, 2010, to Ryota Hama.
Kojima's AJPW page was taken down soon before he agreed to compete in New Japan Pro-Wrestling's 20th annual G1 Climax. It is reported that he was plagued with an arm injury that required surgery and needed time off to heal. AJPW then refused to discuss re-signing Kojima until he was healthy. It has been reported Kojima was not pleased with this and began entertaining other possibilities.
Return to NJPW (2010–present)
Kojima returned to New Japan in August 2010 to take part in the 2010 G1 Climax tournament. His return match took place on August 6, 2010, when he teamed up with El Samurai in a tag team match, where they were defeated by Hirooki Goto and Ryusuke Taguchi. In the round robin stage of the tournament Kojima won five out his seven matches and won his block to advance to the finals, where, on August 15, he defeated Hiroshi Tanahashi to win G1 Climax. On October 11 Kojima defeated Togi Makabe to win the IWGP Heavyweight Championship for the second time. On December 11 Kojima made his first successful defense of the title, defeating Shinsuke Nakamura. On December 14 Kojima announced that he was starting his own stable, tentatively named Kojima Office, and named Taichi, who had accompanied him to the ring for his Nakamura match, its first member. Kojima turned heel on December 23, when he hit his number one contender Hiroshi Tanahashi with a lariat after a match, where he and Kota Ibushi had defeated Tanahashi and Prince Devitt. On January 4, 2011, at Wrestle Kingdom V in Tokyo Dome, Kojima lost the IWGP Heavyweight Championship to Tanahashi. On January 30 Kojima defeated Togi Makabe to earn a rematch with Tanahashi. Meanwhile, the newly renamed Kojima-gun expanded to include Taka Michinoku and Nosawa Rongai, who in turn used his connections to get MVP to also join the group. Kojima received his rematch for the IWGP Heavyweight Championship on February 20 at The New Beginning, but was again defeated by Tanahashi. After Kojima was defeated by Togi Makabe on May 3, Taichi and Taka Michinoku turned on him and named the returning Minoru Suzuki as their new leader, while Kojima himself formed a new partnership with Makabe and MVP, who left the stable after Suzuki took over. On July 18, Suzuki defeated Kojima in a singles match. The two had a rematch on August 1 during the first day of the 2011 G1 Climax, where Kojima managed to pick up the win. Kojima managed to win five more matches in the tournament, but a loss to former partner Hiroyoshi Tenzan on the final day eliminated him from the running for a spot in the finals. After the tournament Kojima was sidelined indefinitely with an eye injury suffered during the match with Tenzan.