Tiger Mask

[The Great Gouki]

OK!! So I am sorry if I should have posted this in the General Board, but here's a question for everyone:


It's no doubt that Satoru Sayama and the Tiger Mask character revolutionized Jr. Heavyweights all over the world, and then some!!!
Wrestlers such as Hayabusa, Sabu, Ultimo Dragon, and Rey Mysterio Jr. have mentioned how Tiger Mask was one of their biggest inspirations. Even wrestlers that pick up the mantel of Black Tiger, dreaded rival to TM, became stars in their own right.

My question is who do you think was your favorite wrestler to wear the Tiger Mask?

Although I like Misawa...I liked him AFTER he unmasked. My Favorite without any question has got to be the Original Tiger Mask Sayama.

[Hisaharu Tanabe]

Sayama.

It's hard for the immitations to beat the original.

Jahno.

[The Great Gouki]

Ok, Hisa...to expand on that question a bit:

Who's your favorite wrestler to wear a Tiger Mask, that WASN'T a Tiger Mask...


for me,joke answer: King from Tekken 3

real anwser: Tiger Emperor...I think that's his name...wrestles for NOAH...Kotaro Suzuki I think....

[Hisaharu Tanabe]

Mark Rocco...if all those Black Tigers count.

Jahno.

[The Great Gouki]

That was Black Tiger 1 right?? I haven't seen too much of him. Is he still wrestling? The first Black Tiger I've seen was BT 2, Eddy Guerrero...I didn't dig the ankh on his mask! ^_^ Anyway, I came across a "Best of Tiger Mask" VHS I had, and I haven't got through it all yet. Some of it is bad quality..I think a friend copied it from a friend, ect,ect... I saw a few matches against Dynamite Kid, and there was even a WWE match on there. 1981 or 82, for the WWF Jr. Heavyweight title...crazy to see Howard Finkle giving a ring intro to Tiger Mask, it was cool though.

I also saw recently Sayama's UWF match against Akira Maeda...what was the story on that? All I know was Maeda supposedly gave Sayama low blows on purpose...

[stunning_grover]

About the Tiger Masks and the Black Tigers...

Tiger Mask I, the original Tiger Mask, Satoru Sayama was a revolutionary wrestler. His matches against Dynamite Kid were just light years ahead of their time.

And yes, Mark Rocco was Black Tiger I. He is currently retired. He was one of the greatest British pro wrestlers ever.

Eddy Guerrero did a great job as Black Tiger II. It's quite hard to follow in the footsteps of Black Tiger I as he was great, but Guerrero managed and that was one of the signs of Guerrero being one of the greatest wrestlers that ever lived.

Why didn't you like the Ankh on the mask? I thought it was pretty cool.


About the Sayama vs. Maeda match...

You are probably talking about the match from September 1985. Maeda was giving Sayama some low blows on purpose and Sayama basically told the referee to ring the bell and to disqualify Maeda. So there was some real heat there. It was Maeda's final UWF match as he was fired after the shoot incident. The UWF went out of business soon after that. Sayama retired from pro wrestling and turned his back on pro wrestling by exposing the wrestling business.

[The Great Gouki]

About the Ankh, I don't know...just didn't seem to look right you know? I've never seen the Tiger Mask cartoon, so if Black Tiger is on there with an Ankh then nevermind lol! But if he was say...the Black Sphinx I don't think I would have minded it too much. It'd be like a Native American character with Yin-Yangs on his outfit you know? Just seems out of place to me is all. ^_^