Jun Akiyama
| Jun Akiyama | |
|---|---|
Akiyama in August 2008.
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| Born |
October 9, 1969 Izumi, Osaka |
| Professional wrestling career | |
| Ring name(s) | AJ Ranger White Jun Akiyama Mr. Christmas Shura White Santa |
| Billed height | 1.88 m (6 ft 2 in) |
| Billed weight | 110 kg (240 lb) |
| Debut | September 17, 1992 |
Jun Akiyama (秋山 準 Akiyama Jun?, born October 9, 1969) is a Japanese professional wrestler, currently working for All Japan Pro Wrestling (AJPW), where he is the president, representative director, co-head booker, and former two-time Triple Crown Heavyweight Champion. Akiyama is known for his serious style and outstanding, time-tested work as a tag team wrestler, as well as his innovation of the Blue Thunder Driver and the wrist–clutch exploder suplex.
In junior high school, Akiyama practiced swimming and in senior high school he did freestyle amateur wrestling and judo. After high school he went to Senshu University in Tokyo. There he joined an amateur wrestling team that produced other professional wrestlers Riki Choshu, Hiroshi Hase and Manabu Nakanishi.
Akiyama had great success as an amateur wrestler and was eventually scouted by All Japan Pro Wrestling (AJPW). He made his professional wrestling debut in September 1992 in a match against Kenta Kobashi, which he lost. He gradually rose in rank, earning a trial series in January 1993. Afterwards, Akiyama started competition in tag teams. The tag team division soon became his specialty, teaming with Takao Omori against Kenta Kobashi and Mitsuharu Misawa. On more than one occasion, Dave Meltzer rated the matches they had together five stars. In 1995, he split with Taue, and was selected to be Misawa's partner after he split with Kobashi. The two teamed together successfully and won the World Tag Team Championship during 1996. Akiyama and Misawa also competed in the World's Strongest Tag Determination League tournaments in 1996 and 1997, but lost in successive years to the team of Toshiaki Kawada and Akira Taue. Akiyama then began closing in on the Triple Crown Heavyweight Championship, first challenging Misawa in September 1997, again challenging Misawa in January 1998, Kobashi in July 1998 and Vader in January 2000. He was unsuccessful on all occasions, and never managed to capture the championship.
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