Team Japan is a professional wrestling group that was brought together as a part of

Total Nonstop Action Wrestling Total Nonstop Action Wrestling (abbreviated as TNA Wrestling or TNA) is an American professional wrestling promotion based in Nashville, Tennessee. It is a subsidiary of Anthem Sports & Entertainment, a Canadian media company owned by busines ...

World X Cup Tournament The world is the totality of entities, the whole of reality, or everything that exists. The nature of the world has been conceptualized differently in different fields. Some conceptions see the world as unique, while others talk of a "plu ...

History

2004

Team Japan started as six-man team as team captain Nosawa from

All Japan Pro Wrestling (AJPW/AJP) or simply All Japan is a Puroresu, Japanese professional wrestling Professional wrestling promotion, promotion founded on October 21, 1972, by Giant Baba after he left the Japanese Wrestling Association to create his own promotion. Ma ...

teamed with Osaka Pro Wrestling's Ebessan and Kamen competed in non-tournament exhibition match. They lost to Elix Skipper, Sonjay Dutt and Chris Sabin. For the World X-Cup event in May 2008, Nosawa dropped Ebessan and Kamen and replaced them with Mitsu Hirai Jr., Ryuji Hijikata and Taichi Ishikari, all of whom were like Nosawa from All Japan. They enjoyed some success in exhibitions and singles matches not related to the tournament itself, but failed to have any significant success in the actual tournament and were quickly eliminated, leaving

Team Canada Canadian National Team or Team Canada may refer to: Canada at multi-sport events * Canada at the Olympics ** Canadian Olympic Committee * Canada at the Paralympics ** Canadian Paralympic Committee * Canada at the Commonwealth Games * Canada at ...

Team Mexico Team Mexico is a professional wrestling stable that was first formed in 2004 to compete in TNA Wrestling's America's X-Cup Tournament and has since returned to compete in other TNA X Cup Tournaments. History 2004 The original team consisted of ...

, and

Team USA The United States national team or Team USA may refer to any of a number of sports team representing the United States in international competitions. Olympic teams Additionally, these teams may compete in other international competitions such as ...

for the finals which were held under

Ultimate X The Ultimate X match is a type of professional wrestling match created by Total Nonstop Action Wrestling (TNA), mainly used in their X Division. It is considered the signature match of the X Division. Match format Ultimate X is contested by th ...

rules. After the X-Cup event, Nosawa teamed with fellow All Japan wrestler

Kazushi Miyamoto is a Japanese professional wrestler. Career Kazushi Miyamoto will forever have the distinction of being the first post-split graduate of the All Japan Pro Wrestling dojo. While in the Dojo Miyamoto was trained by Hiroshi Hase, Johnny Smith, and ...

for several months under the Team Japan name. They disappeared from TNA after Victory Road.

2006

Team Japan returned to TNA for the TNA 2006 World X-Cup Tournament. On the March 11, 2006 episode of

TNA Impact! ''TNA Impact!'' (stylized as ''TNA iMPACT!'') is an American professional wrestling television program produced by the American promotion Total Nonstop Action Wrestling (TNA) that debuted on June 4, 2004. It also features wrestlers from WWE's ...

Mike Tenay Michael William Tenay (born March 1, 1955) is an American podcast presenter and retired professional wrestling play-by-play announcer known for his time as an announcer for World Championship Wrestling (WCW) and Total Nonstop Action Wrestling. T ...

said that Puma would be on Team Japan for the competition.

Jushin Thunder Liger , better known as and later , is a Japanese retired Professional wrestling, professional wrestler and mixed martial artist, signed to New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW) as a trainer. He is the longest-tenured member of the NJPW roster, having work ...

was shortly thereafter announced to be the captain of the team. Rumored members of the team included

Hiroshi Tanahashi is a Japanese professional wrestler, sports executive and Podcast, podcaster. He is signed to New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW), where he serves as the president and representative director of the promotion, and is also an active wrestler. Widel ...

, Black Tiger, and

Tiger Mask is a Japanese manga series written by Ikki Kajiwara and illustrated by Naoki Tsuji. The series was first published in Kodansha's ''Bokura Magazine'' from 1968 to 1970 and was later published in ''Weekly Shōnen Magazine'' from 1970 to ...

. Oddly, the character of Black Tiger has always been that of a

heel The heel is the prominence at the posterior end of the foot. It is based on the projection of one bone, the calcaneus or heel bone, behind the articulation of the bones of the lower leg. Structure To distribute the compressive forces exerted ...

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

while Tiger Mask is the

babyface Babyface or Baby Face can refer to: Nicknames * Lester Joseph Gillis a.k.a. Baby Face Nelson, an infamous 1930s bank robber * Roosevelt "Baby Face" Willette (1933–1971), an American hard bop and soul-jazz musician * "Baby Face", Jimmy McLarnin ...

. The characters are that of "twins" with Black Tiger being the "evil twin". They do not tag and this would have been considered an unusual decision for TNA to make. These were proven as nothing more than rumors, and none of the rumored competitors were included on the team. Team Japan made its return at

TNA Lockdown 2006 The 2006 Lockdown was a professional wrestling pay-per-view (PPV) event produced by Total Nonstop Action Wrestling (TNA), which took place on April 23, 2006, at the Impact Zone in Orlando, Florida. It was the second annual event under the Lockdow ...

, with members

Hirooki Goto is a Japanese Professional wrestling, professional wrestler. He is signed to New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW), where he is the IWGP World Heavyweight Champion in his first reign. He is also one-half of the tag team Bishamon alongside Yoshi-Hashi. ...

, Minoru Tanaka, and Black Tiger competing in an exhibition six man tag match against

members

Jay Lethal Jamar Shipman (born April 29, 1985), better known by the ring name Jay Lethal, is an American professional wrestler. He is signed to All Elite Wrestling (AEW). He is best known for his tenures in Ring of Honor (ROH), Total Nonstop Action Wrest ...

Sonjay Dutt Retesh Bhalla (born April 7, 1982) is an American Professional wrestling, professional wrestler signed to All Elite Wrestling (AEW) as a Glossary of professional wrestling terms#agent, producer and Glossary of professional wrestling terms#manage ...

, and

Alex Shelley Patrick Kenneth Martin (born May 23, 1983), better known by the ring name Alex Shelley, is an American professional wrestler. He is signed to WWE, where he performs on the SmackDown (WWE brand), SmackDown brand. He is widely known for his tenure ...

. Team Japan pulled out the win in light of miscommunication on the part of Team USA. Liger was supposed to be a part of the exhibition competitions at Lockdown, as he was slated to face off with

Christopher Daniels Christopher Daniel Covell (born March 24, 1970), better known by the ring name Christopher Daniels, is an American retired Professional wrestling, professional wrestler. He is signed to All Elite Wrestling (AEW), where he works as the Head of Ta ...

. Due to travel conflicts, Liger was unable to make the pay-per-view, and TNA had to alter the card, declaring Daniels' opponent to be a mystery competitor. The competitor was later announced to be Senshi. Liger did, however, compete in a second round match against Petey Williams from Team Canada. Liger pulled out the win after a double underhook faceplant after teammates Hiroko Goto and Black Tiger interfered in the match. Team Japan was heavily favored to win the 2006 World X-Cup in light of TNA's talent-swap agreement with

New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW) is a Puroresu, Japanese professional-wrestling Professional wrestling promotion, promotion founded on January 13, 1972, by Antonio Inoki, and based in Nakano, Tokyo. It is currently majority owned by card-game company Bushiroad, with TV As ...

, but to the surprise of many, the team finished in last place. It is speculated that this may be due to a lack of participation from Team Captain,

who only made on-screen appearances in the tournament during

Sacrifice Sacrifice is an act or offering made to a deity. A sacrifice can serve as propitiation, or a sacrifice can be an offering of praise and thanksgiving. Evidence of ritual animal sacrifice has been seen at least since ancient Hebrews and Gree ...

. All four members of the 2006 Team Japan were also members of Liger's heel Control Terrorism Unit (C.T.U.) stable from NJPW.

2008

Team Japan returned to

TNA Wrestling Total Nonstop Action Wrestling (abbreviated as TNA Wrestling or TNA) is an American professional wrestling promotion based in Nashville, Tennessee. It is a subsidiary of Anthem Sports & Entertainment, a Canadian media company owned by busine ...

for the 2008 World X-Cup.

Naruki Doi is a Japanese professional wrestler currently performing for Dragon Gate, DDT Pro-Wrestling and All Japan Pro-Wrestling as a freelancer. He also wrestled for Ring of Honor (ROH) and Total Nonstop Action Wrestling (TNA); in the former promotio ...

and

Masato Yoshino is a retired Japanese professional wrestler, best known for working in Dragon Gate, where he was known as ''Speed Star''. Dragon Gate's second Grand Slam champion, having been a record six-time Open the Brave Gate Champion, four-time Open ...

debuted on the June 12 edition of "Impact!" with a loss to The Motor City Machine Guns of

Team TNA Team USA (also known as Team NWA or Team TNA) is a wrestling faction brought together as part of Total Nonstop Action Wrestling's X-Cup Tournaments, which involved a team of X Division contestants from various countries representing their nation ...

would go on to win the World X Cup. American T. J. Perkins, performing as Puma, became the first wrestler to represent two different countries in the World X Cup, having wrestled as part of Team Mexico in 2006.

Members

2004

NOSAWA , better known by his ring names Nosawa and , is a Japanese retired professional wrestler, best known for his appearances in All Japan Pro Wrestling and various independent promotions. Career Early career (19952004) Nosawa spent most of his ear ...

(Captain) *

Kuishinbo Kamen is a Japanese professional wrestler better known as , a masked clown character. Kuishinbo Kamen is Japanese for "Gluttonous Mask". For a while he was forced to give up the Kuishinbo Kamen character, instead he worked as "Super Robo K", a futuris ...

(Never wrestled in the 2004 World X Cup) *

Mitsunobu Kikuzawa , better known as his wrestling persona and , is a Japanese professional wrestler who works as a freelancer. Though best known for wrestling under a mask, he also regularly works unmasked under the ring name Kikuzawa (stylized in all capital l ...

(Never wrestled in the 2004 World X Cup) * Mitsu Hirai Jr. *

Ryuji Hijikata (born May 17, 1978) is a Japanese professional wrestler also known under the ring name . Hijikata is best known for his tenure in Battlarts and All Japan Pro Wrestling since 2002 where he is a former World Junior Heavyweight Champion. Prof ...

Taichi Ishikari (born March 19, 1980) is a Japanese professional wrestler, better known by his ring name , shortened from his previous ring name . He is primarily working for New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW), where he is a member of the Just 4 Guys stable. He is ...

* Miyamoto (Joined TNA after the 2004 World X Cup)

2006

Jushin Liger , better known as and later , is a Japanese retired Professional wrestling, professional wrestler and mixed martial artist, signed to New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW) as a trainer. He is the longest-tenured member of the NJPW roster, having work ...

(Captain) * Black Tiger IV * Minoru Tanaka *

2008

Milano Collection A.T. , is a Japanese color commentator and retired professional wrestler, better known by his ring name . As Milano, Sawafuji adopted the gimmick of an Italian fashion aficionado/supermodel, reflected in his ring attire. Milano is also known for walkin ...

(Captain) * Puma *

(Never wrestled as part of the team, was replaced by Puma)

Competitive Record

World X Cup Record

References

{{reflist

External links

TNAWrestling.com (Official Website of TNA Wrestling)
Total Nonstop Action Wrestling teams and stables Lucha Libre AAA Worldwide teams and stables