{"id":137625,"date":"2025-07-06T16:12:39","date_gmt":"2025-07-06T20:12:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/?p=137625"},"modified":"2025-07-06T16:12:39","modified_gmt":"2025-07-06T20:12:39","slug":"tiger-mask-iv-announces-retirement-at-new-japan-soul-event","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/2025\/07\/06\/tiger-mask-iv-announces-retirement-at-new-japan-soul-event\/","title":{"rendered":"Tiger Mask IV Announces Retirement at New Japan Soul Event"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Following a loss against Hiroshi Tanahashi on the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/2025\/07\/06\/njpw-new-japan-soul-2025-results-7-6-2025\/\" target=\"_self\">final day of NJPW&#8217;s New Japan Soul<\/a> tour at Korakuen Hall, Tiger Mask announced that he will retire in July next year. During his backstage interview, the fourth iteration of Tiger Mask said that he has decided to call it a career in July 2026.<\/p>\n<p>Portrayed by Yoshihiro Yamazaki, the current Tiger Mask is the character&#8217;s longest-running and most enduring iteration. He debuted on July 15, 1995, facing The Great Sasuke in a singles match also at Korakuen Hall. Yamazaki was trained by the original Tiger Mask, Satoru Sayama, and succeeded Koji Kanemoto, who was forced to unmask after losing a high-stakes mask vs. mask match against Jushin Thunder Liger in 1994.<\/p>\n<h2>Tiger Mask IV Set to Retire<\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"vertical-align: inherit;\"><span style=\"vertical-align: inherit;\">The Tiger Mask character itself holds a unique place in both professional wrestling and pop culture history. The character was originally inspired by a popular manga and anime series created by Ikki Kajiwara and Naoki Tsuji. The series followed a heroic masked wrestler wrestling villainous opponents, and its popularity led to the debut of a real-life Tiger Mask in 1981, portrayed by Satoru Sayama.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"vertical-align: inherit;\"><span style=\"vertical-align: inherit;\">Sayama wore the mask from 1981 to 1984, revolutionizing junior heavyweight wrestling with his high-flying, hybrid martial arts-inspired style. After Sayama&#8217;s departure, the rights to the character were purchased by All Japan Pro Wrestling, with Mitsuharu Misawa becoming the second Tiger Mask from 1984 to 1990.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"vertical-align: inherit;\"><span style=\"vertical-align: inherit;\">Following Misawa&#8217;s unmasking to wrestle under his real name, Koji Kanemoto took over the mantle in 1992 but lost the mask in 1994. Yamazaki then stepped in as the fourth incarnation and has since maintained the character&#8217;s legacy for nearly three decades.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"vertical-align: inherit;\"><span style=\"vertical-align: inherit;\">Now 54 years old, Yamazaki will wrestle his final year under the mask, having won the IWGP Junior Heavyweight Championship six times, the IWGP Junior Heavyweight Tag Team titles twice, the GHC Junior Heavyweight Tag Team titles twice, and the AJPW World Junior Heavyweight Championship once. In addition to his title accomplishments, he is widely respected for his consistency, longevity, and loyalty to the character, remaining one of the few masked wrestlers in Japan to uphold the same persona for such an extended period.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"ja\" dir=\"ltr\">\u30bf\u30a4\u30ac\u30fc\u300c\u6765\u5e74\u306e7\u6708\u3001\u5f15\u9000\u3059\u308b\u3053\u3068\u306b\u3057\u307e\u3057\u305f\u30027\u6708\u3068\u3044\u3046\u306e\u306f\u50d5\u304c7\u670815\u65e5\u3063\u3066\u3044\u3046\u306d\u3001\u30c7\u30d3\u30e5\u30fc\u3057\u305f\u65e5\u306a\u3093\u3067\u3059\u3051\u3069\u3002\u5e74\u6570\u7684\u306b\u306f\u4eca\u5e74\u304c30\u5e74\u3067\u300131\u5e74\u76ee\u306e\u30b9\u30bf\u30fc\u30c8\u3002\u3060\u3051\u3069\u3082\u3001\u6765\u5e74\u306e7\u6708\u300130\u5e74\u3084\u3063\u305f\u30bf\u30a4\u30ac\u30fc\u30de\u30b9\u30af\u3001\u5f15\u9000\u3055\u305b\u3066\u3044\u305f\u3060\u304d\u307e\u3059\u300d <\/p>\n<p>\u5168\u6587<a  href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/x9gJ99vKuF\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">https:\/\/t.co\/x9gJ99vKuF<\/a><a  href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/njSOUL?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#njSOUL<\/a> <a  href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/NvN0TWADE8\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">pic.twitter.com\/NvN0TWADE8<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; \u65b0\u65e5\u672c\u30d7\u30ed\u30ec\u30b9\u30ea\u30f3\u30b0\u682a\u5f0f\u4f1a\u793e (@njpw1972) <a  href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/njpw1972\/status\/1941819506059509770?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">July 6, 2025<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p><strong><span style=\"vertical-align: inherit;\"><span style=\"vertical-align: inherit;\">More From LWOS Pro Wrestling<\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><em><span class=\"s1\"><span style=\"vertical-align: inherit;\"><span style=\"vertical-align: inherit;\">Header photo \u2013 NJPW \u2013 Stay tuned to the\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/\" target=\"_self\"><span style=\"vertical-align: inherit;\"><span style=\"vertical-align: inherit;\">Last Word on Pro Wrestling<\/span><\/span><\/a><span style=\"vertical-align: inherit;\"><span style=\"vertical-align: inherit;\"> for more on Tiger Mask IV, NJPW New Japan Soul, and other stories from around the world of wrestling, as they develop. You can always count on LWOPW to be on top of the major news in the wrestling world, as well as to provide you with analysis, previews, videos, interviews, and editorials on the wrestling world. You can rewatch all NJPW events and plenty more tremendous wrestling content from New Japan Pro-Wrestling on <\/span><\/span><a href=\"http:\/\/njpwworld.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><span style=\"vertical-align: inherit;\"><span style=\"vertical-align: inherit;\">NJPWWorld.com<\/span><\/span><\/a><span style=\"vertical-align: inherit;\"><span style=\"vertical-align: inherit;\"> ; The King of Sports Streaming.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Following a loss against Hiroshi Tanahashi on the final day of NJPW&#8217;s New Japan Soul tour at Korakuen Hall, Tiger Mask announced that he will retire in July next year. During his backstage interview, the fourth iteration of Tiger Mask said that he has decided to call it a career in July 2026. Portrayed by [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5576,"featured_media":137637,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[13,12,14],"tags":[9441,609,2731],"class_list":["post-137625","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-international","category-news","category-njpw","tag-new-japan-soul","tag-tiger-mask","tag-tiger-mask-iv"],"modified_by":"Chinyere Okafor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137625","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5576"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=137625"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137625\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":137638,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137625\/revisions\/137638"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/137637"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=137625"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=137625"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=137625"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}