Kai En Tai


Kai En Tai was a professional wrestling stable made up of Japanese wrestlers Shiryu, Dick Togo and Mens Teioh, later joined by Sho Funaki and Taka Michinoku. The group was managed by Yamaguchi-San when they were in the WWF.

History

Michinoku Pro Wrestling

The group debuted in Japan's Michinoku Pro wrestling promotion in late 1994 when SATO, Terry Boy and Shiryu introduced themselves as Kai En Tai. The name "Kai En Tai" was based on Japan's first modern corporation, Kaientai, a naval institution and paramilitary organization dedicated to freeing Japan from feudal rule and protecting the country's national sovereignty that was a major player in the introduction of the Meiji Restoration.
Kai En Tai had many high profile tag team matches before two of them changed their names; SATO became Dick Togo, Terry Boy became Men's Teioh while Shiryu's name remained unchanged. The stable's name was also changed to "Kaientai Deluxe", or Kaientai DX for short. They would later be joined by The Dream Chasers as new members. Other members included Hanzo Nakajima, Yoshihiro Tajiri, Gran Hamada and Super Boy.

Extreme Championship Wrestling

In early 1997, Taka Michinoku, Dick Togo and Terry Boy had a short stint in Extreme Championship Wrestling as BWO Japan and feuded with the fellow Japanese team of The Great Sasuke, Gran Hamada and Gran Naniwa. The rivalry culminated at ECW's first ever Pay-Per-View event Barely Legal 1997 where the team of Sasuke, Hamada and Masato Yakushiji came out victorious. Since then, Kai En Tai would permanently adopt the bWo colors of blue and white as their own.

World Wrestling Federation

Kai En Tai made their first appearance in the WWF the night after WrestleMania XIV on the March 30, 1998 episode of Raw is War. The team dropped the 'DX' from their full title due to the existence of D-Generation X in the WWF. They attacked Taka Michinoku — who signed with the WWF much earlier — because they felt he had become Americanized since joining the WWE until he later rejoined them. Kaientai was originally referred to by the announcers as Club Kamikaze, but their new manager Yamaguchi-San announced their actual name upon his arrival shortly afterwards.
Their most infamous WWF feud was with Val Venis, who had a porn star gimmick at the time. Yamaguchi was enraged when he was shown a pornographic video of his wife, sleeping with Venis, and threatened to punish both of them. Mrs. Yamaguchi-San was brought to the ring for what was going to be a spanking by Yamaguchi-san using a wooden paddle, but she was rescued by Venis. A week later, just as Venis had finished a match, Yamaguchi and Kaientai showed up with a salami on a table. Yamaguchi proceeded to chop the salami while shouting at Venis, "I choppy choppy your pee pee!"
The following week, Venis teamed up with Taka Michinoku to take on Togo and Funaki in a tag team match. Taka made a swerve, however, by turning against Venis, proclaiming that Mrs. Yamaguchi-San was his sister. Venis was dragged backstage by Kaientai to have his member amputated, though the audience did not see what happened next. Venis returned after a week, explained that Yamaguchi's sword narrowly missed his genitalia, due to the lights being turned off by John Wayne Bobbitt, broke off his relationship with Mrs. Yamaguchi-San and thus ended the feud.
After Togo, Teioh and both Yamaguchis left the WWF, Michinoku and Funaki began wrestling as a tag team using the name Kaientai. They were primarily jobbers, best known for their "Evil! Indeed!" skits in which Bruce Prichard dubbed English voices into their promos while they badly lip-synced, with Taka ending his "comments" with "Evil!" and Funaki "saying" only "Indeed!" Funaki and Taka's last ever tag team partnership as Kaientai in the WWF was a win over Raven and Justin Credible on the October 20, 2001 edition of WWF Jakked.
Michinoku eventually left the WWF. He ran a promotion called Kaientai Dojo until 2019. Funaki remained in the WWF, finding a niche as part of the SmackDown cruiserweight division and as a backstage interviewer before being released from his contract in 2010 after 12 years with the company. However, he has since been re-hired and currently serves as a member of the Japanese commentary team.

Michinoku Pro Wrestling

With the occasion of Michinoku Pro's 10th Anniversary on November 2, 2003, Kaientai DX reformed, as Dick Togo, Men's Teioh, Taka Michinoku, Shiryu and Hanzo Nakajima took down Jinsei Shinzaki, Hayate, Kesen Numa-jiro, Kazuya Yuasa and Chi-Nen Hokkai.

Independent circuit

On July 15, 2005, another Kaientai reunion took place at Kaientai Dojo, when Taka Michinoku teamed up with Sho Funaki, Dick Togo and Men's Teioh to do battle with Kengo Mashimo, Kazma, Ryota Chikuzen and Kunio Toshima. Although Kaientai came up short of defeating the opposing team, it was a very emotional moment and the crowd showed their support after the match.
Kaientai reunited once again on the 2006 New Year's Eve Indie Summit show where Taka Michinoku, Sho Funaki, Kaz Hayashi, Dick Togo and Men's Teioh defeated Makoto Oishi, Kudo, Katsuya Kishi, Shinjitsu Nohashi and Milanito Collection a.t. The Kaientai team claimed victory after Togo hit Oishi with a diving senton. On January 25, 2007, Taka Michinoku, Men's Teioh and Dick Togo appeared in Dragon Gate to take on the team of Cima, BxB Hulk and Matt Sydal.

Members


ImageSize = width:900 height:200
PlotArea = left:170 bottom:60 top:0 right:50
Alignbars = justify
DateFormat = mm/dd/yyyy
Period = from:05/05/1995 till:10/15/2001
TimeAxis = orientation:horizontal format:yyyy
Colors =
id:Leader value:red legend:Japan
id:Member value:green legend:WWF
Legend = orientation:horizontal position:bottom
ScaleMajor = increment:1 start:1996
ScaleMinor = unit:month increment:1 start:05/05/1995
LineData =
at:05/05/1995 color:black layer:back
at:10/15/2001 color:black layer:back
BarData =
bar:Togo text:"SATO/Dick Togo"
bar:Teioh text:"Terry Boy/Men's Teioh"
bar:Shiryu text:"Shiryu"
bar:Funaki text:"Sho Funaki"
bar:Taka text:"Taka Michinoku"
bar:SuperBoy text:"Super Boy"
bar:Nakajima text:"Hanzo Nakajima"
bar:Tajiri text:"Yoshihiro Tajiri"
bar:Hamada text:"Gran Hamada"
bar:Yamaguchi text:"Yamaguchi-san"
PlotData=
width:10 textcolor:black align:left anchor:from shift:
bar:Togo from:05/05/1995 till:03/30/1998 color:Leader
bar:Togo from:03/30/1998 till:11/24/1998 color:Member
bar:Teioh from:05/05/1995 till:03/30/1998 color:Leader
bar:Teioh from:03/30/1998 till:11/24/1998 color:Member
bar:Shiryu from:05/05/1995 till:04/25/1997 color:Leader
bar:Funaki from:06/09/1996 till:03/30/1998 color:Leader
bar:Funaki from:03/30/1998 till:10/15/2001 color:Member
bar:Taka from:06/09/1996 till:12/17/1997 color:Leader
bar:Taka from:07/28/1998 till:10/15/2001 color:Member
bar:Nakajima from:04/23/1997 till:08/17/1997 color:Leader
bar:SuperBoy from:04/23/1997 till:03/15/1998 color:Leader
bar:Tajiri from:03/01/1998 till:03/15/1998 color:Leader
bar:Hamada from:02/28/1998 till:02/28/1998 color:Leader
bar:Yamaguchi from:04/27/1998 till:10/20/1998 color:Member

Championships