(born October 26, 1973), better known by his ring name (with his first name usually stylized in all capital letters), is a Japanese professional wrestler and former mixed martial artist. Michinoku is known in North America for his work for the World Wrestling Federation (WWF, now WWE) where he had the first ever WWF Light Heavyweight Championship reign recognized by the promotion. Michinoku is the founder and former promoter of Kaientai Dojo (now Active Advance Pro Wrestling), where he also primarily wrestled until 2019. In 2019, Michinoku started another promotion, Professional Wrestling Just Tap Out (JTO). Michinoku has also appeared for New Japan Pro-Wrestling since 2011 where he was a member of Suzuki-gun. Having held championship titles in Japan, North America, Mexico and Europe, Yoshida is known for his long title reigns. He held the FMW Independent World Junior Heavyweight Title for a combined duration of more than 15 months, the WWF Light Heavyweight Title for a then record-setting 10 months and the WEW Six-Man Tag Team Title for almost a year. Yoshida has held the World Junior Heavyweight Championship, Michinoku Pro Tohoku Junior Heavyweight Championship and Kaientai Dojo (K-Dojo) Strongest-K Championship simultaneously for almost 10 months. During his reign, he has defended his titles against both AJPW and independent circuit talent to increase his base of opponents, and thus has increased the reach of the World Junior Heavyweight Championship, which was closed off to outside competition in the late 1980s and throughout the 1990s. Professional wrestling career Early career Taka Michinoku took his name as a sign of respect for his mentor The Great Sasuke, who was the owner of Michinoku Pro Wrestling and had been the first to use Michinoku as part of his ring name. He debuted Wrestling International New Generations and Michinoku Pro Wrestling joint event by teaming up with Great Sasuke, they lost to Super Delfin & Terry Boy. He would later move to Federacion Universal De Lucha Libre and debuted by beating the team of Mongolian Yuga & Shiryu with Buffalo Chohe. Then he debuted for Frontier Martial-Arts Wrestling in a six-man tag team match at Summer Spectacular in 1993. Michinoku would primary compete at MPW, UWF and FMW in his early career. His debut for New Japan Pro-Wrestling came during Super J-Cup 1994 and was eliminated from the competition in the first round by Black Tiger. He competed in Best of the Super