ruptured his left Anterior cruciate ligament during the match, and was inactive for the rest of 1989. Misawa returned after his injury by participating in a main-event battle royal at Korakuen Hall in Tokyo on January 2, 1990, the first date of AJPW's New Year Giant Series. On February 10, Misawa would wrestle for the first time inside the Tokyo Dome, though not in an AJPW event. NJPW president Seiji Sakaguchi asked Baba to help the company with their second Tokyo Dome show after plans with WCW fell through, and he agreed under the condition that the AJPW wrestlers would not be beaten or made to look weak. Misawa teamed with Genichiro Tenryu in a victory by countout against George Takano and Riki Choshu, in an event that sold out the Tokyo Dome with 53,000 people in attendance (the day after Mike Tyson vs. Buster Douglas drew 30,000 people). Despite the event's success, Misawa's match was never broadcast on television, since performers' contracts included exclusivity clauses to the television networks which broadcast their respective promotions' programming. On April 9, Misawa and Kenta Kobashi won the All Asia Tag Team Championship from the Can-Am Express, and four days later, Misawa wrestled Bret Hart to a time-limit draw at the WWF/NJPW/AJPW Supershow in the Dome. Later that month, top star Genichiro Tenryu abruptly departed AJPW. He disagreed with Baba's creative direction, especially the booker's resistance to shootfighting influence on the All Japan product. Tenryu received a lucrative offer from Hachiro Tanaka, executive of eyewear company Megane Super, who had been interested in building his own wrestling promotion (and had almost signed Keiji Mutoh instead, but was blocked by Sakaguchi). This was initially under the auspices of becoming an ambassador for the brand, but the actual intentions of this deal were made clear months later by the formation of wrestling promotion Super World of Sports (and a resultant exodus of talent in its wake). Since this departure left Jumbo Tsuruta as the only native main event star that the promotion had, Baba made the decision to turn Misawa into his new rising star. During a tag match with Kawada against Yoshiaki Yatsu and Samson Fuyuki (both of whom would later join SWS) on May 14, Misawa commanded Kawada to unmask him, and thus abandoned the Tiger Mask gimmick. After winning the match, Misawa challenged his "childhood hero" Tsuruta to a singles match. After