(NOAH): Akitoshi Saito History: Misawa...
Hochi News
June 13th, 2009, Hiroshima Prefectural Gymnasium. Saito, who was the GHC Tag Team Champion, teamed up with Bison Smith to face the challengers, Mitsuharu Misawa and Go Shiozaki. The gong for the main event rang just after 8:10pm. Misawa's incredible ability to parry every move is ingrained in his body, and just like in previous fights, Saito delivered kicks and throws to Misawa and Shiozaki. After twenty-five minutes, the match reaches its climax. Saito gets behind Misawa, and throws him with a back drop.
"I don't know why, but the only thing I remember clearly from that match is when I threw him with a back drop".
Fifteen years have passed since then, but the memory of the backdrop is clear, but it was not right, which could be called an abnormal sensation...
"Usually, in a back drop, you feel the weight of your opponent the most when you lift them. It is the same for ordinary people when you lift something heavy, right? When you lift something, you use the most strength when you lift it. However, once you have lifted it, you don't need that much strength. The same goes for the back drop. It takes a lot of strength to lift someone up, but once you've picked them up, you can take the momentum to throw them. But in that match, when I lifted Misawa up, he became much heavier. What was it? Why? I still don't know. If I had stopped when lifting him above, he might have become heavier, but at that time he wasn't, so I just threw him as he was. Years later when I asked a lot of people about this feeling, they said it was impossible. What was that sensation? I still don't know, but I still remember his weight clearly."
Saito threw a back drop while sensing something was wrong. There was no way he could defeat Misawa in one move, and so Saito was sure he could get up and prepare for his next one.
"I did a backdrop in the middle of the ring. After that, I went to the neutral corner. I was planning to do a lariat if Misawa stood up."
But Misawa didn't get up.
He remained down.
"I was waiting for Misawa-san to stand up, so I could deliver a lariat from the corner, but he didn't stand up. I thought, "Huh? What?" I also thought that the referee, Nishinaga, might be waiting for him to recover, but I felt that the atmosphere was clearly different".
Referee Nishinaga called out to the fallen Misawa. He didn't get up.
"In a normal match when a wrestler is injured, the referee will ask, "Are you OK?" but this time, the atmosphere was completely different. However, I couldn't ask "Are you okay?" in the middle of the championship match".
Young wrestlers and trainers entered the ring and administered cardiac massage to Misawa. They also tried to resuscitate him with an AED*.
"They were taking off his ring shoes*, and I had the sense that a state of emergency was clearly occurring. I was so shaken up that I don't remember much about what happened in the ring after that, except for the scene of him being carried away on a stretcher."
Top wrestlers such as Kensuke Sasaki and Yoshihiro Takayama, who had just finished their matches, rushed to the ring. The packed crowd of 2,300 people erupted in screams and cries of "Misawa!", as Saito just stood there, stunned. The match was announced as a TKO victory at 27 minutes and 3 seconds. An ambulance rushed to the scene, and Misawa was taken to hospital.
"I immediately took a taxi to the hospital and just prayed that nothing would happen"
In the intensive care unit, all possible life saving measures were taken, and Saito prayed in the hallway for him to regain consciousness. Then the doctor appeared in the hallway and said, "He has passed away".
On June 13th 2009 at 10:10pm, Mitsuharu Misawa suddenly passed away at the young age of forty-six. The cause of death was "disarticulation of the cervical spinal cord".
"When the doctor told me, I was like, "I can't believe it..." My heartfelt thought was that if I closed my eyes, it would all be just a dream. This was Misawa-san...someone I respected...I just couldn't believe it, and I was suddenly hit with reality, and a tremendous shock."
Overwhelmed by shock, he was questioned by the Hiroshima Prefectural Police in the hospital. Misawa had died immediately after receiving the backdrop from Saito. The police investigated whether there was any foul play.
"I told them everything. The police decided there was no criminal element, and with the doctor's permission, I stayed in the same room as Misawa-san until the morning."
The police determined that it was an accidental death in the ring.
When he entered the hospital room, Misawa, who he had been fighting in the ring a few hours earlier, had passed away. Nine years had passed since the year 2000, when they first met when Saito had directly approached Misawa about joining Pro Wrestling Noah. Inside the ring, Misawa had taught him the power of passivity, and outside the ring, he had impressed him with his greatness as a person over drinks, and Saito had respected him from the bottom of his heart, thinking "I want to work under this man".
Saito prayed earnestly.
"I had heard that even if a person is declared dead, they can sometimes come back to life within twenty-four hours. In fact, one of my relatives actually came back to life after being declared dead, so I spent the night thinking, "Somehow...somehow...please come back".
Before he knew it, the date had become June 14th. That evening, there was a show at Hakata Star Lanes in Fukuoka city. Saito left the hospital after a Noah staff member urged him to return to the hotel, saying "You have another match today", and he walked through the streets of Hiroshima in a daze. The sun began to rise, and as dawn broke, he reached a bridge over a river that runs through the city*....
NOTES
AED: Taiji Ishimori had to RUN round the building looking for one.
Ring shoes: Wrestlers tight lace, taking shoes off or undoing them (sometimes seen after title matches), helps with blood flow.
River: Hiroshima is a city of rivers.
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