143-547: Shinsuke Nakamura ( Japanese : 中邑 真輔 , Hepburn : Nakamura Shinsuke , born February 24, 1980) is a Japanese professional wrestler . He is signed to WWE , where he performs on the SmackDown brand . Nakamura is known for his time in New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW), where he is a former 3-time IWGP Heavyweight Champion , with his first reign coming at the age of 23 years and 9 months; making Nakamura
286-503: A Kinshasa and giving him a 10-count . At the event on June 17, Nakamura failed to win the title, ending their feud. He then suffered a minor injury after a police dog bit his left leg. At Extreme Rules on July 15, Nakamura defeated Jeff Hardy by executing a low blow and Kinshasa to win the WWE United States Championship , his first title on the main roster. On August 19, Nakamura successfully defended
429-416: A Kinshasa . On the following episode of SmackDown Live , Nakamura said in an interview that he got "too emotional" and was "sorry" for attacking Styles, but when asked to explain more, he sarcastically said "Sorry, no speak English". Later that night, Nakamura cemented his heel turn by attacking Styles and Daniel Bryan, low blowing Styles twice and striking Bryan in the back of the head with a Kinshasa . Over
572-585: A feud against Togi Makabe and Tomoaki Honma . This new group was soon named Chaos with Nakamura as their leader. Nakamura began to work a much rougher style, using a lot of knees and continuing to use a straight right hand as a frequent move in addition to the Bomaye (renamed Kinshasa in WWE), his new finisher . It was the Bomaye that took him to the finals of the 2009 G1 Climax , where he lost to Makabe. Prior to
715-471: A low blow . Two nights later on SmackDown Live , Nakamura defeated Corbin in a rematch, ending their feud. On the August 1 episode of SmackDown Live , Nakamura defeated John Cena to earn a WWE Championship match against Jinder Mahal on August 20 at SummerSlam , which he lost after interference from The Singh Brothers , marking his first pinfall loss on the main roster. Nakamura defeated Randy Orton on
858-827: A "Battle for the Crown" match. Overall, Nakamura is a five-time world champion in professional wrestling. Shinsuke Nakamura was born in Mineyama , Kyoto, on February 24, 1980. As a child, his favorite wrestler was Jushin Liger . Nakamura joined NJPW in March 2002 and quickly began making a name for himself as a bright prospect for the company. Having earned the nickname "Super Rookie", Nakamura impressed both NJPW officials and fans with an excellent combination of strength, speed, and technical skill. Alongside fellow rookies Hiroshi Tanahashi and Katsuyori Shibata , Nakamura became known as one of
1001-532: A 30-minute time limit draw and thus missed the finals of the tournament by a single point. The draw with Shiozaki led to a no time limit match at a Pro Wrestling Noah show on August 22, where Nakamura was defeated. Despite losing to Goto in a number one contender's match on October 11, Nakamura was hand-picked by new IWGP Heavyweight Champion Satoshi Kojima as his first challenger. The title match took place on December 11, which Nakamura lost. On January 4, 2011, Nakamura avenged his loss to Go Shiozaki by defeating him in
1144-520: A Fantastica Mania 2013 rematch between the two. On May 31, Nakamura lost the IWGP Intercontinental Championship to La Sombra, ending his reign at 313 days and eight successful title defenses. Nakamura wrestled his final match of the tour on June 9, losing to Rush. Nakamura returned to New Japan on June 22 at Dominion 6.22 , where he and Tomohiro Ishii lost to Minoru Suzuki and Shelton X Benjamin, who pinned Nakamura for
1287-637: A benefit from the in-group to the out-group) means "[I/we] explained [it] to [him/her/them]". Such beneficiary auxiliary verbs thus serve a function comparable to that of pronouns and prepositions in Indo-European languages to indicate the actor and the recipient of an action. Japanese "pronouns" also function differently from most modern Indo-European pronouns (and more like nouns) in that they can take modifiers as any other noun may. For instance, one does not say in English: The amazed he ran down
1430-683: A broken finger he had to pull out of the event. On 23 February 2013, he defeated the overmatched Martynas Knyzlis on points in Moscow, Russia. Ignashov had his rubber match with Badr Hari at Legend 2: Invasion in Moscow on 9 November 2013, losing by unanimous decision in yet another lackluster fight. Ignashov was slated to fight Andonis "Wrangler" Tzoros in Greece for the WKN K-1 Super Heavyweight Championship on 26 April 2015. Ignashov defeated Tzoros and won
1573-741: A decision against Ali Cenik. He defeated Zinedine Hameur-Lain via decision in Kazan , Russian on 20 October 2012. Just a week later, he was defeated by Tomáš Hron by unanimous decision at Nitrianska Noc Bojovnikov in Nitra , Slovakia . He was scheduled to fight Benjamin Adegbuyi on 10 November 2012 in Craiova , Romania, in the quarter-finals of the SuperKombat World Grand Prix 2012 Final Elimination . Unfortunately, due
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#17327830930931716-414: A distinct language of its own that has absorbed various aspects from neighboring languages. Japanese has five vowels, and vowel length is phonemic, with each having both a short and a long version. Elongated vowels are usually denoted with a line over the vowel (a macron ) in rōmaji , a repeated vowel character in hiragana , or a chōonpu succeeding the vowel in katakana . /u/ ( listen )
1859-419: A glide /j/ and either the first part of a geminate consonant ( っ / ッ , represented as Q) or a moraic nasal in the coda ( ん / ン , represented as N). The nasal is sensitive to its phonetic environment and assimilates to the following phoneme, with pronunciations including [ɴ, m, n, ɲ, ŋ, ɰ̃] . Onset-glide clusters only occur at the start of syllables but clusters across syllables are allowed as long as
2002-484: A listener depending on the listener's relative social position and the degree of familiarity between the speaker and the listener. When used in different social relationships, the same word may have positive (intimate or respectful) or negative (distant or disrespectful) connotations. Japanese often use titles of the person referred to where pronouns would be used in English. For example, when speaking to one's teacher, it
2145-519: A match between the two on June 8 at NXT TakeOver: The End , which Nakamura won. On the June 15 episode of NXT , Nakamura challenged former NXT Champion Finn Bálor to a match that was accepted and won by Nakamura on the July 13 episode of NXT . At NXT TakeOver: Brooklyn II on August 20, Nakamura defeated Samoa Joe to win his first NXT Championship. On November 19, at NXT TakeOver: Toronto , Nakamura lost
2288-745: A new finisher, called the Landslide. On December 10, Nakamura was unable to win the IWGP Heavyweight Championship from then-champion Tanahashi and was again unsuccessful on January 4, 2007, at the Wrestle Kingdom in Tokyo Dome show, where he lost to Toshiaki Kawada . Nakamura entered the 2007 G1 Climax tournament, where he reached the semi-finals before dislocating his shoulder. The injury sidelined Nakamura for months, but he made his return on November 11 and took over
2431-552: A no contest after low blowing each other, with Styles again retaining the title. Looking for a decisive winner, SmackDown Commissioner Shane McMahon announced one more rematch between the two at Money in the Bank . Nakamura was granted the right to choose the stipulation for the match after defeating Styles on the May 15 episode of SmackDown Live , which he revealed the following week to be a Last Man Standing match after attacking Styles with
2574-914: A playable character in King of Colosseum II in 2004, Nakamura has been added in fourteen WWE games: WWE Tap Mania, WWE Mayhem, WWE Universe, WWE Undefeated, WWE Champions, WWE SuperCard , WWE 2K17 , WWE 2K18 , WWE 2K19 , WWE 2K20 , WWE 2K Battlegrounds , WWE 2K22 , WWE 2K23 , and WWE 2K24 Nakamura's theme was sampled on Lil Uzi Vert 's song "Nakamura" (named after him), which appeared on Uzi's 2023 album Pink Tape . Nakamura resides in Orlando, Florida . He has been an avid surfer since 2003. He married Harumi Maekawa in September 2007. Nakamura also practices Brazilian jiu-jitsu and Shito-ryu karate . Japanese language Japanese ( 日本語 , Nihongo , [ɲihoŋɡo] )
2717-558: A rematch on the September 24 episode of SmackDown to retain the title in his only successful defense. On the October 8 episode of SmackDown , just prior to the start of the King of the Ring tournament that night, Nakamura relinquished the crown. At Survivor Series on November 21, Nakamura defeated United States Champion Damian Priest by disqualification in a champion vs. champion match. On
2860-408: A sentence need not be stated and pronouns may be omitted if they can be inferred from context. In the example above, hana ga nagai would mean "[their] noses are long", while nagai by itself would mean "[they] are long." A single verb can be a complete sentence: Yatta! ( やった! ) "[I / we / they / etc] did [it]!". In addition, since adjectives can form the predicate in a Japanese sentence (below),
3003-590: A shot at the title at Nexess on May 3, now held by Bob Sapp , but lost to the defending champion. Later that month, Nakamura competed in his last MMA fight, defeating Alexey Ignashov with a forearm choke on May 22. On December 11, Nakamura and his tag team partner Hiroshi Tanahashi defeated Kensuke Sasaki and Minoru Suzuki in a decision match to win the IWGP Tag Team Championship . On January 4, 2005, at Toukon Festival: Wrestling World 2005 , Nakamura defeated his own tag team partner to win
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#17327830930933146-428: A single adjective can be a complete sentence: Urayamashii! ( 羨ましい! ) "[I'm] jealous [about it]!". While the language has some words that are typically translated as pronouns, these are not used as frequently as pronouns in some Indo-European languages, and function differently. In some cases, Japanese relies on special verb forms and auxiliary verbs to indicate the direction of benefit of an action: "down" to indicate
3289-482: A singles match at Wrestle Kingdom V in Tokyo Dome . On May 3, Nakamura failed in his attempt to regain the IWGP Heavyweight Championship from Hiroshi Tanahashi. From late May to early June, Nakamura worked a tour with Mexican promotion Consejo Mundial de Lucha Libre (CMLL), whom New Japan had a working agreement with. On August 1, Nakamura entered the 2011 G1 Climax and after winning seven out of his nine-round robin stage matches finished first in his block to advance to
3432-470: A spot in the semi-finals. On January 4, 2014, Nakamura lost the IWGP Intercontinental Championship to Tanahashi in the main event of Wrestle Kingdom 8 in Tokyo Dome , and lost a rematch on February 9 at The New Beginning in Hiroshima . In March, Nakamura took part in the 2014 New Japan Cup , which he won, defeating Bad Luck Fale in the finals on March 23 and challenging Tanahashi to another rematch for
3575-680: Is compressed rather than protruded , or simply unrounded. Some Japanese consonants have several allophones , which may give the impression of a larger inventory of sounds. However, some of these allophones have since become phonemic. For example, in the Japanese language up to and including the first half of the 20th century, the phonemic sequence /ti/ was palatalized and realized phonetically as [tɕi] , approximately chi ( listen ) ; however, now [ti] and [tɕi] are distinct, as evidenced by words like tī [tiː] "Western-style tea" and chii [tɕii] "social status". The "r" of
3718-421: Is topic–comment . Sentence-final particles are used to add emotional or emphatic impact, or form questions. Nouns have no grammatical number or gender , and there are no articles . Verbs are conjugated , primarily for tense and voice , but not person . Japanese adjectives are also conjugated. Japanese has a complex system of honorifics , with verb forms and vocabulary to indicate the relative status of
3861-609: Is a Belarusian former Heavyweight kickboxer . He is a four-time Muay Thai World champion, K-1 World GP 2003 in Paris and K-1 World GP 2001 in Nagoya tournament champion. As of 2011 he is living in Auckland , New Zealand, and training at Balmoral Lee Gar Gym under Lollo Heimuli. He is best known for his knee strikes, notably used to score knockout wins over Badr Hari , Semmy Schilt , Nicholas Pettas , and Carter Williams. Ignashov
4004-448: Is also seen in o-medetō "congratulations", from medetaku ). Late Middle Japanese has the first loanwords from European languages – now-common words borrowed into Japanese in this period include pan ("bread") and tabako ("tobacco", now "cigarette"), both from Portuguese . Modern Japanese is considered to begin with the Edo period (which spanned from 1603 to 1867). Since Old Japanese,
4147-527: Is also used in a limited fashion (such as for imported acronyms) in Japanese writing. The numeral system uses mostly Arabic numerals , but also traditional Chinese numerals . Proto-Japonic , the common ancestor of the Japanese and Ryukyuan languages , is thought to have been brought to Japan by settlers coming from the Korean peninsula sometime in the early- to mid-4th century BC (the Yayoi period ), replacing
4290-440: Is appropriate to use sensei ( 先生 , "teacher"), but inappropriate to use anata . This is because anata is used to refer to people of equal or lower status, and one's teacher has higher status. Japanese nouns have no grammatical number, gender or article aspect. The noun hon ( 本 ) may refer to a single book or several books; hito ( 人 ) can mean "person" or "people", and ki ( 木 ) can be "tree" or "trees". Where number
4433-701: Is associated with comedy (see Kansai dialect ). Dialects of Tōhoku and North Kantō are associated with typical farmers. The Ryūkyūan languages, spoken in Okinawa and the Amami Islands (administratively part of Kagoshima ), are distinct enough to be considered a separate branch of the Japonic family; not only is each language unintelligible to Japanese speakers, but most are unintelligible to those who speak other Ryūkyūan languages. However, in contrast to linguists, many ordinary Japanese people tend to consider
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4576-466: Is better documentation of Late Middle Japanese phonology than for previous forms (for instance, the Arte da Lingoa de Iapam ). Among other sound changes, the sequence /au/ merges to /ɔː/ , in contrast with /oː/ ; /p/ is reintroduced from Chinese; and /we/ merges with /je/ . Some forms rather more familiar to Modern Japanese speakers begin to appear – the continuative ending - te begins to reduce onto
4719-453: Is considered by his fans to be one of the most talented and technically sound heavyweight kickboxers in the world. However, he is also considered by many as frustratingly inconsistent, occasionally appearing lackluster or inactive in the ring, such as in his K-1 Final quarterfinal match against Peter Aerts in 2003. He suffered a knee injury in a fight against Bjorn Bregy in 2005. Since then, his performance has diminished. Ignashov trained in
4862-509: Is correlated with the sex of the speaker and the social situation in which they are spoken: men and women alike in a formal situation generally refer to themselves as watashi ( 私 , literally "private") or watakushi (also 私 , hyper-polite form), while men in rougher or intimate conversation are much more likely to use the word ore ( 俺 "oneself", "myself") or boku . Similarly, different words such as anata , kimi , and omae ( お前 , more formally 御前 "the one before me") may refer to
5005-417: Is important, it can be indicated by providing a quantity (often with a counter word ) or (rarely) by adding a suffix, or sometimes by duplication (e.g. 人人 , hitobito , usually written with an iteration mark as 人々 ). Words for people are usually understood as singular. Thus Tanaka-san usually means Mx Tanaka . Words that refer to people and animals can be made to indicate a group of individuals through
5148-755: Is less common. In terms of mutual intelligibility , a survey in 1967 found that the four most unintelligible dialects (excluding Ryūkyūan languages and Tōhoku dialects ) to students from Greater Tokyo were the Kiso dialect (in the deep mountains of Nagano Prefecture ), the Himi dialect (in Toyama Prefecture ), the Kagoshima dialect and the Maniwa dialect (in Okayama Prefecture ). The survey
5291-420: Is often called a topic-prominent language , which means it has a strong tendency to indicate the topic separately from the subject, and that the two do not always coincide. The sentence Zō wa hana ga nagai ( 象は鼻が長い ) literally means, "As for elephant(s), (the) nose(s) (is/are) long". The topic is zō "elephant", and the subject is hana "nose". Japanese grammar tends toward brevity; the subject or object of
5434-498: Is preserved in words such as matsuge ("eyelash", lit. "hair of the eye"); modern mieru ("to be visible") and kikoeru ("to be audible") retain a mediopassive suffix - yu(ru) ( kikoyu → kikoyuru (the attributive form, which slowly replaced the plain form starting in the late Heian period) → kikoeru (all verbs with the shimo-nidan conjugation pattern underwent this same shift in Early Modern Japanese )); and
5577-665: Is the principal language of the Japonic language family spoken by the Japanese people . It has around 123 million speakers, primarily in Japan , the only country where it is the national language , and within the Japanese diaspora worldwide. The Japonic family also includes the Ryukyuan languages and the variously classified Hachijō language . There have been many attempts to group the Japonic languages with other families such as
5720-402: Is the version of Japanese discussed in this article. Formerly, standard Japanese in writing ( 文語 , bungo , "literary language") was different from colloquial language ( 口語 , kōgo ) . The two systems have different rules of grammar and some variance in vocabulary. Bungo was the main method of writing Japanese until about 1900; since then kōgo gradually extended its influence and
5863-471: Is used for the present and the future. For verbs that represent an ongoing process, the -te iru form indicates a continuous (or progressive) aspect , similar to the suffix ing in English. For others that represent a change of state, the -te iru form indicates a perfect aspect. For example, kite iru means "They have come (and are still here)", but tabete iru means "They are eating". Questions (both with an interrogative pronoun and yes/no questions) have
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6006-405: Is why some linguists do not classify Japanese "pronouns" as pronouns, but rather as referential nouns, much like Spanish usted (contracted from vuestra merced , "your ( majestic plural ) grace") or Portuguese você (from vossa mercê ). Japanese personal pronouns are generally used only in situations requiring special emphasis as to who is doing what to whom. The choice of words used as pronouns
6149-418: The 2010 New Japan Cup winner and former teammate Hirooki Goto and afterwards accepted Togi Makabe's challenge for the title. On May 3, at Wrestling Dontaku 2010 , Nakamura lost the IWGP Heavyweight Championship to Makabe. Following the loss, Nakamura was sidelined with a shoulder injury until he returned on June 19 at Dominion 6.19 , defeating Daniel Puder . Atsushi Sawada and Simon Inoki of IGF appeared at
6292-713: The 2014 World Tag League alongside Tomohiro Ishii. The team finished second in their block with a record of four wins and three losses, narrowly missing the finals of the tournament due to losing to Hirooki Goto and Katsuyori Shibata on the final day. On January 4, 2015, at Wrestle Kingdom 9 in Tokyo Dome , Nakamura made his second successful defense of the IWGP Intercontinental Championship against Kota Ibushi . His third defense took place on February 14 at The New Beginning in Sendai , where Nakamura defeated Yuji Nagata. On May 3, Nakamura's fourth title reign ended after losing to Goto at Wrestling Dontaku 2015 , and he lost his rematch for
6435-504: The 2024 Draft , Nakamura was drafted back to the SmackDown brand . During that time, he would mostly compete in live events, until making his on-screen return after seven months on the November 15 episode of SmackDown , by attacking United States Champion LA Knight after his title match against Berto . On October 30, 2022, Pro Wrestling Noah announced that Nakamura (while under WWE contract) would be The Great Muta 's opponent for
6578-615: The Ainu , Austronesian , Koreanic , and the now-discredited Altaic , but none of these proposals have gained any widespread acceptance. Little is known of the language's prehistory, or when it first appeared in Japan. Chinese documents from the 3rd century AD recorded a few Japanese words, but substantial Old Japanese texts did not appear until the 8th century. From the Heian period (794–1185), extensive waves of Sino-Japanese vocabulary entered
6721-653: The Fantastica Mania 2013 weekend, co-promoted by New Japan and CMLL. In the main event of the second night, Nakamura made his fifth successful defense of the title against La Sombra . In early 2013, Nakamura became involved in Chaos' rivalry with New Japan's other top villainous stable, Suzuki-gun . At New Japan's 41st anniversary event on March 3, Nakamura defeated Suzuki-gun's Lance Archer for his sixth successful defense. On April 5, Nakamura and Ishii unsuccessfully challenged KES (Archer and Davey Boy Smith Jr. ) for
6864-611: The IWGP Heavyweight Championship , thus becoming the youngest wrestler in history to win the title. On January 4, 2004, at Wrestling World 2004 , Nakamura successfully defended the IWGP Heavyweight Championship against the NWF Heavyweight Champion Yoshihiro Takayama in a title unification match. However, Nakamura was forced to vacate the title due to an injury just a month later. Upon his return, Nakamura received
7007-518: The IWGP Intercontinental Championship for the first time. In August's 2012 G1 Climax tournament , Nakamura wrestled in the same block as fellow Chaos member and recent IWGP Heavyweight Champion Kazuchika Okada . The two stablemates faced each other on August 5, with Nakamura picking up the win, effectively solidifying his spot as the leader of Chaos. After four wins and three losses, Nakamura lost to Hiroyoshi Tenzan in
7150-619: The IWGP U-30 Openweight Championship . During their tag team title reign, the two left for an excursion to Mexico, where they feuded with Los Guerreros del Infierno and defended the IWGP Tag Team Championship against Rey Bucanero and Olímpico . On October 30, they lost the IWGP Tag Team Championship to Cho-Ten (Hiroyoshi Tenzan and Masahiro Chono ). At Toukon Shidou Chapter 1 on January 4, 2006, Nakamura challenged Brock Lesnar for
7293-462: The Japonic language family, which also includes the Ryukyuan languages spoken in the Ryukyu Islands . As these closely related languages are commonly treated as dialects of the same language, Japanese is sometimes called a language isolate . According to Martine Irma Robbeets , Japanese has been subject to more attempts to show its relation to other languages than any other language in
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#17327830930937436-697: The NXT TakeOver: Dallas event. On January 31, Nakamura was confirmed to have finished his NJPW commitments and was said to be reporting to the WWE Performance Center for training and handling logistical matters regarding his move to the company. On February 2, Nakamura arrived in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania to undergo pre-contract signing medical tests. On February 22, WWE held a press conference in Tokyo, Japan to officially announce
7579-610: The Noah The New Year show on January 1, 2023. At the event, Nakamura defeated Muta, his long-time idol, in a dramatic finish. In December, the match was awarded the Best Bout Award (2023) by Tokyo Sports, recognizing it as one of the most outstanding matches of the year in Japan. On October 14, 2024, during a Pro Wrestling Noah event at Korakuen Hall, Keiji Muto announced that Ulka Sasaki would face Shinsuke Nakamura on January 1, 2025 at Nippon Budokan , as part of
7722-514: The Philippines , and various Pacific islands, locals in those countries learned Japanese as the language of the empire. As a result, many elderly people in these countries can still speak Japanese. Japanese emigrant communities (the largest of which are to be found in Brazil , with 1.4 million to 1.5 million Japanese immigrants and descendants, according to Brazilian IBGE data, more than
7865-538: The Royal Rumble on January 28, 2018, Nakamura entered the Royal Rumble match at number 14, which he won after last eliminating Roman Reigns . Immediately afterwards, Nakamura announced that he would challenge AJ Styles for the WWE Championship at WrestleMania 34 . At the event on April 8, Nakamura lost to Styles; after the match, Nakamura turned heel by attacking Styles with a low blow followed by
8008-533: The Royal Rumble , Nakamura defeated Rusev to win his second United States Championship. Later that night, he participated in the Royal Rumble match, entering at #3, but was eliminated by Mustafa Ali . Two days later on SmackDown Live , Nakamura lost the title to R-Truth . Rusev then confronted Truth and pushed him into a title match, but Truth retained the title. After the match, Nakamura joined forces with Rusev into attacking Truth, starting an alliance between
8151-558: The Texas Rangers and Tampa Bay Rays in Arlington, Texas . On October 8, at King of Pro-Wrestling , Nakamura successfully defended the title in a rematch against Hirooki Goto. On November 11, at Power Struggle , Nakamura made his third successful defense against Karl Anderson . From November 20 to December 1, Nakamura took part in the round-robin portion of the 2012 World Tag League , alongside stablemate Tomohiro Ishii under
8294-738: The United States (notably in Hawaii , where 16.7% of the population has Japanese ancestry, and California ), and the Philippines (particularly in Davao Region and the Province of Laguna ). Japanese has no official status in Japan, but is the de facto national language of the country. There is a form of the language considered standard : hyōjungo ( 標準語 ) , meaning "standard Japanese", or kyōtsūgo ( 共通語 ) , "common language", or even "Tokyo dialect" at times. The meanings of
8437-626: The WWE World Cup at Crown Jewel . On November 2, he successfully defended the title against Rusev at Crown Jewel. At Survivor Series on November 18, Nakamura lost to Raw's WWE Intercontinental Champion Seth Rollins in an interbrand Champion vs Champion match. On the December 25 episode of SmackDown Live , Nakamura lost the United States Championship to Rusev, ending his reign at 156 days. On January 27, 2019, at
8580-806: The de facto standard Japanese had been the Kansai dialect , especially that of Kyoto . However, during the Edo period, Edo (now Tokyo) developed into the largest city in Japan, and the Edo-area dialect became standard Japanese. Since the end of Japan's self-imposed isolation in 1853, the flow of loanwords from European languages has increased significantly. The period since 1945 has seen many words borrowed from other languages—such as German, Portuguese and English. Many English loan words especially relate to technology—for example, pasokon (short for "personal computer"), intānetto ("internet"), and kamera ("camera"). Due to
8723-477: The "new Three Musketeers ". Nakamura began training vale tudo and, on December 31, he made his mixed martial arts debut, where he was defeated by Daniel Gracie via submission to an armlock . Nakamura's second MMA fight took place on May 2, 2003, when he defeated Jan Nortje with a guillotine choke . He followed that up on September 13 with another submission victory over Shane Eitner in his third MMA fight. On December 9, Nakamura defeated Hiroyoshi Tenzan for
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#17327830930938866-527: The 1.2 million of the United States ) sometimes employ Japanese as their primary language. Approximately 12% of Hawaii residents speak Japanese, with an estimated 12.6% of the population of Japanese ancestry in 2008. Japanese emigrants can also be found in Peru , Argentina , Australia (especially in the eastern states), Canada (especially in Vancouver , where 1.4% of the population has Japanese ancestry),
9009-468: The Chinuk gym for 11 years, before immigrating to New Zealand in 2006. He has beaten the best kickboxers in the world, including decision wins over three times K-1 champions Remy Bonjasky and Peter Aerts and knockout highlight reel wins over two currently best kickboxers in the world Semmy Schilt and Badr Hari . He has also fought legendary Rob Kaman , losing by decision, but after that fight Rob gave
9152-438: The February 18, 2022 (taped February 11) episode of SmackDown , Nakamura lost the title to Sami Zayn, ending his reign at 189 days. At Night 1 of WrestleMania 38 on April 2, Boogs and Nakamura faced The Usos for the SmackDown Tag Team Championship in a losing effort. On the June 3 episode of SmackDown , he teamed with Riddle against the Usos for the titles, but lost. On the August 12 episode of SmackDown , he failed to win
9295-495: The IWGP Heavyweight Championship, but lost. In March 2006, Nakamura announced that he would depart on a learning excursion to further improve his wrestling skills. He would also travel to Mexico, Brazil and Russia and train with Lesnar at Lesnar's personal gym to gain muscle mass. NJPW President Simon Inoki later suggested that as part of his learning excursion, Nakamura would be loaned to World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) to gain experience in working large American shows. However, it
9438-600: The IWGP Intercontinental Champion against Daniel Gracie. On June 21, at Dominion 6.21 , Nakamura lost the title to Bad Luck Fale in his second defense. In the 2014 G1 Climax , Nakamura won his block with eight wins and two losses, advancing to the finals on August 10, where he lost to Chaos stablemate Kazuchika Okada. On September 21, at Destruction in Kobe , Nakamura regained the IWGP Intercontinental Championship from Bad Luck Fale. He made his first successful title defense on November 8 at Power Struggle against Katsuyori Shibata. From November 23 to December 5, Nakamura took part in
9581-433: The IWGP Tag Team Championship. Immediately after the match, the duo were attacked by Giant Bernard, Rick Fuller and the returning Low Ki, who had just left RISE to join Makabe's GBH faction. On February 15, 2009, Nakamura faced Tanahashi for the IWGP Heavyweight Championship, but he failed to regain the title. In April 2009, Nakamura turned into a villain , siding with the former members of GBH (especially Toru Yano) in
9724-498: The IWGP Tag Team Championship. Two days later at Invasion Attack , Nakamura successfully defended the IWGP Intercontinental Championship against Smith, avenging the previous loss from the first round of the New Japan Cup. On May 3, at Wrestling Dontaku 2013 , Nakamura defeated Suzuki-gun's newest member Shelton X Benjamin for his eighth successful defense of the championship. On May 11, Nakamura left for another tour with Mexican promotion CMLL. His first match back in Mexico took place
9867-406: The Intercontinental Championship from Gunther . On October 18, Nakamura made his first NXT appearance in over five years as Tony D'Angelo 's hand-picked opponent against Channing "Stacks" Lorenzo , whom he defeated. After six months away from WWE programming, Nakamura made his return on the April 14, 2023, episode of SmackDown , defeating Madcap Moss . As part of the 2023 WWE Draft , Nakamura
10010-422: The January 8, 2021, episode of SmackDown , Nakamura competed in a gauntlet match to determine the challenger for the WWE Universal Championship at the Royal Rumble , defeating Rey Mysterio , King Corbin , and Daniel Bryan , the latter of whom he proceeded to shake hands with following Bryan's loss, before he lost to Adam Pearce after being assaulted by champion Roman Reigns and Jey Uso , turning face for
10153-434: The Japanese language is of particular interest, ranging between an apical central tap and a lateral approximant . The "g" is also notable; unless it starts a sentence, it may be pronounced [ ŋ ] , in the Kanto prestige dialect and in other eastern dialects. The phonotactics of Japanese are relatively simple. The syllable structure is (C)(G)V(C), that is, a core vowel surrounded by an optional onset consonant,
10296-556: The Noah The New Year 2025 show. Along with fellow NJPW wrestler Kazuchika Okada , Nakamura is featured in the Japanese music video directed by fashion designer, DJ and record producer Nigo for Pharrell Williams ' song " Happy ", released in May 2014. On May 27, 2014, Nakamura published an autobiography titled King of Strong Style: 1980–2014 . An English language version of the book was released by Viz Media on August 7, 2018. Nakamura made his first video game appearance as
10439-736: The Old Japanese sections are written in Man'yōgana , which uses kanji for their phonetic as well as semantic values. Based on the Man'yōgana system, Old Japanese can be reconstructed as having 88 distinct morae . Texts written with Man'yōgana use two different sets of kanji for each of the morae now pronounced き (ki), ひ (hi), み (mi), け (ke), へ (he), め (me), こ (ko), そ (so), と (to), の (no), も (mo), よ (yo) and ろ (ro). (The Kojiki has 88, but all later texts have 87. The distinction between mo 1 and mo 2 apparently
10582-488: The Ryūkyūan languages as dialects of Japanese. The imperial court also seems to have spoken an unusual variant of the Japanese of the time, most likely the spoken form of Classical Japanese , a writing style that was prevalent during the Heian period , but began to decline during the late Meiji period . The Ryūkyūan languages are classified by UNESCO as 'endangered', as young people mostly use Japanese and cannot understand
10725-616: The September 5 episode of SmackDown Live to earn a rematch for the WWE Championship at Hell in a Cell on October 8, but was again defeated. On November 19, at Survivor Series , Nakamura competed as part of Team SmackDown in the 5-on-5 Survivor Series elimination match , but was the first man eliminated by Braun Strowman , and his team lost to Team Raw . At Clash of Champions on December 17, Nakamura and Orton lost to Kevin Owens and Sami Zayn, who retained their jobs with Daniel Bryan and Shane McMahon serving as special guest referees. At
10868-669: The SmackDown Tag Team Championship from The New Day. At Royal Rumble on January 26, 2020, Nakamura entered the Royal Rumble match at #11, but was eliminated by Brock Lesnar . On the January 31 episode of SmackDown , Nakamura lost the Intercontinental Championship to Braun Strowman , ending his reign at 201 days. At Elimination Chamber on March 8, Zayn, along with Nakamura and Cesaro, defeated Strowman in 3-on-1 handicap match for
11011-575: The World Heavyweight Championship from Rollins on September 2 at Payback and at Fastlane on October 7 in a Last Man Standing match , ending their feud in the process. Nakamura then began appearing in pre-filmed promos, challenging an unspecified wrestler. He subsequently began a feud with Rhodes after spraying his face with mist on the November 27 episode of Raw . On the December 11 episode of Raw , Rhodes defeated Nakamura by disqualification as Nakamura once again utilized
11154-543: The addition of a collective suffix (a noun suffix that indicates a group), such as -tachi , but this is not a true plural: the meaning is closer to the English phrase "and company". A group described as Tanaka-san-tachi may include people not named Tanaka. Some Japanese nouns are effectively plural, such as hitobito "people" and wareware "we/us", while the word tomodachi "friend" is considered singular, although plural in form. Verbs are conjugated to show tenses, of which there are two: past and present (or non-past) which
11297-533: The best chins in the sport. However he was very inactive in the ring and lost by unanimous decision. He was heavily criticized by the fans after the fight. Ignashov announced that he wants to have a rubber match with Badr Hari after he has a few more K-1 fights to get used to the big ring again. Just recently he competed in his 99 official fight while winning with Freddy Kemayo . He made his comeback after one year at 12 May 2012 in Budapest Hungary losing
11440-525: The brand in the process. However, a feud never materialized as Miz and Maryse would move to Raw during the Superstar Shake-up . Nakamura would eventually have his first feud with Dolph Ziggler , culminating in a match at Backlash on May 21, where he won in his main roster in-ring debut. Nakamura was then announced as a competitor in the Money in the Bank ladder match at Money in the Bank . At
11583-578: The effect of changing Japanese into a mora-timed language. Late Middle Japanese covers the years from 1185 to 1600, and is normally divided into two sections, roughly equivalent to the Kamakura period and the Muromachi period , respectively. The later forms of Late Middle Japanese are the first to be described by non-native sources, in this case the Jesuit and Franciscan missionaries; and thus there
11726-421: The event on June 18, while Nakamura made his entrance, Baron Corbin attacked him with both a ladder and a camera. He was checked on by medical staff and carried out of the arena, but he later returned during the match and attacked all other participants, only to lose the match as Corbin retrieved the briefcase. At Battleground on July 23, Nakamura defeated Corbin by disqualification after Corbin attacked him with
11869-437: The event, it was reported that Nakamura had given his notice to NJPW on the morning of January 4, announcing that he was leaving the promotion for WWE. Nakamura remained under NJPW contract and was expected to finish off his contracted dates with the promotion before leaving. On January 12, NJPW confirmed Nakamura's upcoming departure, announcing he would also be stripped of the IWGP Intercontinental Championship. Nakamura handed in
12012-548: The final day of the tournament and was eliminated from the finals, failing to defend his crown. On August 26, Nakamura traveled to the United States to make his first successful defense of the IWGP Intercontinental Championship, defeating Oliver John at a Sacramento Wrestling Federation (SWF) event in Gridley, California . The following day, Nakamura threw the ceremonial first pitch at a Major League Baseball game between
12155-538: The final, Nakamura had gone undefeated, winning each match with the Bomaye . The move was also credited for fracturing IWGP Heavyweight Champion Hiroshi Tanahashi's orbital bone in the semi-finals of the G1, which forced Tanahashi to vacate the title later that month. On September 27, Nakamura avenged his G1 loss and defeated Makabe in a decision match to win the IWGP Heavyweight title for a third time. Upon winning
12298-508: The finals of the tournament. On August 14, Nakamura defeated Tetsuya Naito to win the 2011 G1 Climax and earn another shot at the IWGP Heavyweight Championship. Nakamura went on to challenge for the IWGP Heavyweight Championship on September 19, but he failed to recapture the title from Tanahashi. In the 2011 G1 Tag League , Nakamura teamed with Toru Yano as the Chaos Top Team, winning all five of their group stage matches, advancing to
12441-594: The first successful defense of his second reign as the IWGP Intercontinental Champion. His second successful defense took place on October 14 at King of Pro-Wrestling , when he defeated Pro Wrestling Noah representative Naomichi Marufuji. On November 9, at Power Struggle , Nakamura made his third successful title defense against Minoru Suzuki in a match which had the added stipulation that Nakamura would have had to join Suzuki-gun had he lost
12584-435: The first time since 2018. The following week, Nakamura cemented his face turn by insulting Jey Uso before defeating him in a match. At Royal Rumble on January 31, Nakamura entered at #7, but was eliminated by King Corbin. On the May 14 episode of SmackDown , after losing to Corbin, Nakamura attacked him before stealing his crown, starting a feud between the two. The next week, Rick Boogs became an ally of Nakamura, playing
12727-455: The flow of loanwords from European languages increased significantly, and words from English roots have proliferated. Japanese is an agglutinative , mora -timed language with relatively simple phonotactics , a pure vowel system, phonemic vowel and consonant length, and a lexically significant pitch-accent . Word order is normally subject–object–verb with particles marking the grammatical function of words, and sentence structure
12870-407: The following day when he teamed with El Felino and Negro Casas in a six-man tag team two out of three falls match at Arena Coliseo , losing to Máscara Dorada , Rush and Titán . Nakamura quickly started a rivalry with La Sombra and after suffering two pinfall defeats in six-man tag team matches on April 17 and 24 accepted his challenge for the IWGP Intercontinental Championship, setting up
13013-730: The following month's Tokyo Dome show. On January 4, 2008, Nakamura defeated his rival Tanahashi in the main event of Wrestle Kingdom II in Tokyo Dome , winning the IWGP Heavyweight Championship for the second time. On February 17, Nakamura defeated Kurt Angle to win the IGF version of the IWGP Heavyweight Championship, unifying it with his own NJPW version of the title. He lost the IWGP Heavyweight Championship to All Japan Pro Wrestling (AJPW) representative Keiji Mutoh in Osaka on April 27. On September 5, Nakamura and RISE stablemate Hirooki Goto unsuccessfully challenged Togi Makabe and Toru Yano for
13156-509: The following weeks, Nakamura continued to low blow Styles and received a rematch for the WWE Championship at the Greatest Royal Rumble on April 27, where Nakamura and Styles fought to a double count-out, with Styles retaining the title. Another rematch between the two was made for Backlash with a no disqualification stipulation added on the May 1 episode of SmackDown Live . At the event on May 6, Nakamura and Styles fought to
13299-609: The genitive particle ga remains in intentionally archaic speech. Early Middle Japanese is the Japanese of the Heian period , from 794 to 1185. It formed the basis for the literary standard of Classical Japanese , which remained in common use until the early 20th century. During this time, Japanese underwent numerous phonological developments, in many cases instigated by an influx of Chinese loanwords . These included phonemic length distinction for both consonants and vowels , palatal consonants (e.g. kya ) and labial consonant clusters (e.g. kwa ), and closed syllables . This had
13442-556: The guitar for him during his entrance. On the June 18 episode of SmackDown , Nakamura defeated Corbin in a "Battle for the Crown" match to become the new King. Now known as "King Nakamura", he defeated Corbin on the July 9 episode of SmackDown to to qualify for the Money in the Bank ladder match at the titular event on July 18, which was won by Big E. On the August 13 episode of SmackDown , Nakamura defeated Apollo Crews to win his second Intercontinental Championship. He defeated Crews in
13585-430: The language, affecting the phonology of Early Middle Japanese . Late Middle Japanese (1185–1600) saw extensive grammatical changes and the first appearance of European loanwords . The basis of the standard dialect moved from the Kansai region to the Edo region (modern Tokyo ) in the Early Modern Japanese period (early 17th century–mid 19th century). Following the end of Japan's self-imposed isolation in 1853,
13728-458: The languages of the original Jōmon inhabitants, including the ancestor of the modern Ainu language . Because writing had yet to be introduced from China, there is no direct evidence, and anything that can be discerned about this period must be based on internal reconstruction from Old Japanese , or comparison with the Ryukyuan languages and Japanese dialects . The Chinese writing system
13871-449: The languages. Okinawan Japanese is a variant of Standard Japanese influenced by the Ryūkyūan languages, and is the primary dialect spoken among young people in the Ryukyu Islands . Modern Japanese has become prevalent nationwide (including the Ryūkyū islands) due to education , mass media , and an increase in mobility within Japan, as well as economic integration. Japanese is a member of
14014-427: The large quantity of English loanwords, modern Japanese has developed a distinction between [tɕi] and [ti] , and [dʑi] and [di] , with the latter in each pair only found in loanwords. Although Japanese is spoken almost exclusively in Japan, it has also been spoken outside of the country. Before and during World War II , through Japanese annexation of Taiwan and Korea , as well as partial occupation of China ,
14157-514: The leadership of Black New Japan from Chono and reformed the faction under the new name RISE . The faction originally consisted of himself, Minoru , Milano Collection A.T. , Hirooki Goto , Giant Bernard , Travis Tomko and Prince Devitt . Low Ki was later added to the stable after Milano was injured, having impressed Nakamura during an appearance when he was still with Impact! Wrestling (formerly TNA). On December 9, Nakamura defeated Togi Makabe to earn an IWGP Heavyweight Championship match at
14300-467: The mist to blind Rhodes. Nakamura continued to torment Rhodes through promos, leading to a Street Fight match on the January 8, 2024 episode of Raw , where Nakamura lost to Rhodes. On January 27, at the Royal Rumble , Nakamura entered at #6, before he was eliminated by eventual winner Rhodes. On the February 5 episode of Raw , Nakamura lost to Rhodes in a Bull Rope match, ending their feud. As part of
14443-425: The only strict rule of word order is that the verb must be placed at the end of a sentence (possibly followed by sentence-end particles). This is because Japanese sentence elements are marked with particles that identify their grammatical functions. The basic sentence structure is topic–comment . For example, Kochira wa Tanaka-san desu ( こちらは田中さんです ). kochira ("this") is the topic of the sentence, indicated by
14586-448: The original leader of the stable Chaos . Prior to his main roster debut in WWE, Nakamura competed in the company's NXT brand, where he became a two-time NXT Champion . In January 2018, Nakamura won the 2018 Men's Royal Rumble match , and later won the WWE United States Championship twice. He won the Intercontinental Championship for the first time in 2019 at Extreme Rules , making him
14729-470: The out-group gives a benefit to the in-group, and "up" to indicate the in-group gives a benefit to the out-group. Here, the in-group includes the speaker and the out-group does not, and their boundary depends on context. For example, oshiete moratta ( 教えてもらった ) (literally, "explaining got" with a benefit from the out-group to the in-group) means "[he/she/they] explained [it] to [me/us]". Similarly, oshiete ageta ( 教えてあげた ) (literally, "explaining gave" with
14872-415: The particle wa . The verb desu is a copula , commonly translated as "to be" or "it is" (though there are other verbs that can be translated as "to be"), though technically it holds no meaning and is used to give a sentence 'politeness'. As a phrase, Tanaka-san desu is the comment. This sentence literally translates to "As for this person, (it) is Mx Tanaka." Thus Japanese, like many other Asian languages,
15015-481: The proposed larger Altaic family, or to various Southeast Asian languages , especially Austronesian . None of these proposals have gained wide acceptance (and the Altaic family itself is now considered controversial). As it stands, only the link to Ryukyuan has wide support. Other theories view the Japanese language as an early creole language formed through inputs from at least two distinct language groups, or as
15158-459: The same structure as affirmative sentences, but with intonation rising at the end. In the formal register, the question particle -ka is added. For example, ii desu ( いいです ) "It is OK" becomes ii desu-ka ( いいですか。 ) "Is it OK?". In a more informal tone sometimes the particle -no ( の ) is added instead to show a personal interest of the speaker: Dōshite konai-no? "Why aren't (you) coming?". Some simple queries are formed simply by mentioning
15301-461: The second man, after Chris Jericho , to have held both the IWGP and WWE Intercontinental Championship, as well as the first Asian-born wrestler to win the title. On July 27, he retained his title against Ali at Smackville . He then started an alliance with Sami Zayn , defeating The Miz with his help at Clash of Champions on September 15 to retain the title. At Crown Jewel on October 31, Nakamura
15444-489: The second wrestler (behind Chris Jericho ) to hold both WWE and IWGP Intercontinental Championships. Nakamura is also a former WWE SmackDown Tag Team Champion with Cesaro . From July 2021 to October of the same year, Nakamura dubbed himself King Nakamura due to being in possession of the King of the Ring crown, although he never won the tournament, instead defeating reigning King of the Ring Baron Corbin in
15587-410: The semi-finals of the tournament with a clean sheet. On November 6, Nakamura and Yano were eliminated from the tournament in the semi-finals by the team of Lance Archer and Minoru Suzuki . On January 4, 2012, at Wrestle Kingdom VI in Tokyo Dome , the Chaos Top Team was defeated by Pro Wrestling Noah representatives Go Shiozaki and Naomichi Marufuji . On July 22, Nakamura defeated Hirooki Goto to win
15730-420: The show and seemed to eye up Nakamura after the match. On July 19, Nakamura lost to Makabe in a rematch for the IWGP Heavyweight Championship. The following month, Nakamura entered the 2010 G1 Climax , where he won four out of his seven-round robin stage matches, including one over eventual winner Satoshi Kojima , leading his block heading to the final day, where he wrestled Pro Wrestling Noah 's Go Shiozaki to
15873-547: The signing of Nakamura to NXT . On April 1, Nakamura defeated Sami Zayn in his debut match at NXT TakeOver: Dallas in a critically acclaimed match. On the April 13 episode of NXT , Nakamura defeated Tye Dillinger in his NXT television debut. On the May 25 episode of NXT , Austin Aries declared his intention to become the next NXT Champion , prompting a response from Nakamura, and NXT general manager William Regal scheduled
16016-439: The speaker, the listener, and persons mentioned. The Japanese writing system combines Chinese characters , known as kanji ( 漢字 , ' Han characters') , with two unique syllabaries (or moraic scripts) derived by the Japanese from the more complex Chinese characters: hiragana ( ひらがな or 平仮名 , 'simple characters') and katakana ( カタカナ or 片仮名 , 'partial characters'). Latin script ( rōmaji ローマ字 )
16159-817: The state as at the time the constitution was written, many of the elders participating in the process had been educated in Japanese during the South Seas Mandate over the island shown by the 1958 census of the Trust Territory of the Pacific that found that 89% of Palauans born between 1914 and 1933 could speak and read Japanese, but as of the 2005 Palau census there were no residents of Angaur that spoke Japanese at home. Japanese dialects typically differ in terms of pitch accent , inflectional morphology , vocabulary , and particle usage. Some even differ in vowel and consonant inventories, although this
16302-481: The street. (grammatically incorrect insertion of a pronoun) But one can grammatically say essentially the same thing in Japanese: 驚いた彼は道を走っていった。 Transliteration: Odoroita kare wa michi o hashitte itta. (grammatically correct) This is partly because these words evolved from regular nouns, such as kimi "you" ( 君 "lord"), anata "you" ( あなた "that side, yonder"), and boku "I" ( 僕 "servant"). This
16445-433: The tag team name Chaos Invincible. The team finished with a record of three wins, which included a win over stablemates Kazuchika Okada and Yoshi-Hashi as well as three losses, failing to advance from their block. On January 4, 2013, at Wrestle Kingdom 7 in Tokyo Dome , Nakamura defeated Kazushi Sakuraba for his fourth successful defense of the IWGP Intercontinental Championship. From January 18 to 19, Nakamura took part in
16588-544: The title against Hardy at SummerSlam . After refusing to defend the WWE United States Championship at the Hell in a Cell pay-per-view on September 16, general manager Paige ordered Nakamura to defend the championship on the September 18 episode of SmackDown Live , which he did successfully against Rusev . At SmackDown 1000 , Nakamura lost to the returning Rey Mysterio in a qualifying match for
16731-613: The title against previous champion Hiroshi Tanahashi. On December 5, Nakamura retained the title by defeating Yuji Nagata . On January 4, 2010, at Wrestle Kingdom IV in Tokyo Dome , Nakamura successfully defended the IWGP Heavyweight Championship against Yoshihiro Takayama in a rematch of their 2004 Tokyo Dome title unification bout. Nakamura was then challenged by Manabu Nakanishi , whom he would pin on February 14 at New Japan's ISM show in Sumo Hall, making his fifth defense. On April 4, Nakamura made his sixth successful title defense against
16874-487: The title on January 25, officially ending his fifth reign. Nakamura wrestled his last match under his NJPW contract on January 30, where he, Kazuchika Okada and Tomohiro Ishii defeated Hirooki Goto, Hiroshi Tanahashi and Katsuyori Shibata. Before Nakamura's departure from NJPW, ROH had announced that he would be appearing at their 14th Anniversary Show in Las Vegas as part of ROH's cross-promotion deal with NJPW, but ROH
17017-505: The title on July 5 at Dominion 7.5 in Osaka-jo Hall . From July 23 to August 15, Nakamura took part in the round-robin stage of the 2015 G1 Climax . Despite missing one match due to an elbow injury, Nakamura won his block and advanced to the finals by defeating reigning IWGP Heavyweight Champion and Chaos stablemate Kazuchika Okada in his last round-robin match, giving him a record of seven wins and two losses. On August 16, Nakamura
17160-615: The title to Joe in his first defense, marking his first televised loss in NXT. On the December 28 episode of NXT from Osaka, Japan, Nakamura would regain the NXT Championship from Joe. On the January 4, 2017, episode of NXT , he successfully defended the championship against Joe in a steel cage match , ending their feud. At NXT TakeOver: San Antonio on January 28, Nakamura lost the NXT Championship to Bobby Roode . In his return match on March 8, Nakamura defeated T. J. Perkins and
17303-414: The title, Nakamura drew the ire of Antonio Inoki by announcing his plan of wanting to restore the " Strong Style " of New Japan by capturing the original IWGP Heavyweight Championship belt from Inoki to replace the fourth generation title belt held by Nakamura. On October 12, Nakamura successfully defended the title against Shinjiro Otani . On November 8, at Destruction '09 , Nakamura successfully defended
17446-661: The title. On April 6, at Invasion Attack 2014 , Nakamura defeated Tanahashi to win the IWGP Intercontinental Championship for the third time. The following month, Nakamura took part in NJPW's North American tour, defeating Ring of Honor (ROH) wrestler Kevin Steen in an interpromotional match on May 17 at War of the Worlds . On May 25, at Back to the Yokohama Arena , Nakamura made the first successful defense of his third reign as
17589-406: The title. Post-match, Nakamura nominated Hiroshi Tanahashi as his next challenger, setting up the first title match between the two longtime rivals in over two years. From November 23 to December 7, Nakamura and Ishii took part in the 2013 World Tag League , where they finished with a record of three wins and three losses, with a loss against Togi Makabe and Tomoaki Honma on the final day costing them
17732-411: The title; Zayn won by pinning Strowman. Nakamura began teaming with Cesaro more frequently as they feuded with New Day for the SmackDown Tag Team Championship. On July 19, at The Horror Show at Extreme Rules , Nakamura and Cesaro defeated Kofi Kingston and Big E in a tables match to capture the titles. On the October 9 episode of SmackDown , they lost the titles to Kingston and Xavier Woods . On
17875-611: The topic with an interrogative intonation to call for the hearer's attention: Kore wa? "(What about) this?"; O-namae wa? ( お名前は？ ) "(What's your) name?". Negatives are formed by inflecting the verb. For example, Pan o taberu ( パンを食べる。 ) "I will eat bread" or "I eat bread" becomes Pan o tabenai ( パンを食べない。 ) "I will not eat bread" or "I do not eat bread". Plain negative forms are i -adjectives (see below) and inflect as such, e.g. Pan o tabenakatta ( パンを食べなかった。 ) "I did not eat bread". Alexey Ignashov Alexey Ignashov ( Belarusian : Аляксей Ігнашоў ; born 18 January 1978)
18018-417: The trophy to Ignashov. Despite all those huge wins, he has lost some bouts where he was a huge favorite. He was TKO'd only two times, each time because of injury, against Bjorn Bregy in 2005 and in his 2009 bout against 2003 French Kickboxing champion Freddy Kemayo . After 5 years of being out of the major ring events Iggy was granted his wish to return to K-1 in April 2010 against Badr Hari , having one of
18161-419: The two consonants are the moraic nasal followed by a homorganic consonant. Japanese also includes a pitch accent , which is not represented in moraic writing; for example [haꜜ.ɕi] ("chopsticks") and [ha.ɕiꜜ] ("bridge") are both spelled はし ( hashi ) , and are only differentiated by the tone contour. Japanese word order is classified as subject–object–verb . Unlike many Indo-European languages ,
18304-577: The two methods were both used in writing until the 1940s. Bungo still has some relevance for historians, literary scholars, and lawyers (many Japanese laws that survived World War II are still written in bungo , although there are ongoing efforts to modernize their language). Kōgo is the dominant method of both speaking and writing Japanese today, although bungo grammar and vocabulary are occasionally used in modern Japanese for effect. The 1982 state constitution of Angaur , Palau , names Japanese along with Palauan and English as an official language of
18447-480: The two terms (''hyōjungo'' and ''kyōtsūgo'') are almost the same. Hyōjungo or kyōtsūgo is a conception that forms the counterpart of dialect. This normative language was born after the Meiji Restoration ( 明治維新 , meiji ishin , 1868) from the language spoken in the higher-class areas of Tokyo (see Yamanote ). Hyōjungo is taught in schools and used on television and in official communications. It
18590-628: The two. At the Fastlane pre-show on March 2, Nakamura and Rusev were defeated by The New Day . At WrestleMania 35 on April 7, Nakamura and Rusev competed in a fatal four-way tag team match for the SmackDown Tag Team Championship , but lost. On July 14, at the Extreme Rules pre-show, Nakamura defeated Intercontinental Champion Finn Bálor to win the title for the first time in his career. This win made him
18733-407: The verb (e.g. yonde for earlier yomite ), the -k- in the final mora of adjectives drops out ( shiroi for earlier shiroki ); and some forms exist where modern standard Japanese has retained the earlier form (e.g. hayaku > hayau > hayɔɔ , where modern Japanese just has hayaku , though the alternative form is preserved in the standard greeting o-hayō gozaimasu "good morning"; this ending
18876-426: The win. On July 20, Nakamura regained the IWGP Intercontinental Championship from La Sombra, becoming the first multi-time holder of the title. From August 1 to 11, Nakamura took part in the 2013 G1 Climax . Finishing with a record of five wins and four losses, Nakamura narrowly failed to advance to the finals after losing to Benjamin on the final day. On September 29, at Destruction , Nakamura defeated Benjamin to make
19019-548: The world. Since Japanese first gained the consideration of linguists in the late 19th century, attempts have been made to show its genealogical relation to languages or language families such as Ainu , Korean , Chinese , Tibeto-Burman , Uralic , Altaic (or Ural-Altaic ), Austroasiatic , Austronesian and Dravidian . At the fringe, some linguists have even suggested a link to Indo-European languages , including Greek , or to Sumerian . Main modern theories try to link Japanese either to northern Asian languages, like Korean or
19162-405: The youngest IWGP Heavyweight Champion. His other accomplishments within the company include winning the 2011 G1 Climax and the 2014 New Japan Cup , and being the final IWGP Third Belt Champion , the final NWF Heavyweight Champion , and the longest reigning IWGP Intercontinental Champion for his first reign (he formerly held the record for most reigns at five ). He is also a founding member and
19305-448: Was a member of Team Flair , losing to Team Hogan . At Survivor Series on November 24, Nakamura lost to NXT North American Champion Roderick Strong in an inter-brand triple threat match also involving Raw's United States Champion AJ Styles. On the November 29 episode of SmackDown , Nakamura and Zayn formed an alliance with Cesaro , thus forming a stable known as The Artist Collective. That same night, Nakamura and Cesaro failed to win
19448-539: Was based on 12- to 20-second-long recordings of 135 to 244 phonemes , which 42 students listened to and translated word-for-word. The listeners were all Keio University students who grew up in the Kanto region . There are some language islands in mountain villages or isolated islands such as Hachijō-jima island , whose dialects are descended from Eastern Old Japanese . Dialects of the Kansai region are spoken or known by many Japanese, and Osaka dialect in particular
19591-596: Was defeated in the finals of the tournament by Hiroshi Tanahashi. On September 27, at Destruction in Kobe , Nakamura defeated Hirooki Goto to win the IWGP Intercontinental Championship for the fifth time; this would remain the record for most reigns until Tetsuya Naito became a six-time champion in 2020. He made his first successful title defense on November 7 at Power Struggle against Karl Anderson. He made his second successful defense on January 4, 2016, by defeating A.J. Styles at Wrestle Kingdom 10 in Tokyo Dome . Hours after
19734-449: Was drafted to the Raw brand . On the August 7 episode of Raw, Nakamura, Cody Rhodes and World Heavyweight Champion Seth "Freakin" Rollins defeated The Judgment Day ( Finn Bálor , Damian Priest and "Dirty" Dominik Mysterio ). After the match, Nakamura attacked Rollins, turning heel for the first time since 2021 and starting a feud between the two. Nakamura ultimately failed to win
19877-418: Was forced to pull him from the event due to Nakamura signing an exclusive WWE contract. On January 28, 2008, Nakamura defeated Elix Skipper in a match taped for TNA Xplosion . On January 6, 2016, Nakamura confirmed in an interview with Tokyo Sports that he would be leaving NJPW at the end of the month and signing with WWE . On January 27, WWE officially announced that Nakamura would be taking part in
20020-735: Was imported to Japan from Baekje around the start of the fifth century, alongside Buddhism. The earliest texts were written in Classical Chinese , although some of these were likely intended to be read as Japanese using the kanbun method, and show influences of Japanese grammar such as Japanese word order. The earliest text, the Kojiki , dates to the early eighth century, and was written entirely in Chinese characters, which are used to represent, at different times, Chinese, kanbun , and Old Japanese. As in other texts from this period,
20163-474: Was lost immediately following its composition.) This set of morae shrank to 67 in Early Middle Japanese , though some were added through Chinese influence. Man'yōgana also has a symbol for /je/ , which merges with /e/ before the end of the period. Several fossilizations of Old Japanese grammatical elements remain in the modern language – the genitive particle tsu (superseded by modern no )
20306-495: Was mostly speculation and never came to pass as Nakamura was urgently needed back in New Japan due to Lesnar's departure. On September 24, Nakamura made his long-awaited return to New Japan, joining Masahiro Chono's Black New Japan faction, which had the goal of reforming New Japan with Chono as the president and Nakamura as the " ace ". Nakamura had greatly improved his muscular mass during his overseas training and also debuted
20449-556: Was put into a rematch to face Roode for the NXT Championship at NXT TakeOver: Orlando on April 1, but he was unsuccessful in reclaiming the championship. On the April 12 episode of NXT , Nakamura made his final NXT appearance, bidding farewell to the Full Sail University crowd. On the April 4 episode of SmackDown Live , Nakamura made his main roster debut, interrupting The Miz and Maryse following their promo mocking John Cena and Nikki Bella , officially joining
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