The Tragedy of Yokozuna (wrestling documentary)
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 4 มิ.ย. 2024
- Yokozuna was a massive presence in the WWF of the 90's. He was the most agile big man in wrestling when he debuted, but his size would become a problem to both the WWF and himself. His aim to be the biggest wrestler in the world would eventually be the downfall of Rodney Anoa'i.
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- Chapters in 'The Tragedy of Yokozuna' wrestling documentary
00:00 - Intro
00:54 - The Wild Samoans
01:20 - Rodney's training
01:55 - Scouted by the WWF
02:36 - Birth of Yokozuna
03:20 - Yokozuna dominates
04:15 - The push begins
05:00 - The real Rodney Anoa'i
05:40 - Hulk Hogan vs Yokozuna
07:15 - WWF Champion
09:46 - Weight problems arise
11:52 - Vince McMahon's ultimatum
12:32 - Fired from the WWF
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Hi guys, hope you enjoy this one 👍Just letting you know I also upload via Spotify open.spotify.com/show/7a841T1CbmaVVwhnrAsZV7 and Podbean stunnedbywrestling.podbean.com/ if you ever want to listen on the go.
Sir very informative video. But you didn't mentioned his gem character outside the ring in detail that he made his friendship with almost everybody. Even the kliq member Scott Hall respected him the most!
Yokozuna was every child’s nightmare back in 90’s but a legendary superstar.. Gone too soon. 😢
I remember being a young kid and seeing yokozuna for the first time, what a talent and such a sad demise. But an absolute legend
I remember when they made him tag partners with owen and it was the weirdest pairing ever. Almost as bad as putting Owen in the Nation of Domination.
He was ok
@@sweetpetergeda Definitely talented. You see how big that mfer is? He's one of the few I don't think lied about his weight. Ric Flair 275lbs. Sean Michaels 270lbs. Gtfo
I always forget Yokozuna isn't actually Japanese. He played the part so well !
Yeah I never understand that he was Samoan but he came waving the Japanese flag
@@tishawnpenn1428 FOR strange coincidence at the same decade a HAWAIAN became yokozuna in japan sumo...
Akebono taro
@@FULANODETALhe’s Samoan not Hawaiian
@@forthelaughs1529 Well oceanic polinesians
He was very popular in the early 90s. I was 5-7 years old didn’t follow wrestling but I knew who he was and the name. Rip to the legend
Yoko at 385lbs wasa phenomenon . Yoko at 640lbs was a tragedy . Addiction kills .
I had to go get gastric bypass surgery to lose weight before it took me out too, and I was only 24. I was exactly 501.98lbs (227.7Kg) the day I had the surgery in 2004, I'm 41 years old now and I've been between 170-185 ever since. Food addiction is very real, and the underlying cause is usually a very great deal of sadness and depression. It's a vicious cycle that I almost lost my fight with. At just 24 years old, I shouldn't have been facing things like extreme type two diabetes, liver/kidney/and heart failure, and everything else.
What a fantastic comment, well done brother ❤️🩹 and I agree 💯 all addictions including food addiction are driven by crippling sadness and trauma, always originating from adverse childhood experiences, devoid of love, safety, nurture and peace, as a result an individual loses there true authentic self, (spirit of god) and hate themselves. Thus consuming themselves to death with dysfunctional and addictive behaviours, but there is a way out, if people have the courage to go back to that place and time of severe hurt, and genuinely heal. Thankyou, and god bless 👌🙏
I’m glad you’re doing well!
Food addiction is one of the worst because its not as if you can quit eating altogether
I don't know how tall you are, but that sounds like a current healthy weight to me. Congrats! Mind over matter. A fella needs to identify their problem and sincerely want to improve for anything meaningful to happen.
I respect efforts towards health, and they don't need to be major, but they're real, nonetheless. Don't allow yourself to be controlled by anyone but yourself, and that certainly includes what you consume.
Brother great comment and I completely understand. I was extremely overweight, diabetic with high blood pressure and high cholesterol. I’m 5 foot 10 but at the time I weighed 363 pounds. In 2018 I had the gastric sleeve surgery and now at 200 pounds with no more complications
Gone way too soon..great job on this. Rip Rodney.
Yokuzuna was a phenom and he fought the great from Undertaker to Steve Austin. He was good but as gained weight, it was a downward spiral. God bless and rest his soul
Fought Hogan,hart,undertaker,macho man and scsa
he played his character very well, and i never knew he had such a good side to him outside of the ring. surely his kids miss him dearly....
Being he was part of the Anoia family of great pro wrestlers, not shocked he was a good Hoss
Rodney. You are a rare remarkable talent. Your presence scared me whn i was younger lol but usually the guys scare you the most are the nicest guys. Andre the giant, big show, taker and kane etc....
My dad saw him outside of a venue during a raw taping back in the day and couldn't believe the vile stuff everyone was yelling at him after the show
Thats messed up. I bet none of those ppl wouldn't dare to say that vile stuff face to face. Rip Rodney...gone way too soon
Hogan? 😂
Rodney could generate the heat. People thought he was actually Japanese😮
@@hollis684they weren't typing to him they were yelling at him so they did see him face-to-face
@@BileDuctBalderdash I figured they were yelling..but from a loooong ways from him. That man didn't deserve that..and he could easily and seriously hurt somebody 4 real. The audacity and nerve of ppl to be so disrespectful.
This is why I love wrestling. Samoa, Mexico, Japan and Canada, US are hot beds of the best wrestlers in the world. We as fans wanna thank you and absolutely respect the work you professionals do for our entertainment!
I agree, a well worded comment!
Yokozuna was one of the most agile 400 pound guys. He should’ve stayed at that way.
Seka... Still lives in my hometown to this day grew up with his daughter Vanessa and Matt. It was very common to see yok three or four times in a week when he was in town some of my fondest memories and yes they did have a wrestling ring in their backyard everyone wanted to go over there you never know who would be showing up WWF back in the day. We misss U YOK.
Rodney was truly a gentle giant .
Sure was.
Yoko was a generational talent. Like seriously.
like no, seriously, compare his performance to every other wrestler and say it again.
he was a freak at that point of his life.
He apparently never liked school 😂
@@johnjacobo huh??
@@johnjacobo what does that have to do with anything, though? Lmao
The sumo wrestling gimmick played by a Polynesian wrestler was absolutely perfect. A lot of people don't realize during the 90s some of the top of sumo wrestlers in Japan were Polynesian.
he was Japanese...i don't care what others said
@@xXJonnyJamboXxhe’s full Samoan buddy lol
Great video upload thanks again 👍
I really really enjoy your videos. Glad I found you.
❤ thanks for doing this video I loved Yokozuna he was so cool not to many men his size could move so well in the ring I miss him 😢 the most sushi I ate was 70 years ago
Yoko could move for his size.... sadly he never could lose weight n it killed him.. may he rest in peace..🙇♀️🙇♀️❤
He didn't want to lose weight. He died because of his ignorance.
Fuck him
I seen a video saying his diet was like 15 turkey butts
No he could and was losing the weight that was Vince Mcmahon's fault he kept offering Yokozuna more money to gain weight.
Born in the mid 80’s
My favs were always Andre, savage, hogan, and bam bam
Undertaker and yoko were two of the last big wwf names that I became a fan of before finding out the about kayfabe and the dying
It's a shame he didn't embrace the sumo gimmick more, maintaining his weight but also building muscle and improving his cardio. Actual sumo have a grueling schedule and are no fat slobs.
It's sad rodney died so young 😥
Everyone who talks about Rodney has nothing but good things to say about him. RIP.
It saddens me to watch this. I loved watching Yokozuna. I wish he would have heeded Vince McMahon's warning/advise in a timely manner. God bless you Rodney.
This had to be around 1991 when me and some friends were at a house show at the old Spectrum in Philly. We arrived early and saw the area where the wrestlers arrived at the ramps to the underground parking and locker room areas. We managed to get pictures and autographs from a lot of the whos who at the time. And then this new (at the time) Cadillac sedan shows up. Mr. Fuji was driving and Yokozuna was in the front seat. Watching him try to get out of that large sedan was borderline heartbreaking. Mr. Fuji is this tiny man, and Yoko was looking like he could barely move. They were playing heel at the time so no autographs or pictures. But seeing him up close and to see how large he actually was...I'm honestly amazed he made it as long as he did. I figured his hips, knees, and ankles were going to go first and put him in a wheelchair or bedbound.
3:50 Taker: I want to work with Yokozuna.
Vince: Best I can do is a fued with Giant Gonzales
🤣 poor Taker
I remember these fights . Men how time flies
Seeing him at Wrestlemania X was amazing experience. He was such a Presence
I got to see him squash Hogan at King of the Ring
I met him at Yokota AF Base outside of Tokyo.... he was still Sumo wrestling at the time... I have his autograph somewhere
Yoko vs Vader was awesome, great big man feud. Yoko and Vader also teamed up in Japan but he was known as "Kokina Maximus".
Loving the accent mate and channel 👌🏽🙏🏽 local legend
3:40 that's why undertaker is a legend
Great video as always dude. Thank you 🙏
Great video
Saw Yoko wrestle Undertaker and Hogan at two WWE/F houseshows in Germany in 1993. At the time I wasn't a child anymore, but I was truly scared of Yoko. 😀 It's just sad he died at such a young age.
You didn’t see anyone wrestling, you watched people pretending to wrestle.
Such a believable talent.
I was at one of the shows he was meant to be at in England. I remember them having the 10 bell salute with Greg Valentine (whom I guess was meant to be his opponent) in the ring.
At Summerslam 1993, he was in the main event. At Summerslam 1996, he was on the pre-show. By Summerslam 1999, he was no longer employed and he would be dead not that long after that. I wonder how different, not just his life, but the landscape of wrestling in general would be had he gotten into better shape. Maybe in an alternate timeline, by 1999 he was back in the title picture, maybe he would have feuded with DX, maybe he would have been in The Corporation as Vince's hired monster, or maybe he would have joined forces with his friends in the Ministry Of Darkness. He probably would have toned down the sumo wrestler gimmick a bit and gone for something that was closer to his real personality. They could have had him as a tag team with Rikishi, that would have been interesting in a time where the tag team division was mostly about TLC matches and big high risk stunts to have this 1 team of big guys.
This is actually a very underrated channel. Opinion on JR aside of course.
My grandmom, and I was arguing whether if yoko is Japanese or from Hawaii when I was still in elementary school. I was like look grandma he is Japanese, look at the flag. My grandma was like I grew up in Japan I know a Japanese when I see one lol
I always thought he was Japanese kkkkkkk
Yoko took his gimmick to such a level that's it's really hard to remember the he is Samoan and not Japanese. I look at his image and it feels weird to imagine someone calling him Rodney
Its not just fear for Yoko health at 660lbs but also the safety of those in the ring with him . At that size it becomes very hard to protect your co-workers .
yea they dont care about that if he can entertain that's all fine
Great video, well done Sir
Vader and Yoko "sneaking out" of the weight loss place...sorry but it's too funny for words
His elimination of macho man at ROYAL RUMBLE 93 was the worst ever .
"And the plan for WM IX was for Rodney to hold the belt for the foreseeable future ..."
Hulk: "Or maybe not brother! I had a great idea, how about after your match I hit the boot and leg drop in quick fashion and hold the belt for awhile dude?!"
Mr McMahon is a true boss. Both concern about the business and also the well being of the wrestler
Can't believe how young he was, The Undertaker was there for nearly as long as Yoko was alive!
One thing that I have come to enjoy and appreciate as I approach my 40s, is the kind of relationships that I develop with the characters that I hated the most as a child.
For example, as a child I hated, with a blinding passion, Mr. Perfect, Rick Rude, and as in the video, Yokozuna, among others. I hated their expressions. I hated to see them celebrate after cheating. I hated their managers who I now often view as some of the absolute funniest, most storied, and incredibly talented of the performers.
And then you experience life yourself. Not only do you just learn about how they're just performers playing a role, which you can appreciate, but you DO start to look at their characters motivations equally. You look at old feuds and you kinda start to side or empathize with them 😂😂😂 For me, its almost like enjoying that era of wrestling again, for a second time, but in a different bizarro world kind of way. You start to love the characters because they're YOUR personal old school shit growing up AND you start to love them because, you know what? Maybe Mr. Perfect was right about Hulk Hogan lmao Maybe Hogan just.... sucked... and wrestled lazy matches, in compression to the acrobatic Mr. Perfect 😂 Yet I was one of the millions of "Hulkamaniacs" out there as a kid 🥰 Because you were just a kid, you didnt know any better. And if you liked Hulk genuinely, that's ok too. The only crime is that guys like Perfect and Rude never got the big title. But Yokozuna did, and now that I have made peace with him from the searing hatred I had for him as a kid, I'm glad he did.
From the full appreciation that I have now, watching Yoko dance around really IS impressive when you consider his size and weight. I couldn't see it as a kid, but someone with that kind of mass that moves quickly is actually a little bit scary. I can imagine that helped the character a lot when Yokozuna first came out because fans probably found the whole sumo thing "funny". There really isn't much exposure to it in America outside of the context of a "funny joke". You see in Hollywood it's always a joke about a "fat guy in a diaper", and so Sumo never gets a serious look into the more serious side of it. It deals with bear-like insanely strong men who train like the devil himself. So when you think about being thrown around and caught by someone of that mass, pretty scary when you think about it.
Terrible that he passed so young, but given his size & what he put his body through wrestling with ridiculous skill & speed for a man his size its not surprising. The human body can only do so much.
Imagine working at a fast food place late at night and seeing both Vader and Yokozuna show up. "Give us all your food!"
Only thing worse would be Ken Patera showing up with a huge rock in his hand.
Dying alone, thousands of miles from his family, in a fleabag Scouse motel is a terrible way to go.
Yeah and he died from drowning... and awful painful death.
Especially after being twice at the top of his field . Yokozuna was not just an interim champion as most heel champions are .
Saw him a few nights before, he didn't look good, truly a sad ending
Yokozuna was the first heel in the history of the company to have a long run with the WWF Championship.
Until 1993, the formula was always simple: Babyface holds the title... babyface drops it to an interim champ... babyface wins the title... rinse and repeat.
Andre, Savage, Slaughter, Undertaker, Flair... all had relatively short runs with the belt as heels. (Savage had a year-long run but was a babyface for most of that.)
Yokozuna regained the WWF Championship at King of the Ring 1993 and held it for 9 months until Wrestlemania X, where Bret Hart avenged his loss from a year ago.
I think we all thought Lex Luger was going to win the title at Summerslam, but Yokozuna retained via count-out loss.
R.I.P. Yokozuna
Goodbye grand champion you will be missed
Thank you for not mentioning the heroes of wrestling pay-per-view
I forgot how dominant Yokozuna was during his short time and it's a shame how he passed. I was baffled to see he was actually a samoan and not Japanese, this is the first time I've heard of this and heck of a job pulling it off. I remember when Lex Luger body slammed him on the ship. On a side note that had to be terrifying having him even fake splash you off the ropes since 1 slip up could ruin your life forever or end it, same has to be said for Nia Jax.
Bret Hart would have outshined Hogan in a match and Hogan knew it .
I was always impressed with those kicks for such a big man. Very entertaining and convincing R.I.P
When his weight wasn’t completely ballooning, he was a very agile and mobile big guy, but when his weight reached like 500, I have seen enough My 100000000lb life shows to know who that can kill your mobility as
Well as destroy your joints… but in 93-94 he was an awesome heel
And his moves had great pact and I don’t think hurt too many people (could have worked with nia jax on how not to be dangeraous)
I was there that night before he died, I managed to sneak back stage in the famous olympia (close to the grafton 😉)
Where I briefly met Rodney an Greg, yoko had such a nice smile an was very nice fella! Next night he was gone.. very sad! Wish you well Rodney in the sky ❤🙏🏻❤
Another sad story when they were working on WrestleMaina arcade game I think Scott Hall stated it took Yoko bout an hr to make it to the building that's how heavy he had gotten
12:46 he makes rikishi look tiny 😮
He was my favorite character in wwe games back then
Oh the Wrestlemania Arcade game memories!
You've got to give it to Vince though, for all his faults, he did try and help. I've heard similar stories regarding Andre the Giant.
Greatest actor of all time. Be it emotion, agility, stage presence... Samoan legend...
I love Yoko's belly to belly suplex.
I train in wrestling with his family they are amazing people and hard working. It would break my heart to hear anyone saying crude things to Yoko.
You're great. I used to die hard fan of wrestling dreaming I'll be wrestler one day , however I never trained and slowly I came out of wrestling dresm in a decade
Insane days of mine 1997-2007
All day dreams of just wrestling downloading classics', re watching, practicing wrestling moves on friends siblings 😂
My earliest memories as a toddler in the early 90s occurred at my uncle’s house. My dad and other uncles would all meet up and watch wwf pay per view. Yokozuna was the big, bad guy at the time. Probably 1992-1993.
Someone needs to do a biopic on Yokozuna as cautionary tale on what a UNHEALTHY relationship with food is/ looks like #RIPYokozuna
You need to worry about your unhealthy relationship with other people's business.
@@diamond852 Homoerotic trolling is not the move, bro... God Bless & do better
Mr Fuji was born in Hawaii, he was actually ofJapanese and Native Hawaiian ancestry
And couldn't actually speak Japanese lol
@@freakystyley4000 if that was true, why did Mr Fuji always complain about poor American quality products he was force to indure?
FUI: He hated to be called Rodney... there's a video of a Smark fan calling him that and he drops all facade in an instant -.-
6:28 I even prefer Joe Kozuna :D
8:53 Even at this angle you can see that Yoko's left shoulder is up...
Nice video -- thank you!
Heard he was great guy.
What's the bit of him eating rice backstage from ?
I first came to know about him। through 16 bit video gsmes in 90s
I hated watching his finisher. Sometimes it seemed his feet would slip and he would legit crush his opponent
He did with jobbers.
For a man his size, he was incredible, his moves legitimately looked devastating.
i remember him as one who dominate every wrestlers. then when it comes to undertaker, his eyes was so funny, looking how scared he was.
The undertaker vs Yokozuna at the royal rumble gets alot of hate but I quite liked that match. Maybe its the nostalgia talking but it did make the Undertaker look like a bad ass taking on all those wrestlers and seeing taker fight them all off for a time was great as a kid. Shame what happened to yoko he was so agile for a big man and remember the fear he caused as a monster heel. The bonzai drop looked devastating but generally he was a safe worker from shoot interviews I have seen.
I would like to see you do a Documentary on George ( THE ANIMAL) Steel
I heard a rumor he was deathly afraid of spiders and saw one in the hotel room. Not sure how true it is
Remember reading that somewhere myself.
It's fake news. He died of pulmonary edema. Fluid build up in his lungs. Too much fat, blood and pressure around/in his lung. He drowned.
It was in UK papers for sure
Rip legend 🙏
I was at wrestlemania X, good times.
R.i.p. Rodney yokozuna a real legend 😎💯💙💰🤝💪🇺🇲✊
When I was young, one of my favorite WWF trump card (weight)
Bret Heart Hit Man, Undertaker are my favourite.
Tragic really, I feel Brett Hart got it right when he stated superstars are treated like circus animals, once they’re finished they are taken out back and a slug put in their head.
R.i.p
He was big, talented and strong 💪 rip yoko
He was quite popular in India in 90s.
In the game of trump cards, his specs were on top to give a winning edge
Who was that wrestler at 10 15?
That's pretty sad... I do remember WWF celebrating his ever increasing weight, maybe around the time of the body slam competition or the following Wrestlemania, but I kind of assumed it was mostly kayfabe... I suppose that was before McMahon started getting genuinely concerned... Now I know it was real, it's pretty horrifying.
RIP 1966-2000
Yoko was a dominant force once in a lifetime talent
How the hell did Hogan wind up with a belt that was up for grabs between Yoko and bret hart?
R.I.P. mighty yoko
Died in my home town in a hotel that isn't even there anymore 😢
Was my favorite