Lori Tanaka

Lori Tanaka
Tanaka in September 2019 Tanaka in September 2019
Birth name	Lori Oichi Elizabeth Tanaka-Watson
Born	July 17, 1975 (age 44) Newark, New Jersey, USA
Residence	Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA
Children	Riley Tanaka (daughter)
Relatives	Amy Tanaka (sister) Casey Tanaka (sister)
Professional wrestling career
Ring name(s)	Lori Tanaka Miss Takaka
Billed height	5 ft 6 in (1.67 m)
Billed weight	128 lb (58 kg)
Billed from	Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Trained by	Raven Tommy Dreamer Sabu
Debut	March 24, 1995

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Lori Oichi Elizabeth Tanaka-Watson (born July 17th, 1975) is an American professional wrestler, professional wrestling manager, model, singer, musician and songwriter. She is currently signed to WWE on the NXT brand under her the ring name Lori Tanaka, where she is the current NXT Women's Champion in her second reign.

Early life

Birth and adolencence

Lori Tanaka-Watson was born on July 17th, 1975, in Newark, New Jersey, to Japanese-born Mitsunari Tanaka and Australian-born Mary Watson. According to Tanaka-Watson, while her parents never married, they had a strong love for each other. Tanaka-Watson has also stated how her parents were very loving towards her and always devoted their time to her growing up.

Tanaka-Watson was a self-described tomboy from an early age, taking an interest in men's activities such as skateboarding, aggressive inline skating, baseball, football and NASCAR. It was also during this time when she became a fan of professional wrestling, saying;

"I started watching wrestling at the age of 11, when I first saw WWF Prime Time Wrestling on the USA Network and I became hooked almost instantly, especially whenever Roddy Piper, Jake Roberts, The British Bulldogs, The Hart Foundation, Ricky Steamboat & Randy Savage were on TV. I wasn't really a fan of Hogan though, his gimmick was way too cartoonish for me. However, what actually made me want to become a wrestler was watching AWA Championship Wrestling on ESPN about a year later & seeing some of the brilliant work of Nick Bockwinkel, Scott Hall, Curt Hennig, The Midnight Rockers and of course the women wrestlers such as Madusa Miceli, The Magnificent Mimi, Candi Divine, and Sherri Martel."

Teen years and pregnancy

On October 7th 1990, when Tanaka-Watson was 15 years old, her mother Mary was tragically killed in a hit and run accident. Tanaka-Watson described her downwards spiral caused by her mother's death;

"When my mom died, that's when life for me was truly fucked up. I fell into a deep depression and very slowly I started to become openly rebellious. I started drinking heavily, very often getting myself thrown into fights, kept vandalizing property, and I started to become sexually active, to the point that I lost my virginity at the age of 16 while at a friend's house party, the only thing I refused to ever touch was drugs, & that was because one of my closest friends at the time nearly died of an overdose. But my attitude and behavior was so bad that by the end of '92 I was pretty close to getting expelled from high school so I chose to drop out anyway."

Tanaka-Watson's relationship with her father by this stage was beginning to become strained, as more and more often they would get into arguments about her behavior and attitude. Tanaka-Watson described the massive argument that nearly caused them to have a fallling out.

"I think things really came to a head one night around December '92 when I had come back home from a party and I was drunk off my face, dad was so pissed off at me; and of course he had every right to be, because I was so fucking out of control. But we had this massive fucking argument; actually it was more one-sided because my dad was trying to be calm and reasonable even though he was pissed off & I was the one yelling and being so ignorant calling him a 'miserable old fuck'. I think the reality check for me was when dad said that 'if mom was still alive she would've be embarrassed and ashamed of my behavior', I was really shocked hearing those words come out of his mouth, I ran off to my room where I had an emotional breakdown and literally cried myself to sleep."

Tanaka-Watson also revealed the argument led to her wanting to change her attitude and led to her decision to leave New Jersey.

"I remember the very next day I was reflecting on the whole argument that I had with my dad the previous night, and I felt so guilty. Not just because my behavior was so fucked up, but because of how it was affecting my dad, esecially because he was still grieving for mom and still had to look after Amy and Casey who were only toddlers at the time. At the same time, I felt that I couldn't change my ways unless I moved away from home. So, later that afternoon I waited for my dad to come back from picking up my sisters from kindergarten and when they got back home I asked him if we could talk. The first thing dad did during the conversation was apologize for what he said the previous night, and I told him that he said did hurt, but it had to be said. & I apologized too and told him that he was right about my behavior and that I wanted to fix it, but I would have to leave home because if I stayed I would probably still be a huge nuisance to him and my sisters. I was starting to become emotional during this point, and dad hugged me and said that he understood & that he would always love me no matter what. So he helped organize my move to Philly and a couple of weeks later I said a bittersweet goodbye to my dad and my little sisters and left New Jersey. That would also be the last time I'd see the three of them for about a year and a half. Altough I would talk to dad on the phone every couple of months."

Tanaka-Watson moved to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in January 1993, where she tried to get her life back on track. She still suffered from alcohol addiction during the first two months, but by May 1993, she stopped drinking alcohol completely after a stint in rehab. On July 18, 1993; the day after her 18th birthday, Tanaka-Watson attended the Lollapalooza music festival at the site of the recently demolished JFK Stadium. After the attending the festival, she had an intimate sexual encounter with her next-door neighbor Brian Smith, which would lead to her becoming pregnant.

"Y'know, that night was interesting, but I remember I was at the Lollapalooza festival for the entire time watching some of my favorite bands at the time such as Primus, Rage Against the Machine & Alice In Chains perform live. Then after the show I was ran to this dude named Brian, who was my next-door neighbor about the same age as me who was one of the first friends I made when I moved to Philly. We were chatting for a bit and he invited me to his place where we were listening to some of his music CDs, which surprised me because he was into the same music as I was into which at the time was mostly grunge & alternative. We were then sitting on the couch in Brian's living room when he told me that his girlfriend Jodi; who I didn't really get along with because she was always treating Brian like dirt, broke up with him a month prior and was living in Italy with a man she was having an affair with. I was shocked hearing about this, because Brian was so in love with Jodi that he was talking about getting married to her, only for her to cheat on him and dump him like that. So I comforted him, telling him that it sucked that Jodi would do that to him and that any chick would be lucky to have someone as kind-hearted and sweet as him. That's when he suddenly kissed me, and I pushed myself back for a second; not because I didn't like it, but because I was a bit shocked. He then apologized for doing that and I told him that it was ok and he deserves to be happy. We then started making out on the couch and then... things just escalated from there. It was the first time where I felt like I had a romantic connection with somebody. I mean, I had many sexual encounters before this, but this was the first time I truly thought that I met someone who I would spend the rest of my life with. The next day, we decided that make our relationship official."

Tanaka-Watson and Smith were together for over two months. However, Smith died on September 20, 1993 of a heart attack aged just 19. Tanaka-Watson was devastated with her boyfriend's death that she nearly began drinking again until she found out she was pregnant.

"Brian was heading out with his brother Timmy (who I'm still very close with to this day) to rent a movie for the three of us to watch. But then about an hour later I got a call from Timmy telling me that he was at the hospital and that Brian was being taken to emergency as he was having chest pains and was having trouble breathing. I immediately hopped into my car and drove to the hospital where I met up with Timmy & it was about 10 minutes later when the doctor told us that there was nothing they could do and that Brian died. I broke down almost immediately, another person who I loved dearly, someone who I planned to spend the rest of my life with was taken away from me. Then the doctor told us that Brian's death was caused by a heart attack, which I didn't understand at first because he had only turned 19 a week before. Timmy explained that Brian had a heart defect which was discovered when he was 16 and that he had a pacemaker attached to his heart which was supposed to keep him alive but it was later discovered after he died that his pacemaker was faulty due to corroded wiring. Brian's death really tore me up deeply, to the point that I nearly verged myself towards drinking again to cope with the grief, but then I found out I was pregnant with Brian's baby. That's when I decided to live a straight-edge lifestyle, to finally kick the boozing habit forever"

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Professional wrestling career

Extreme Championship Wrestling (1995-2000)

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World Wrestling Federation/World Wrestling Entertainment (2000-2007)

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Total Nonstop Championship Wrestling (2007-2012)

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Return to WWE and temporary retirement (2012-2014)

Tanaka in April 2014

Tanaka returned to WWE on July 23, 2012 during RAW's 1000th episode, appearing alongside Lita and the other WWE legends in confronting Heath Slater

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Action Zone Championship Wrestling (2015-2018)

Return of "The Hardcore Bitch" and feud with Hollie Lee Grant (2015-2016)

In late-February 2015, Tanaka was contacted by Robbie Jacko, the founder of Australian hardcore wrestling promotion Action Zone Championship Wrestling & was asked if she would like to join the promotion as a manager, Tanaka agreed to join on the condition that she uses her "Hardcore Bitch" gimmick and that she'd be allowed to wrestle full-time, which Jacko happily agreed to.

Tanaka made her AZCW debut on the March 14, 2015 episode of AZCW TV, attacking Hollie Lee Grant with a kendo stick and establishing herself as a heel. Tanaka then grabbed a microphone and announced that "The Hardcore Bitch is back motherfuckers!!!". Despite being a heel, the crowd cheered loudly for Tanaka and started chanting "She's hardcore!!" after the repeated kendo stick attacks towards Grant.

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Second Return to WWE (2018-present)

NXT debut and feud with Lacey Evans (2018)

On January 27, 2018, Tanaka was shown on-screen sitting in the front row at NXT TakeOver: Philadelphia. The next day on WWE.COM, it was announced that Tanaka had signed a contract with WWE and would perform full-time on the NXT brand. On the February 7th episode of NXT, Tanaka would make her NXT in-ring debut as a face, now sporting purple hair, reverting back to her old "Grizzly" entrance music and displaying mannerisms of her "hardcore" gimmick, where she defeated Peyton Royce. She would then start a winning streak, defeating the likes of Nikki Cross, Billie Kay, and Candice LaRae.

On the May 15th episode of NXT, Tanaka would begin a feud with Lacey Evans, after Evans criticized Tanaka's ring attire and attitude.

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Feud with Emily Travis and winning the NXT Women's Championship (2018-2019)

At NXT WarGames II, Lori made an appearance aiding her daughter Riley after she was viciously assaulted by the new NXT Women's Champion Emily Travis, who had just defeated Riley for the belt. On the November 21st episode of NXT, in a interview with Mauro Renallo, Lori tearfully revealed the extent of Riley's injuries then angrily promised revenge against Travis for what she did to her daughter, starting a intensely heated rivalry between the two. On the November 28th episode of NXT, Tanaka confonted Travis following her match against Io Shirai, before attacking her with a kendo stick and chasing her out of the arena.

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Professional wrestling style and persona

Takaka's wrestling style has been described as a mix of the brawler, technical and high-flyer wrestling styles. Her signature finishing move is a variation of the Stone Cold Stunner, which she has dubbed "Da Lori Stunner". Tanaka also uses the 450 splash, which since her return to WWE in 2018 was renamed "Pretty & Deadly".

Her persona is that of a sexy alternative grunge (later metalhead) babe who loves to fight and win.

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Other media

Modeling career

File:LoriTanakaPB2017.jpg

Tanaka on the cover of the September/October 2017 edition of Playboy, which would mark the fifth time in twenty years that she posed nude for the magazine.

In mid-1994, while working as a topless dancer at her local strip club, Tanaka-Watson was approached to do some modeling by a local agency. Her extensive list of credits include dozens of magazine features and covers, ad campaigns, billboards, and spans all genres from fashion to fetish and art nudes; especially during her early modeling career. Tanaka-Watson also posed nude for Playboy on five seperate occasions (March 1997, May 1998, February 2000, October 2011 & September/October 2017) and also posed nude for Penthouse magazine on six separate occasions (July 1994, November 1994, September 1995, October 1998, June 1999 and in the Australian edition of the magazine in September 2016). Aside from Playboy and Penthouse, Tanaka-Watson is also best remembered as a model for Hot Topic during the late-1990's and early 2000's, modeling the nu metal-influenced apparel that was marketed by the brand at the time.

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Music career

Tanaka-Watson is the lead singer and rhythm guitarist of nu metal band X-Sail, which she formed in mid-1995. X-Sail have released 7 studio albums between 1997 to 2019, 5 of which topped the Billboard 200 charts and 4 of which were certified multi-platinum by the RIAA. Their most successful album ''Control Desolution'' (which was released on July 27th, 2002; on Tanaka-Watson's 27th birthday) has sold over 30 million albums in the United States to date (over 60 million albums worldwide) was certified Diamond by the RIAA, and recieved a Grammy Award nomination for Best Rock Album. Her daughter Riley joined the band as bassist in 2013.

Tanaka-Watson's musical influences include a wide range of nu metal, grunge, industrial metal and alternative metal artists such as Coal Chamber, Linkin Park, 40 Below Summer, Dope, Alice In Chains, Soulfly, Kittie, Korn, My Ruin, Slipknot, Deftones, Static-X, Guano Apes, Soundgarden, Tura Satana, Faith No More, Godsmack, Staind, Adema, Blindspott, Exilia, Hole, Rage Against The Machine, Nirvana, Otep, Papa Roach & Cold.

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Personal life

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In wrestling

Tanaka performing her finishing move, Da Lori Stunner (a variation of the Stone Cold Stunner) on Shayna Baszler

• Finishing moves
  • Da Lori Stunner (Facelock jawbreaker)
  • Pretty & Deadly (450 Splash)
• Signature moves
  • Gamengiri & Cartwheel moonsault combo
  • Knee balancing enzugiri
  • Spaceman plancha
  • Avalanche spanish fly
  • Wrecking ball hurricanrana
  • Bronco buster
  • Springboard dropkick
  • Arabian press
  • Handspring headscissor takedown
  • Glitter blizzard
  • Tope atomica
  • Suicide dive
  • Springboard moonsault
  • Stinkface
  • Corner foot choke
  • Springboard dive
  • Slingshot gullotine leg drop
• Nicknames
  • "The Hardcore Bitch"
  • "The Hardcore Babe"
  • "Pretty & Deadly"
• Entrance themes
  • "Would?" by Alice In Chains (August 1995-March 2000, March 2016-January 2018)
  • "Grizzly" by Peter Jordan (March 2001-October 2007, August 2012-December 2012)
  • "Do You Think I'm A Whore" by Kittie (May 2015-March 2016)
  • "Grizzly (Pretty & Deadly Mix)" by Peter Jordan (February 2018-Present)

Championships and accomplishments

Action Zone Championship Wrestling

• AZCW Women's Championship (3 times)

CBS Sports

• Wrestler of the Year (2019)

Extreme Championship Wrestling

• ECW World Heavyweight Championship (1 time)

Pro Wrestling Illustrated

• Woman of the Year (2000, 2001, 2004, 2009, 2019)
• Ranked No. 1 of the Top 100 female wrestlers in the PWI Female 100 in 2019

Total Nonstop Action Wrestling / Impact Wrestling

• Impact X Division Championship (1 time)
• TNA Knockouts Championship (3 times)
• TNA Knockouts Tag Team Championship (1 time) - with Amy Tanaka

World Wrestling Federation / Entertainment / WWE

• WWE Hall of Fame (Class of 2014)
• WWE Hardcore Championship (5 times)
• NXT Women's Championship (2 times, current)
• WWE Women's Championship (5 times)
• WWE Divas Championship (1 time)
• WWE Women's Tag Team Championship (1 time) - with Riley Tanaka