page_title: Jushin Liger
section_title: Junior heavyweight veteran (2001–2020)
hierarchical_section_title: Jushin Liger / Professional wrestling career / New Japan Pro-Wrestling / Junior heavyweight veteran (2001–2020)
caption_attribution_description: English: Jushin Liger at ROHxNJPW Global Wars 2018 Night 2 in May 2018.
context_page_description: Keiichi Yamada, better known as Jushin Liger and later Jushin Thunder Liger is a Japanese retired professional wrestler and mixed martial artist who is best known for his work in New Japan Pro-Wrestling, where he is the longest-tenured member of the roster, having remained with the company since his debut in 1984 until his retirement in January 2020. Throughout his career, which spanned three-and-a-half decades, he wrestled over 4,000 matches and performed in major events for various promotions across the globe, including America's WWE, where he was also inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame Class of 2020.
  Debuting under his real name for NJPW in 1984, he was given the gimmick of Jushin Liger in 1989, based on the anime series of the same name. Becoming Jushin "Thunder" Liger the following year, he saw unprecedented success in the junior heavyweight division when he won the IWGP Junior Heavyweight Championship a record 11 times and set the record for its longest reign during his second reign, which lasted for 628 days.
context_section_description: From 2004 to 2007, Liger was the leader of the NJPW heel stable Control Terrorism Unit (CTU) along with Hirooki Goto, Minoru Tanaka, Black Tiger IV, Gedo, Jado, Prince Devitt and briefly James Gibson.
  CTU was disbanded in August 2007, when Liger decided CTU would disband while at the top of NJPW, Liger would then join Masahiro Chono's Legend stable. The Legend stable would disband in February 2010, after Chono, Choshu and Akira's departures.
  Since then, Liger has mainly teamed with fellow veteran Tiger Mask, remaining outside of championship contention for the most part. Liger and Tiger won the vacant IWGP Junior Heavyweight Tag Team Championship on June 16, 2012, at Dominion 6.16, losing it to Forever Hooligans (Alex Koslov and Rocky Romero) on July 22. Liger's next shot at the IWGP Junior Heavyweight Championship took place on May 3, 2016, when he unsuccessfully challenged Kushida for the title at Wrestling Dontaku 2016. In May 2017, Liger announced that the 2017 Best of the Super Juniors would be his last BOSJ tournament. He finished the tournament with a record of six losses and one win, which came in his last match against Taichi.
  At New Japan's 47th Anniversary Event, Liger was awarded a Junior Heavyweight title match against Taiji Ishimori after scoring a non-title victory over him the previous evening, however he failed to win the title losing via submission. The next day on March 7, 2019, it was announced that Liger will retire on January 5, 2020, at Wrestle Kingdom 14. Liger retired on January 5, 2020, after he and Naoki Sano were defeated by Hiromu Takahashi and Ryu Lee.
caption: Liger in 2018
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