Big Ben

**Big Ben** (ビッグ ベン, *Biggu Ben*) was a professional wrestling tag team signed to Dragon Gate in which they formed it on November 3, 2017, where they are a former two-times Open The Twin Gate Championship, while also being a former Open The Triangle Gate Champions alongside former stablemate Naruki Doi who both turned on him and joined ANTIAS.

The team name consists of Shimizu and Ben-K's first names respectively, with the **Big Ben** coming from Shimizu first name **Big** and Ben-K's first name **Ben**.

On August 7, Shimizu turned on MaxiMuM stablemate Naruki Doi, followed by Ben-K on September 6, who turned on Doi also and joined ANTIAS. In May 2019, Shimizu turned on Ben-K, disbanding the team.

## History

Before being an official team, Ben-K and Big R Shimizu won the Open The Triangle Gate Championship alongside Naruki Doi on March 20, 2017 at Memorial Gate in Wakayama, and later formed MaxiMuM with Doi, Masato Yoshino and Kotoka.

Shortly after losing the Open The Triangle Gate Championship in July, a few months later the two focused on tag team competition. As part of MaxiMuM, Ben-K and Shimizu formed a tag team named "Big Ben", unsuccessfully challenging CK-1 for the Open The Twin Gate Championship on November 3 at Gate of Destiny. In March, 2018 Ben-K and Shimizu both received an Open The Dream Gate Championship, first Ben-K on March 4 and Shimizu on March 21, with both losing on both occasions. On April 1, 2018 Ben-K and Shimizu and their MaxiMuM stablemate Naruki Doi defeated ANTIAS (Eita, T-Hawk and Takashi Yoshida), after Shimizu pinned Eita. Afterwards, Shimizu and Ben-K challenged Eita and T-Hawk to a title match for the Open The Twin Gate Championship. This led to them defeating Eita and T-Hawk to win the Open The Twin Gate Championship in their second attempt on May 6 at Dead or Alive.

Following the Dead or Alive, Ben-K and Shimizu took part in the King of Gate, wrestling in separate blocks. Ben-K finished his block with a record of two wins, one draw and one loss against YAMATO prevented him to enter in the semifinals. Meanwhile, Shimizu finished last in his block with one win and three losses, advancing to a tournament to decide the last placed wrestler in the King of Gate. They lost the titles to Tribe Vanguard (YAMATO and BxB Hulk) on July 22 at Kobe Pro Wrestling Festival. Following the Kobe World, on August 7, Shimizu would turn on Doi and join ANTIAS, thus disbanding the team for a while On September 6, Ben-K turned on Doi to join ANTIAS, thus reuniting with each other. Shortly after, ANTIAS renamed themselves to R.E.D. On December 23 at Final Gate, Shimizu and Ben-K defeated Tribe Vanguard (Kagetora and YAMATO), Speed Muscle (Masato Yoshino and Naruki Doi) and MexaBlood (Bandido and Flamita) in a four-way elimination tag team match to regain the Open The Twin Gate Championship for the second time.

Since January 16, 2019, during a match between R.E.D and MaxiMuM, Shimizu accidentally attacked Ben-K on two occasions which caused some tension between them. Shimizu had previously cost R.E.D a match, with the rest of R.E.D leaving the arena without him. Shimizu's mistakes would repeat during R.E.D's matches, leading Eita to accuse him of doing it on purpose, and blamed Ben-K and Shimizu for the loses and accused them of being incompetent. On February 5, tensions would come ahead between R.E.D and the rest of the others stables in Dragon Gate except MaxiMuM, Eita would criticize each stable weak points and agreed to a match with each other on March 7. Eita would nominate himself, PAC, Kazma Sakamoto and Yasushi Kanda for the match, leaving Shimizu arguing that he and Ben-K should be in the match due to holding the Open The Twin Gate Championship. Mochizuki Dojo would try to enter the match, Eita protested, but Shimizu wanted them in the match, leading Eita to claim that he was the leader of R.E.D. Five days later, Eita would accidentally hit Ben-K with a chair, costing his match against U-T. Shimizu blamed Eita for Ben-K's loss and demanded an explanation, but he refused claiming they were the ones who lost the match. Ben-K and Shimizu errors led Eita to threat them that he would kick them out of the stable. Despite **Big Ben**, retaining the Open The Twin Gate Championship on March 3 at Champion Gate in Osaka, Eita warned them that he had no problems of kicking them out. On March 7, Tribe Vanguard won the four-way eight-man tag team elimination match, after Ben-K accidentally attacked Kanda. Shimizu would beg Eita to not kick them out of the stable, YAMATO would provoke Eita, leading him to berate the other units. General Manager Takayuki Yagi capitalized on the opportunity and announced the rules for the Steel Cage Survival match at Dead or Alive on May 6, as well multiple tag team matches between members of the respective units to decide, which member would enter in the match. Eita would select Yoshida as his partner and their opponents would be Big Ben. On April 10, Big Ben defeated Eita and Yoshida, with Shimizu pinning Eita, to represent R.E.D in the match. Afterwards, Shimizu dared Eita to kick him out of the stable. Yoshida declared that he was not on Eita's side causing tensions in R.E.D, leading Sakamoto and Kanda to choose Eita's side, dividing the stable.

On April 28, Ben-K and Shimizu lost the Open the Twin Gate Championship to KAI and YAMATO, after Eita cost them the match. On May 6 at Dead or Alive, Ben-K and Eita lost to Kaito Ishida and Masato Yoshino. During the match, Ben-K refused to cooperate with Eita and later after some miscommunication, Ben-K attacked Eita, allowing Ishida and Yoshino to win the match. Later that night, after Shimizu lost the "Bonds" steel cage survival five-way match, Shimizu along with the rest of R.E.D turned on Ben-K, revealing that he was never planning on kicking Eita out, they were working together all this time, while also claiming that Eita was the leader.

## In wrestling

* **Double team finishing moves**
	+ Pop-up (Shimizu) into a spear (Ben-K)
* **Double team signature moves**
	+ Belly to Belly Suplex (Ben-K) followed by an OTAKEBI (Shimizu)
	+ Double Spear
* **Ben-K's Finishing moves**
	+ *Ben-K Bomb* (Deadlift gutwrench powerbomb)
* **Shimizu's Finishing moves**
	+ *Shot-put Slam* (Chokeslam)
* **Entrance themes**
	+ "1st FINGER" by 21g (using while a part of MaxiMuM)

## Championships and Accomplishments

* **Dragon Gate**
	+ Open The Triangle Gate Championship (1 time) – with Naruki Doi
	+ Open The Twin Gate Championship (2 times)

### Luchas de Apuestas record

1 **^**  This was a five-way steel cage match, also involving Kzy, YAMATO and Shun Skywalker, where Shimizu lost and as per the stipulation Shimizu decided to kick Ben-K out of R.E.D, subsequently ending their partnership.