Daikokubō Benkei
Sumo career. Kotani practiced judo in junior high school before switching to sumo wrestling after enrolling at Minabe High School. After high school, he received several offers from professional sumo stables, but decided to decline them and continued his amateur career at the collegiate level. He joined Nihon University's sumo club and in his fourth year, won the national student sumo championship to become college "yokozuna". After graduating from university, Kotani opted to turn professional and joined the Hanakago stable. He made his professional debut in the March 1980 tournament ("honbasho"). Due to his amateur accomplishments, he  was granted "makushita tsukedashi" status which allowed him to make his debut at the bottom of the "makushita" division. Even though he was given this special dispensation, he still struggled to break through to the "jūryō" rank and was stuck in "makushita" for four years. After changing his ring name ("shikona") to in May 1982, he began to produce stronger results and was promoted to "jūryō" in March 1984. Hanaarashi was only ranked in "jūryō" for a total of three tournaments. In his first tournament, he could only manage a 7-8 record after losing to Wakasegawa on the final  day. Since he was ranked at the bottom of "jūryō" , he was demoted back down to "makushita". Nevertheless, he returned to "sekitori" status in July 1984 and achieved a winning record. As a result he was promoted to the rank of "jūryō 9", but could only manage 4 wins at that rank and was demoted from "jūryō". After losing his "sekitori" status, Hanaarashi remained in "makushita" for another year before announcing his abrupt retirement prior to the start of the November 1985 tournament. The reason for this was because the Hanakago stable closed down and he was not accustomed to  living in a stable with so many wrestlers as all the personnel from Hanakago stable transferred to the Hanaregoma stable. Professional wrestling career. Independent circuit (1993–2011). Kotani made his professional wrestling debut under the name "Arashi" at "WAR WAR-ISM ~2nd~", an event promoted by Wrestle Association-R on November 11, 1993 where he defeated Yuji Yasuraoka. Kotani also wrestled in the International Wrestling Association of Japan, and at "IWA Japan WELCOME THE WORLD CHAMPION TOUR’97" on October 27 he fought Dan Severn in a losing effort. Big Japan Pro Wrestling (1998–2011). He participated in one of the longest matches  in professional wrestling history, an 108-man battle royal at , a cross-over event held between Big Japan Pro Wrestling (BJW), DDT and Kaientai Dojo from December 31, 2009, competing against notable opponents such as the winner Jun Kasai, Danshoku Dino, Great Kojika, Taka Michinoku, Kenny Omega, Tajiri, Gota Ihashi and many others. At "BJW/OZ Academy Asahikawa Pro-Wrestling Festival", a cross-over event promoted by BJW in partnership with Oz Academy on September 22, 2009, he teamed up with Ryuji Yamakawa and Chikayo Nagashima to defeat Atsushi Ohashi, Manami Toyota and Yuichi Taniguchi in a six-person tag  team match. Kotani is known for competing in the promotion's signature events. One of them is the Saikyo Tag League, making his first appearance at the 2000 edition of the event where he teamed up with Shunme Matsuzaki, placing themselves in the Block A and scoring a total of two points after competing against the teams of Abdullah the Butcher and Shadow WX, Men's Teioh and Daisuke Sekimoto and Kamikaze and Abdullah Kobayashi. One year later at the 2003 edition, Kotani teamed up with Abdullah Kobayashi, placing themselves in the Block B and scoring a total of five  points after competing against ODD and Homicide, Ryuji Ito and Daisaku Shimoda, Da Hit Squad (Mafia and Monster Mack) and Bancho Matsuzaki and Jaki Numazawa. Kotani participated in other events such as the 2000 Grand Prix Tournament where he fell short to Mike Samples in a first-round match. At the BJW Heavyweight Championship Tournament from March 20, 2001, Kotani defeated Shadow WX in a first round match but fell short to John Zandig in the second round. Sumo career record.