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Tadao Yasuda attempts suicide
By Zach Arnold | October 5, 2007
By Zach Arnold
Tadao Yasuda, former Sumo wrestler and ex-New Japan star, reportedly attempted suicide in his Tokyo apartment. An acquaintance discovered Yasuda’s body and he was taken to a local hospital. Yasuda will remain in the hospital for 1-2 weeks.
The story comes at a bad time for the sport of Sumo, which has been receiving negative press this year.
In this Nikkan Sports report, the paper quotes a source as stating that Yasuda had sent out a note the night before his suicide attempt that worried his friends. The paper said that when a friend discovered Yasuda’s body in his apartment, the place was full of smoke from briquettes (carbon monoxide poisoning). Also, the paper indicated that Yasuda may have taken sleeping pills in a high quantity at the same time. Nikkan reports that Yasuda was placed in intensive care, but that he is expected to survive. There is concern that the carbon monoxide and drug poisoning may have caused brain damage.
Yomiuri Shimbun quoted a supposed acquaintance of Yasuda as saying that he had recently gotten into more gambling problems and that he was in debt (again).
Yasuda became a star in Japan after defeating Jerome Le Banner at the Inoki Bom-Ba-Ye 2001 event. On Tokyo Broadcasting System, the network aired video packages before the fight talking about Yasuda’s past gambling addiction and the financial debts he racked up, causing tension with his daughter. Antonio Inoki eventually rewarded Yasuda by placing him in an IWGP title match against Yuji Nagata, resulting in Yasuda being the ace of the company for a short time. Yasuda later became a comedy heel in the promotion, with the fans making fun of him as he was labeled the “borrowing money king.” He left New Japan to wrestle for ZERO-ONE and recently wrestled in the IGF promotion (facing Josh Barnett on 6/29 at Ryogoku Kokugikan and Mark Coleman this past September).
Topics: Japan, MMA, Media, Pro-Wrestling, Zach Arnold | 2 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback | Share This
Yahoo has a big report on the death of a sumo trainee on the front of their homepage.
I was suprised by this when I first read it, but it is not a shock. Thank God he’s okay, but unfortunately it is no shock he tried to do this. I take it his wrestling and fighting career is probably over. He was never any good, but the man I bet has bills to pay.