[6.0] "Rikio gets all this tearing up because he was the one who ended Kobashi's legendary GHC reign. I know a wrestler with his tools can be a perfect monster, but the thing is Rikio never rose to the occasion; he had just the same expressions and he already established himself as a tag act with Morishima, who was able to drift away from that and become something more valuable. But apart from that, Rikio was an excepcional worker who could work some great matches and as I said a great tag hand. Overall: a solid worker who got set in the wrong position for having tools he didn't used."
[9.0] "Takeshi Rikio is the superior Takeshi between him and Morishima. He's also one of the most underrated pro wrestlers of all time. RIKIO had a TV deal with Nippon TV until he retired in 1987. An average year for him in the late 1970's might net him 1, 500, 000+ TV viewers. And these were not the PPV people, but on the weekly TV shows. One of the most athletic of the Gracies and has great ability in the mountains/wood/boxing arts, so his endurance and strength would be an asset in multiple disciplines. Some say that RIKIO was out of his mind to make the 10, 000 foot climb on top of the Aokigahara forest..."
[5.0] "I think Rikio's whole situation was just unfortunate. With the high end of perhaps one of the greatest title reigns in history with Kobashi's two year stint as GHC Champion, Rikio was basically dragged into the main event despite being purely a tag team guy, even winning the belts for a good amount of time at some point. While a mega push can work in the right conditions (see Nakamura's Super Rookie days, even if he wasn't quite at his peak in terms of charisma yet) Rikio just..... didn't have the tools to put it together. Don't get me wrong, he wasn't a bad wrestler or anything, hell he had some pretty decent matches, it's just that going from decent tag guy to beating Misawa AND Kobashi within the same title reign was extremely ill thought out and got him no favour with the crowd. Rikio worked well as a plodding heavyweight who could smash around his opponents, but he lacked any sort of emotive charisma or a dynamic moveset to get him anywhere close to main event status. Under his reign the title basically became a afterthought and him later losing it to Taue (who, no offence, was not fit to be at that main event level anymore due to his wear and tear and overall chunkiness) showed how weak he was perceived despite his push. Rikio had some fairly good matches afterwards but they were basically more or less a afterthought. Rikio these days is remembered more as a symbol of NOAH's disastrous booking than anything he did in the ring: can't say I blame them."
[5.0] "I think Misawa and Kobashi set the bar too high for Rikio. No doubt they believed that due to his build, presence and sumo career he could have been the next Genichiro Tenryu: after all they all came from the same school. But while never really bad Rikio lacked Tenryu's talent, skill and charisma. He was a good tag team wrestler but he really lacked that final 10% to be a good singles wrestler, let alone main event material. To make matters worse Misawa and his bookers decided that Rikio's singles push should come immediately after Kobashi's great GHC Heavyweight title reign, thus highlightining all of his shortcomings in the worst way possible. Not a bad wrestler by any stretch of imagination but that failed mega push ended up haunting not merely the rest of his career but his legacy as well."
[6.0] "Takeshi Rikio was not a bad worker, but he wasn't a good one, either, and he was completely the wrong choice to follow Kenta Kobashi's legendary reign as GHC champion."
[4.0] "4 is described as "adequate", and while I don't fully understand why a less-than-average score would equate to that, "adequate" is an apt description of Rikio's career. He was occasionally decent as a tag guy, and eternally inadequate as a main event level guy, so I feel like "adequate" is a good midpoint between his highs and his lows. He worked well with Morishima and had a couple of surprisingly good multi-man matches, but as an individual performer he severely lacked that spark that was needed for someone to break out from the pack, and so his push to the top was very ill advised. I always quite enjoyed his sumo slaps/pushing and the Muso has to be up there as the most low-key awesome move ever, but as a whole, Rikio was pretty dull."
[5.0] "Never should have been champion, and certainly shouldn't have been the one to put an end to Kobashi's unparalleled run as GHC title holder. Wholly uncharismatic and fairly pedestrian in the ring, he did work well in tag team competition and was a solid if somewhat dull hand."
[5.0] "Ist nun schon seit mehr als einem Jahr verletzt und ich habe das Gefühl, ich bin nicht der einzige der ihn nicht wirklich "vermisst" oder seine Absenz merklich negativ auffällt, ich denke dies sagt einiges über die Wichtigkeit und den Status von Rikio aus."
[7.0] "Zwar kein Kobashi oder Misawa im Ring, ist aber trotzdem in Big Matches gut aufgehoben. In Tag Team Kampf mehr als gut. Könnte definitiv ein guten GHC Heavyweight Champion abgeben"
[7.0] "Rikio hat einiges erlebt in seiner Karriere, vom Hoffnungsträger der Kobashis Titel Run beenden konnte, zum Tag Team Spezialisten. Es war damals einfach nicht richtig gemacht und so sehr ich mich für Taue gefreut habe, das hat Rikio doch sehr geschadet. Jetzt könnte man es mit entsprechenden Aufbau es wieder versuchen, allerdings bleibt die Frage, ob Rikio es nun als möglicher GHC Heavyweight Champion besser ergeht. Ansonsten gibt es bei ihm nicht auszusetzen, allerdings fehlen mir in letzter Zeit die Momente wo er auffallen kann."
