When Fujinami arrived in WCW as the standard bearer for Japan, he didn’t uphold any of the preconceived or stereotypical notions of what Japanese wrestlers were. He didn’t wave a Japanese flag over his head. He didn’t insult the United States during his interview segments. He didn’t toss ceremonial salt around the ring or feign a mastery of karate. He didn’t cloak himself in the garb of a ninja, nor did he spew colorful mist from his mouth, wear face paint, or physically manifest any of the other stereotypical elements of Asian mysticism commonly depicted in mainstream North American wrestling during that era.

What Tatsumi Fujinami did on that May night in St. Petersburg, Florida was simple. He climbed into the wrestling ring and did everything... perfectly. Toward the tail end of his stellar world championship match with Ric Flair, Fujinami also did something that is retroactively quite understated in its significance. He casually executed the tightest, crispest version of a Scorpion Deathlock ever delivered in North America up until that moment. WCW’s superstar babyface Sting had been performing the move as his signature maneuver for years, but his variation of the hold notably lacked the precision of Fujinami’s offering. Bret Hart had debuted his own variation of the Scorpion Deathlock, which he dubbed The Sharpshooter, one month prior during the April 21st episode of WWF Wrestling Challenge. At that moment in time, even Bret’s rendition of the move lacked the effortlessness of someone who had either administered or received the hold during countless main event matches for roughly a decade.