, better known by his ring name

Ring name

A ring name is a stage name used by a professional wrestler, martial artist, or boxer. While some ring names may have a fictitious first name and surname, others may simply be a nickname, such as The Undertaker.-Wrestling:...

 , is a Japan

Japan

Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...

ese professional wrestler

Professional wrestling

Professional wrestling is a mode of spectacle, combining athletics and theatrical performance.Roland Barthes, "The World of Wrestling", Mythologies, 1957 It takes the form of events, held by touring companies, which mimic a title match combat sport...

 who has wrestled on the independent circuit

Independent circuit

In professional wrestling, the independent circuit or indy circuit refers to the many independent promotions which are much smaller than major televised promotions. They are roughly analagous to a minor league for pro wrestling, or community or regional theatre.Specific promotions on the...

 most of his career. He is best known for his exploding steel cage matches againest Atsushi Onita

Atsushi Onita

Atsushi Onita is a Japanese former politician and active professional wrestler best known for his work in Frontier Martial-Arts Wrestling...

 and Pat Tanaka

Pat Tanaka

Patrick "Pat" Tanaka is a semi-retired American professional wrestler best known for his work in the American Wrestling Association as one half of Badd Company and the World Wrestling Federation as one half of The Orient Express...

 in Frontier Martial-Arts Wrestling

Frontier Martial-Arts Wrestling

Frontier Martial-Arts Wrestling was a Japanese professional wrestling promotion founded on July 28, 1989 by Atsushi Onita that specialized in hardcore wrestling involving weapons such as barbed wire and fire. They held their first show on October 6, 1989...

 (FMW).
In 1979, Goto joined a sumo

Sumo

is a competitive full-contact sport where a wrestler attempts to force another wrestler out of a circular ring or to touch the ground with anything other than the soles of the feet. The sport originated in Japan, the only country where it is practiced professionally...

 stable

Heya

In sumo wrestling, a heya , usually translated into English as stable, is an organization of sumo wrestlers where they train and live. All wrestlers in professional sumo must belong to one. There are currently 49 heya , all but four of which belong to one of five ichimon...

, Kokonoe

Kokonoe stable

is a stable of sumo wrestlers, one of the Takasago group of stables. It was formed in 1967 and is located in Ishiwara, Sumida, Tokyo. As of April 2008 it had 16 sumo wrestlers.-History:...

, but shortly afterwards he retired from sumo. Goto then joined All Japan Pro Wrestling

All Japan Pro Wrestling

is a Japanese professional wrestling promotion established in 1972. All Japan Pro Wrestling still remains one of the most popular puroresu promotions still in operation.-The Giant Baba Era :...

 in 1980 and moved to the US to pursue a career in wrestling.

In the 1980s

1980s

File:1980s decade montage.png|thumb|400px|From left, clockwise: The first Space Shuttle, Columbia, lifted off in 1981; American President Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev eased tensions between the two superpowers, leading to the end of the Cold War; The Fall of the Berlin Wall in...

, Goto wrestled mainly in the American southern states including Tennessee

Tennessee

Tennessee is a U.S. state located in the Southeastern United States. It has a population of 6,346,105, making it the nation's 17th-largest state by population, and covers , making it the 36th-largest by total land area...

 (CWA

Continental Wrestling Association

The Continental Wrestling Association was a wrestling promotion managed by Jerry Jarrett. The CWA was the name of the "governing body" for the Championship Wrestling, Inc. promotion which was usually referred to as Mid-Southern Wrestling...

) and Florida

Florida

Florida is a state in the southeastern United States, located on the nation's Atlantic and Gulf coasts. It is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the north by Alabama and Georgia and to the east by the Atlantic Ocean. With a population of 18,801,310 as measured by the 2010 census, it...

 (FCW), and sometimes wrestled as Ho Chi Winh, which was a gimmick

Gimmick

In marketing language, a gimmick is a unique or quirky special feature that makes something "stand out" from its contemporaries. However, the special feature is typically thought to be of little relevance or use. Thus, a gimmick is a special feature for the sake of having a special feature...

 based on the Vietnam

Vietnam

Vietnam – sometimes spelled Viet Nam , officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam – is the easternmost country on the Indochina Peninsula in Southeast Asia. It is bordered by China to the north, Laos to the northwest, Cambodia to the southwest, and the South China Sea –...

ese hero Ho Chi Minh

Ho Chi Minh

Hồ Chí Minh , born Nguyễn Sinh Cung and also known as Nguyễn Ái Quốc, was a Vietnamese Marxist-Leninist revolutionary leader who was prime minister and president of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam...

, and married a female American wrestler named Despina Montagas.

Goto also wrestled in Puerto Rico

Puerto Rico

Puerto Rico , officially the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico , is an unincorporated territory of the United States, located in the northeastern Caribbean, east of the Dominican Republic and west of both the United States Virgin Islands and the British Virgin Islands.Puerto Rico comprises an...

 around 1988.
In 1989, Goto returned to Japan after being proposed by the founder of the pioneering hardcore wrestling

Hardcore wrestling

Hardcore wrestling is a form of professional wrestling that eschews traditional concepts of match rules in favor of matches that take place in unusual environments, using foreign objects that are not normally permitted...

 promotion

Professional wrestling promotion

A professional wrestling promotion is a company or business that regularly performs shows involving professional wrestling. Promotion also describes a role which entails management, advertising and logistics of running a wrestling event...

 Frontier Martial-Arts Wrestling

Frontier Martial-Arts Wrestling

Frontier Martial-Arts Wrestling was a Japanese professional wrestling promotion founded on July 28, 1989 by Atsushi Onita that specialized in hardcore wrestling involving weapons such as barbed wire and fire. They held their first show on October 6, 1989...

, Atsushi Onita

Atsushi Onita

Atsushi Onita is a Japanese former politician and active professional wrestler best known for his work in Frontier Martial-Arts Wrestling...

.

In August 1990, Goto had the first-ever exploding barbed wire match

Barbed wire match

A barbed wire match is one of any number of professional wrestling matches that uses strands of barbed wire in some capacity. Simply using barbed wire in an otherwise regular hardcore match does not make the match a barbed wire match; the barbed wire must be part of the match's design.- No Rope...

 with Onita, which started a revolution between the small "garbage wrestling" organizations of Japan

Japan

Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...

.