Takeru Segawa is officially a ONE Championship Hall of Famer. The promotion inducted the Japanese striker during the ONE SAMURAI 4 broadcast at Ariake Arena in Tokyo on Saturday, Oct. 17, and folded a retirement ceremony into the same moment. That means Takeru got his plaque and said goodbye to competition in front of a home crowd.
ONE confirmed the induction on X mid-broadcast, writing that “Takeru takes his place among ONE’s all-time greats!” Hours earlier the promotion had promoted the night as his “Hall of Fame Induction and Retirement Ceremony,” captioning that post “Once a Fighter, Always a Fighter.”
The Rodtang Clip ONE Picked
The most telling detail came before the show started. In the run-up to the ceremony, ONE pushed fans toward one fight in particular: Takeru’s rematch with Rodtang, which the promotion billed as epic in a post framed around him retiring on top. When a promotion has an entire career to choose from and leads with one bout, that tells you which night it thinks defines him. The post didn’t give a result or a date for the rematch, so I won’t pretend it did.
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Combat Press listed the induction and retirement ceremony as part of the event in its preview. Yahoo Sports’ results page described Takeru as an icon of Japanese martial arts and named the Hall of Fame ceremony among the evening’s headline attractions, next to the title fights.
The Card Around Him
The timing gave the ceremony a strong frame. ONE SAMURAI 4 ran 12 bouts, with Jonathan Haggerty defending the bantamweight kickboxing title against Hiroki Akimoto in the main event. Akimoto held that belt in 2022 and fought his way back to a title shot with wins over John Lineker, Wei Rui and Taimu Hisai. Haggerty came in unbeaten under kickboxing rules in ONE, looking for his third defense after beating Wei and Yuki Yoza.
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In the co-main, Nadaka Yoshinari put his atomweight Muay Thai belt and a 42-fight winning streak dating to 2019 on the line against Malaysia’s Rifdean Masdor. Rifdean earned his contract with a 94-second knockout of Javad Mozafari in June. The featherweight kickboxing tournament also moved forward, with Masaaki Noiri facing Mohammad Siasarani and Marat Grigorian meeting Luo Chao for the right to move closer to Superbon. Noiri, Nadaka, Akimoto, Yoza and Rukiya Anpo all fought on the same night Takeru was sent off. That’s a deep Japanese roster for the sendoff to happen beside, and Shintaro Matsukura made his promotional debut against Sinsamut Klinmee as well.
The event started at 3:30 p.m. JST (2:30 a.m. ET). The first three bouts aired free on ONE’s YouTube and Facebook channels and live.onefc.com, and the rest of the card streamed on live.onefc.com and U-NEXT in Japan.
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Quick Take
This is how you retire a star. ONE didn’t drop a press release on a Tuesday. It gave him a microphone in Tokyo, with a title-fight crowd already in their seats and half the card made up of Japanese strikers who grew up in the sport he helped carry. Picking the Rodtang rematch as the farewell highlight was the right call too, because that is the fight people will bring up first whenever his name comes up. The next Japanese striker who wants that kind of night has a clear target, and Nadaka has 42 straight wins to start with.
