Former WCW World Champion Vader has been announced as the next inductee to the WWE Hall of Fame Class of 2022. As first reported by Bleacher Report, Vader will be posthumously inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame’s Class of 2022 alongside The Undertaker, at the ceremony which takes place on Friday 1 April in Dallas. Vader made a name for himself in the 1980s in Japan, famously battling and beating WWE Hall of Famer Antonio Inoki, before becoming one of the biggest stars in the business during his stint in WCW during the 1990s. 

Guided by the legendary Harley Race, The Mastadon was one of the company’s top draws, winning the WCW World Championship three times and battling names like Ric Flair, Sting and Cactus Jack. 

In 1996, Vader jumped ship and moved to WWE, debuting at that year’s Royal Rumble. Under the management of Jim Cornette, Vader challenged Shawn Michaels for the WWE Championship at SummerSlam that year and would go on to have memorable rivalries with HBK, The Undertaker and Goldust. 

After WWE Vader returned to Japan before slowly winding down his wrestling career. He would later make several one-off appearances for WWE, most notably in 2012 when he was part of a group of legends that took down Heath Slater during Raw’s 1000^th episode and then finally in 2016 to induct Stan Hansen into the WWE Hall of Fame.

Vader sadly passed away in June 2018, aged 63, following a month-long battle with pneumonia. However, his legacy as one of the best big men to ever compete in a WWE ring, will now live on through next month’s Hall of Fame induction.