The Mad Dogs began teaming as early as 1994 as both Goto and Ohara were members of Shiro Koshinaka's stable Heisei Ishingun.
[6] In 1997, The Mad Dogs began to move up the card with Ohara entering the 1997 G1 Climax but was eliminated in the first round by Masahiro Chono.
Though they finished last with 1 point, they did get a victory over multi-time IWGP Tag Team Champions: Tatsumi Fujinami and Kengo Kimura.
On June 27, The Dogs received their first shot at the IWGP Tag Team Championship against Shiro Koshinaka and Kensuke Sasaki.
[10] Two months later at the Jingu Climax on August 28, The Mad Dogs lost the titles to Yuji Nagata and Manabu Nakanishi.