RINGS 4/23/99: RISE 2nd

Rise 2nd

April 23, 1999 in Osaka, Japan

Furitsu Gym drawing 3,870

THE SOFT AND CALMING VOICE-OVERS THAT OPEN THESE RISE SHOWS RECALLS NOTHING SO MUCH AS THE EARLIEST ASTRAL STEPS TAKEN SOME EIGHT YEARS AGO and time is folding in and around us in all kinds of ways lately so I guess this should be no surprise. We open with clips of Frank Shamrock and Maurice Smith sparring lightly as Shamrock describes his strategy for FRANK SHAMROCK VS. KIYOSHI TAMURA which is very much the main event that is scheduled to be contested before the lore-wise Osaka crowd. Joining Kenichi Takayanagi (and friend) at commentary for some reason is Hiromitsu Kanehara, and it is already delightful that he is here:

  

RINGS OFFICIAL RANKINGS feel weirdly hollow now or at least antiquated in that there is so much RINGS shooting about us right now and not all of the people ranked here have RINGS-shot or at least have yet to RINGS-shoot but let us see what we have: 10. Nikolai Zouev 9. Masayuki Naurse 8. Hans Nijman 7. Hiromitsu Kanehara 6. Dick Vrij 5. Joop Kasteel 4. Volk Han 3. Mikhail Ilioukhine 2. Kiyoshi Tamura 1. Tsuyoshi Kohsaka, and our champion remains Bitsadze Tariel (but for how long in our current clime). 

Referee Ryogaku Wada presides over the opening contest between U-File Camp's Ryuki Ueyama and Lee Hasdell which I believe from its earliest energies to be a shoot (I am a fool whose views are oft-disproven so I must caution you here against all I say). The ne waza is compelling, as Hasdell first threatens with a mae-hadaka-jime front choke, and next Ueyama with a hiza-juji knee-bar. OH GOD LEE HASDELL'S EYE:

That is a hansoku-make (defeat by grave infringment) at 4:18. 

Next we have Sander Thonhauser, who has been here at least a few times, against GROM ZAZA. Will this be another Grom Zaza shoot-triumph like his well-earned decision for laying on Ricardo Morais? It certainly looks that way, as Zaza is up a point like nine seconds in on a takedown and standing kata-ashi-hishigi single-leg-crush. Thonhauser loses another point about a minute later for applying a heel holdo or heel hook, which I guess has been (rightly, in my view) banned? Another kata-ashi-hishigi and another point. Grom Zaza knows no surcease! Wrestlingo technique is right, Kenichi Takayanagi, we are seeing a very good amount of it, and then immediate kata-ashi-hishigi attacks and at about 3:20 Thonhauser has lost five points, and the rule now seems to be six points to a loss. At this rate it really should be like twenty seconds or so at most. Ah, yes: 4:02 TKO on points lost. GET IT, GROM. 

Masayuki Naruse and Christopher Haseman is an intriguing contest to the extent that Haseman is really pretty good, and Naruse is a guy who has been kept quite strong in the fast-receding shoot-style era; one wonders if a shoot will be permitted? Naruse is much smaller than Haseman, which for whatever reason surprises me (it shouldn't, as I have seen plenty of both fellows). I think this one is real? Haseman lands a lovely side-kick in the early going that has the Osaka crowd saying hwooooah. The first point comes at about 2:40, as Naruse would not like to be gyaku-ude-garami'd any more than necessary; the second comes but a moment later as Haseman throws another side-kick, but this time completely to the dikk:

NARUSE FIRES BACK WITH  A KICK TOTALLY TO HASEMAN'S DIKK:

HOW LONG CAN THIS GO ON, THIS IS WILD but soon enough we are back to waza more decorous with the ethos of RINGS and although the earlier dikkickingz were pretty exciting they were not sustainable. Naruse has his moments in ne waza but for the most part he is just totally on the run from kata-gatame (shoulder hold/arm-triangle), the reverse-arm-entanglement of gyaku-ude-garami, a little juji-gatame, and really just a lot of things. YOKO SHIHO is the call as Haseman moves to the side, KESA GATAME as he secures that noble hold. Even when Naruse sweeps his way to the top, things don't improve much for him, as Haseman is all over his legs. Ah, but it is Naruse's ashi-dori-garami figure-four toe-hold that sends Haseman to the ropes! This is an excellent match. The end comes at 13:18 when Hasemane ably finishes the gyaku-ude-garami he has long pursued. They both did great!

Yoshihisa Yamamoto, for whom I think we all feel a weird sort of pity, is in against the still-enormous Joop Kasteel. We recall that Joop is ranked fifth currently, while Yamamoto holds no rank to speak of, save whatever rank he has achieved in the exquisite art of Kodokan Judo when he was in high school. If this is a shoot, Yamamoto should win unless he is crushed by fists immediately, which can happen to anyone at anytime. Yamamoto unleashes a great barrage of slaps; Kasteel responds with some credible hitting, and now they are to the mat with Yamamoto very much on top in tate-shiho-gatame until Kasteel hip-bumps and comes up in the do-osae position. I guess I think this is shoot-style? I could easily be mistaken about nearly everything at almost all times but I grow increasingly sure that in this one very limited case I am not. Yamamoto goes down to strikes a couple times and it doesn't look great, and then Kasteel goes down very much the same way. This is a ten-point match, I should note. Not that it goes that far: Yamamoto wins by fairly shabby KO at 7:32 as Kasteel tenderly touches his temple as though to say "my temple; my temple." This was not as good as the previous match!

OH NO TSUYOSHI KOHSAKA LOOK OUT IT IS GILBERT YVEL and as we have discussed previously I am always concerned when Gilbert Yvel is around because he is a skilled and dangerous striker and also he is totally willing to cheat. We are shown first Kohsaka's dynamic harai-goshi to juji-gatame win over Kiyoshi Tamura on 1/23/99 and then more of his bicycling in Seattle.

We are also shown TK engaging in nice light ne waza randori (or perhaps it is spirited ne waza uchi komi) with the great Maurice Smith before these two fine martial artists of achievement and distinction teach two children the intricacies of kata-ashi-hishigi, the single-leg-crush or straight ankle lock (this is the one leg-lock I think it is totally ok to teach children, by the way, not that anyone should adjust their græppling pedagogy to suit me [yes they should]). Both TK and Maurice understand the centrality of teaching others to the perfection of one's own martial way: one must aspire to be both, as the GZA rhymes in the second verse of "Liquid Swords" from the album that bears that same sikk name, a child educator plus head amputator; it simply will not do to be one but not the other. "You got too much space, Antoine, it's gotta be tight. Put your hand to your chest." Maurice Smith is for the children.

With a lovely mountain backdrop, Kohsaka says a number of things I do not understand, of course, but he also says judo techniqu and RINGS techniqu and submission techniqu and I get it; I get it.

Well that was all lovely but here's Gilbert Yvel, capable of pretty unreal levels of destruction both within and without the rules and bounds of kakutogi. A less objectively evil, but more skilled Gerard Gordeau? Is that fair? "Dirty" Bob Shrijber with a clearer sense of purpose? I don't know but I feel unsettled. My assumption is that this will be a shoot, as Kohsaka has already shown himself to be totally competitive against the best heavyweight mixed martial arts fighter in the world (you will recall, I am sure, Bas Rutten) so the working RINGSassumption at this point would have to have been that he'd be fine in there with whoever, right? But who knows what Akira Maeda needs to happen (intellectually, emotionally). No gloves here, so one assumes RINGS rules rather than vale tudo rules. The earliest energies here strongly argue towards shoot as TK eats a knee whilst dropping low for the two-hand reap of morote gari, which he finishes without too much trouble (aside from the knee, which I do not wish to diminish) aaaaand there we have it, Gilbert Yvel commits his first foul (but of how many?) at about twenty seconds for punching TK in the face on the ground NOOOOOOOO MY DISC STOPPED PLAYING AND I CAN'T FIND THIS MATCH ON DAILYMOTION NOR CAN I FIND THE MAIN EVENT NOOOOOOOOOOO maybe I will order another copy? AH OK HERE'S WHAT HAPPENED: this disc is in fact one I ordered from IVP Videos (a partner in the initial RINGSbox purchase) just as this RINGSblogging was beginning to take shape; I had sorted through the RINGSbox to see if there were any missing discs, and there were only a few, so it was just a very small order to get everything arranged. He sent me this disc probably six months ago, I guess, but I hadn't checked it or anything. I let him know Friday night that it was cutting off, this disc, and asked if he could upload the file maybe, and he tried, and found that his copy had a bad scratch that was preventing this! Oh no! He offered to send me another disc of something else, which was kind of him, but before we sorted that out, he ingeniously tried to make a copy of his scratched disc and then rip that one, and somehow that worked (I understand nothing), and he had that copy uploaded for me by Sunday evening! I am of course impressed but I can't in all honesty say that I am surprised at this level of RINGSservice, because IVP Videos has been unfailingly excellent to deal with. Buying things is of course a revolting practice, but should you find yourself in a position where you are going to do it (and we have all been there), I heartily recommend IVP Videos. But if you are sufficiently interested in twenty-odd-year-old Japanese wrestling/martial arts as to be reading this (RINGS)blog it is nearly a certainty that you are already well aware of his service. AT ANY RATE I thank him once more for his indispensable help.    

AND WE ARE BACK and I am no less worried for TK than I was when last we spoke. Yvel half-lands a flying knee, and then, when Kohsaka is down, drives a hard knee right into his large and square head. The replay reveals it to be even worse than I first thought:

  

That's extremely another yellow card for Yvel, so he is down by two points, but Kohsaka is down by two shots to the head, neither of which were legal, obviously, and one of which super looked like it hurt. Like anyone who græpples, I sometimes have occasion to take a hard but totally accidental (at least I hope they are!) knee to the head, and more than once I have felt a little dazed after, and I have taken every such instance as evidence in support of my position that hitting should be halted at once (we can end hitting in our lifetime if we are all willing to work together towards that aim). Kohsaka, though, is undaunted, or, if daunted, imperceptibly so, as he gets right back after Yvel and plants him on the mat with a low, tackling morote-gari (two-hand reap) and passes effortlessly to tate-shiho-gatame (right up on top) before Yvel wisely drapes his foot across the rope to lose his third point in two minutes. Yvel grabs a rope on the way down on another morote-gari no more than twenty seconds later, so that's four points. About fifteen seconds later there's another. Ah, okay, TK has him down in the middle of the ring now, and perhaps will have some time to work? But no, scooching of quality has Yvel within grasping distance. Not that he needs it: Kohsaka's juji-gatmae attempt costs him position, and Yvel gets on top for an instant before standing up and connecting with holy cow a brutal jumping kick to the face; this match is really going very badly for Tsuyoshi Kohsaka's head. TK is cut, and the replay reveals that it was a rope-assisted jumping knee a moment ago, which explains why there was no knockdown ruled against Kohsaka, but there was no rope-grab charged to Yvel, either, which I don't get:

Kohsaka takes Yvel down over and over and over and never has any trouble getting around the legs, but he is plagued by rope escapes, just plagued by them. As we speak this very moment he's got Yvel sort of half-way into an Iatskevich roll juji-gatame attack but his head is turned towards Yvel's rather than towards his hips and so this is going nowhere. Standing again, Yvel hits TK with a hard palm-strike for a knockdown, and I don't know what image is called to mind when you hear tell of a hard palm-strike, but do you generally think of something that can cause this?

I knowI don't! And yet here we are. We're not eight minutes in, and Kohsaka has lost a mere two points to Yvel's five, but he is getting clobbered. He eats another knee en route to yet another morote-gari takedown and needs to be cleaned up again. This is pretty terrible! A super low kibisu-gaeshi (heel-reversal, ankle-pick) puts Yvel down in the middle of the ring, though, and TK moves effortlessly to his osaekomi-waza (pinning/immobilization techniques) to work towards an ude-garami arm entanglement. Maurice Smith looks fairly calm in Kohsaka's corner but that is the kind of energy he projects even when he is himself having fights with people so there is only so much one can read into that here. Yvel scooches back and Kohsaka scooches forwards and before you know it they're in the corner and so restood. Kohsaka is getting sloppy on his takedowns as we near the fourteen-minute mark: he just morote-gari'd his way into a mae-hadaka-jime front choke that came close enough that he used a rope-break to escape. He's bleeding heavily from the nose now, too. His takedowns are still working but they seem increasingly desperate and ill-timed (who among us). I have no idea how many times Yvel has been taken down this match: like fifteen, maybe? But he's weathering the storm down there every time, and then just stalking TK standing and lighting him up. It's pretty grim! Yvel starts to do better and better for himself on the ground, too, as Kohsaka is just battered and bleeding. Maeda, red-jacketed and glorious, peers in as the doctor examines TK in the corner. It doesn't matter at all that Kohsaka is ahead on points: they could totally stop this right now, that would be totally fine. And yes, they do, doctor stoppage at 19:58. This is wise. Yvel does a back-flip in the middle of the ring to celebrate not only his victory, I think, but also a victory in which he only really committed I guess like two and a half fouls, which also represents for him in this instance a victory over self, and as Kimbo (may peace be upon him) taught us in his too-brief time here, the enemy is so often the inner-me. R.I.P. Kevin Ferguson aka Kimbo Slice; we are all of us complicit in the death of this complex man burdened with a too-hard life. We should have saved him from it instead of doing what we did which was kill him. 

FRANK SHAMROCK VS. KIYOSHI TAMURA MIGHT BE PRETTY GOOD LET'S SEE as once again Tamura ties his U-Style t-shirt off in the corner or tucks it in just a little (more the former than the latter here, I think), the better to hug as tight against his beautiful body as so many among us long to, maybe? I am a happily married man but I am sure some of you are single and so I leave such longing to you to do with as you would. Maurice Smith corners Frank Shamrock no less than he does Tsuyoshi Kohsaka for they are, together, The Alliance. HOLY SHIT the first real exchange of the match has Tamura grab a leg for a kuchiki-taoshi dead-tree drop (or single-leg takedown, if you would rob it, and us, of all poesy) only to see Shamrock get perpendicular for the cross-mark armlock of ude-hishigi-juji-gatame; the net effect is that Tamura has put himself in a 飛び十字固め tobi-juji-gatame flying armbar. WILD. This happened at maybe thirty seconds in, and Tamura very much needed the ropes. When next they are aground (it is nearly immediately so) Tamura fares much better, and comes reasonably close with an ude-garami entanglement, but Shamrock slips out. The striking, where we find it, is crisp! As are the transitions: when Tamura overextends whilst reaching around the turtling Shamrock's waist, Shamock tries to roll through for gyaku-ude-garami but Tamura flattens out to stop it and is neeeeeearly in position for juji-gatame but not quite and it is both exquisite and excruciating for the people of Osaka here assembled. Tamura seems to have no trouble getting to and staying on top , for the most part, often in the low side-pin of yoko-shiho-gatame. There is a moment of great interest as Shamrock TK Scissors his way into a yoko-sankaku-jimeside triangle choke attempt but Tamura ends up on top in a kesa-gatame scarf-hold and comes really very close with a kesa-garami arm-entanglement from there, but after much scrambling they return to Tamura's yoko-shiho-gatame hold. Ten minutes passed! This is extremely good! Back to kesa-gatame and indeed kesa-garami once more, look:

I join Tamura in being super into that armlock from kesa. Shamrock's arm is pretty twisted up! But he is a young man still, and pliable, neither elbows nor shoulders yet desiccated unto ruin by time (I bet they are now though!).  A close call! Shamrock scissors around Tamura's head and pulls him back just enough that Tamura must abandon the hold and switch to yoko-shiho-gatame. He passes quickly to the top-most pin of tate-shiho-gatame but the actions stalls out from there and they are stood. Shamock throws a flurry of kicks and palm-strikes but is himself struck down by a whisper-soft Tamura morote-gari two-hand reap. And now, perhaps, for leg-locks? For a little, yes; but then it is Shamrock's rolling juji-gatame nearly countered by a juji-gatame of Tamura's own. At one point, underneath Tamura but not dangerously so, Shamrock asks his corner how much time has passed. "Twelve minutes? OK I'll just wait him out." And then he kind of just waits him out! UNTIL: a lost point for Shamrock! And here's why: Shamrock was standing all hunched over, trying to pass Tamura's legs, and while in that position, strikes are not permitted, referee Ryogaku Wada explains. Shamrock is like "Aaaahhhhh get outta here! Get outta here!" but in a blithe spirit that does him credit. He acknowledges without any real complaint that he is guilty, and we can all see that what he is guilty of is the merest technical infraction, not one against the spirit of the rules. "Please do not wail on a guy who is down when you are not down" is the rule's true plea, and Shamrock did not violate that in his heart. The call is correct, as is Shamrock's reaction to it, and all is well. I backed it up to see it all again, and Wada actually got really close and peered in at a few borderline strikes before he actually stopped Shamrock and made the call. Everyone's doing great!    

It would be easy and probably not wrong to watch this match and say that Tamura is the much better positional græppler, but the ease with which Shamrock cedes positions to Tamura is surely at least in part of a function of the specific rules they're competing under which do not disincentivize this. Shamrock comes reasonably close with a gyaku-ude-garami arm entanglement (they are themselves entangled in the ropes and so it is stopped and stood) and a leglock attack that leads to some light Tamura scurrying (out and to the top, though), but as time expires it is ruled a draw (DRAW, DESU) and Shamrock adopts a Bruce Lee pose and then everyone is buddies:

What a great match! Afterwards, Frank Shamrock says, among other things, "It's okay. Win, lose, or draw, I played the game. I challenged myself. I made one mistake, so it's a draw, but it's okay." And: "I have to fight UFC because I have the title, but RINGS style is good, so I want to train more in the RINGS style now, because the conditioning and the submission technique is so much better than UFC, so I will fight both." Alas, this did not prove true.

WHAT DID DAVE MELTZER SAY:

April 26, 1999:

"What looked going in to be the most important MMA show of the year, the Pride Five show on 4/29 at Nagoya Rainbow Hall (also a PPV show in Japan) has lost a lot of its luster but may have gained in drawing power as its biggest insider heavyweight match with Mark Kerr vs. Enson Inoue was canceled due to Kerr being injured and his replacement will be pro wrestler Naoya Ogawa. Kerr apparently injured his elbow in training and underwent surgery on 4/16. Reports are that Pride is looking at rescheduling the match for July. Ogawa vs. Inoue was briefly scheduled but never announced publicly as a co-main event along with the expected-to-be-worked match with Nobuhiko Takada vs. Mark Coleman, with Dream Stage Entertainment (the parent company of Pride) and Antonio Inoki's UFO working together with the idea to set up a Takada vs. Ogawa match in late July, which should be a good draw to pro wrestling fans. Mario Sperry, considered the best Brazilian Jiu Jitsu sport fighter in the world, who beat Inoue in a non-striking submission rules match in Abu Dhabai recently, was also asked to replace Kerr but turned down the fight on such short notice to prepare. At press time, the plan now was to put Ogawa vs. Kazunari Murakami of the UFO organization instead, since at this point Inoki could control the finish, in what would be billed as an exhibition match on the show.

Inoki had also been negotiating with RINGS for Ogawa to appear on the 5/22 show, but those negotiations are now out the window with the Pride deal. Reports are that Ogawa was upset because Inoki, whose main job in wrestling these days seems to be an attempt to use his business smarts to maneuver Ogawa into superstardom in pro wrestling as a legitimate fighter, was negotiating for him to appear without actually informing him of it beforehand. The idea of taking a match against a real shooter on only two weeks notice wouldn't seen smart on the surface if the match wasn't going to be worked, but if it was, training time isn't as big an issue. The other intriguing match on the show which looked to be speculative as to whether or not it would take place, Vitor Belfort vs. Kazushi Sakuraba, is still on. Belfort had his knee scoped recently but has been saying that he's fine and is dropping weight for the fight and over the weekend was down to 202 pounds (he had agreed to get down to 198 for Sakuraba, who legitimately weighs in the 185-190 range)."

and

"The 5/22 RINGS show at the Ariake Coliseum is headlined by Bitsaze Tariel defending his version of the world heavyweight title against Kiyoshi Tamura, plus Tsuyoshi Kohsaka vs. Yoshihisa Yamamoto, Ilioukhine Mikhail vs. Joop Kasteel and Volk Han vs. Masayuki Naruse."

May 3, 1999:

"4/23 Osaka Furitsu Gym (RINGS - 3,870): Grom Zaza b Sander Townhauser, Christopher Hazemann b Masayuki Naruse, Yoshihisa Yamamoto b Joop Kasteel, Gilbert Yvel b Tsuyoshi Kohsaka, Kiyoshi Tamura d Frank Shamrock. OTHER JAPAN NOTES: The Frank Shamrock vs. Kiyoshi Tamura match on 4/23 at Osaka Furitsu Gym drew a reported 3,870, which is a disappointment, which again speaks of the reality of life after Maeda in RINGS. The match, which was a shoot, went to a 20:00 draw finishing with a 1-1 score. Shamrock scored his point early on an armbar and lost a point by getting a yellow card for an illegal strike. Tamura went into a defensive mode after losing the first point quickly. Shamrock was very impressed with Tamura's defense on the ground and in particular, his low kicks, which Shamrock said were more powerful than those of Bas Rutten. Apparently RINGS made a slight rules modification in regard to now being allowed to strike on the ground if both knees of the striker are touching the ground (with one knee on the ground it's allowable). Shamrock was told of the rules about an hour before his fight and made the mistake in combat. There is talk of rematching the two in September as apparently this was a very good match. It's the first match under any rules that Shamrock hasn't won in more than two years, a streak that has encompassed eight matches, mainly against world-class athletes, under many different formats. Also in a major upset, Gilbert Yvel of Holland destroyed Tsuyoshi Kohsaka in what was also a shoot. Yvel, who is a very exciting Muay Thai specialist who has the best kick boxing coach in Europe and maybe the world, had studied how to avoid Kohsaka's takedowns and keep the fight standing [what?--ed.]. With Kohsaka unable to take him down, he was hammered and bloodied up badly, with a 1 1/2 inch cut that needed 11 stitches to close. We've been told the match probably should have been stopped earlier but they wanted to give Kohsaka the chance to win before finally the doctor stopped it at 19:58. Most, if not all the matches on the show were shoots. The next RINGS is 5/22. Tom Erikson, the former U.S. superheavyweight freestyle wrestling champion, is set to debut on the show. Joop Kasteel was the name asked to be his opponent, but Kasteel has yet to accept. RINGS is going to have trouble at the gate, unfortunately, the more it gets toward shooting and away from worked more dramatic matches."

May 10, 1999:

"RINGS canceled its 6/19 show in Nagoya and moved it to 6/24 at Korakuen Hall. RINGS drew a poor house the last time they were in Nagoya and with the 5/22 show scheduled for Tokyo Ariake Coliseum, they need to load that show up to draw as well."

and

"Randy Couture captured the 1999 U.S. Greco-roman championships in a tournament held over the weekend at 214 pounds. Tom Erikson placed second in the superheavyweight class in freestyle to current NCAA champion Steve Neal of Bakersfield losing 9-3 in the finals. Erikson is undefeated in MMA and has a match scheduled against an opponent as yet unannounced on the 5/22 RINGS show at the Ariake Coliseum. Frank Trigg, who has fought in Shooto this past year, placed fifth in freestyle at 167. Shooto will be running its 10th year anniversary show on 5/29 at Yokohama Bunka Gym. Carlos Newton will be the biggest name foreigner on a show headlined by Rumina Sato vs. Kaoru Uno [which turns to be pretty much the best match--ed.]."

From the Pride 5 recap:

"In the pro wrestling aspect of the show, Ogawa, who for a brief period was scheduled to replace Kerr against Inoue, and then was scheduled to do an exhibition with Kazunari Murakami (neither were ever announced publicly) showed up with the NWA title belt and said he's appear at the 7/4 show challenging anyone. Antonio Inoki was not at this show, but UFO officials spoke with Rickson Gracie, who was at the show doing exhibition drills with brother Royler, about possibly doing business, but balked when Gracie's asking price was $1 million. After Takada's win over Coleman, Ogawa came back into the ring with the NWA title belt, took off his shirt and challenged Takada in a pro wrestling style angle. A lot of shoot fans were upset with them doing a pro wrestling angle after basically a pro wrestling match to headline the show, but again, this got over better with the life crowd than the actual shoot matches."

May 17, 1999: 

"Rutten-Randleman along with the Frank Shamrock vs. Kiyoshi Tamura (more on that one later) and Gilbert Yvel vs. Kohsaka matches on the 4/23 RINGS show may be the strongest candidates thus far for shoot match of the year."

and

Dave

gets

tape:

"4/23 RINGS: For whatever reason, the rules were changed again for this show allowing ten points before a match ended instead of six, at least in some cases, but not in others. It's terribly confusing. The show consisted mainly of shoots, but this time they were great matches and this was probably the best show of its kind of the year. 1. Lee Hasdell beat Ryuki Ueyama in 4:18 via DQ when Ueyama threw a palm blow but accidentally poked Hasdell in the eye and he couldn't continue. Ueyama stayed very competitive even giving up 41 pounds to a more experienced opponent; 2. Grom Zaza beat Sander Thornhauser in 4:02. This was a weird match and from the description would sound like a work, but viewing it looked almost surely like a shoot. Zaza continually took Thornhauser down and would get an ankle lock near the ropes and Thornhauser would grab the ropes. Zaza scored his first point with an ankle lock in 10 seconds. Second point saw him go for the ankle lock but Thornhauser did an illegal heel hook to counter and got a yellow card. Another ankle lock made it three, four and five points and then Zaza did the same take down and grabbed the same ankle and Thornhauser again grabbed the ropes and he was out of points. It was a really weird match; 3. Christopher Hazemann beat Masayuki Naruse in 13:18 with a wristlock submission. This match looked real from start-to-finish. Where I think it was worked is two spots. One is there were a lot of points scored, and they were coming too rapidly for fighters of this skill level. Second, at one point when Naruse had a mount, he pulled his trunks up like they do in pro wrestling and that isn't something you do in the middle of a real fight. They also traded low kicks right away. Hazemann was ahead 4-2 when he got the submission. **1/2; 4. Yoshihisa Yamamoto beat Joop Kasteel via knockout in 7:32. This was a great RINGS style worked match. They traded hard slaps and kicks standing. Kasteel was popping him hard and even got a choke to go up 4-0. Yamamoto came back with a very hard kick and Kasteel took a nine count before getting up. Kasteel came back with a knockdown and Yamamoto made the dramatic rise at nine. It wound up with Yamamoto behind 9-4 and low on points and he threw some slaps and Kasteel went down and out, although the finish wasn't believable enough considering what they'd already done early. Still, this was a great match which says something since Kasteel is very limited. ***1/2; 5. Gilbert Yvel beat Tsuyoshi Kohsaka in 19:58 of a shoot match when it was stopped due to Kohsaka having a dangerous cut over his eye. This was a super match as Yvel does so many crazy moves that he's amazing, plus he's a great striker. Kohsaka couldn't deal with him standing and the clash of style made it intriguing. The rules played a big part here since Kohsaka scored five points fairly quick. Kohsaka took him down but Yvel picked up a yellow card and for using a closed fist while on his back. Yvel scored a hard slap but was taken down and grabbed the ropes to get a stand-up making it 2-0 in the first minute. Kohsaka scored three more rope break points to go up 5-0 at 2:42. The first key blow, which didn't even score a point, is Kohsaka going for a takedown and Yvel holding the ropes to avoid going down, which is illegal, but spun his hips and hit Kohsaka with a brutally hard knee to the chin which opened the first cut. Yvel was connecting on blows and Kohsaka was taking him down after eating blows. This happened several times. Yvel missed a kick and then recovered and decked Kohsaka with a hard palm to the side of the head at 8:15 which was the second telling blow and the knockdown was worth two points. Kohsaka's attitude totally changed at this point as he became wary and started back pedaling more. Kohsaka was still able to take him down but Yvel actually caught Kohsaka in a guillotine and Kohsaka had to give up a point on the ground which was amazing. At this point Kohsaka was bleeding from the nose as well. Yvel hit a knee to the chin but was taken down. At this point Kohsaka was starting to tire, as Yvel was able to reverse him, and he'd then let him up since standing was his world. Yvel tagged him with a left and a knee. Kohsaka got him down and again was so tired he was reversed and let up. Kohsaka did tag Yvel once while standing, but mostly Yvel was tagging him. At this point the eye cut got worse and even though Kohsaka was still ahead on points, he was examined again and the fight was stopped; 6. Frank Shamrock and Kiyoshi Tamura went to a 1-1 draw after going the 20:00 time limit. This was a tremendous match due to the quickness of both standing and on the mat. Shamrock got an armbar in 39 seconds but Tamura made the ropes for his point. They had some tremendous stand-up exchanges, but they were kept short because Tamura would always take Shamrock to the ground. Both had a few close calls on getting holds and both were constantly working for holds. Tamura's point came at 14:55 when Shamrock didn't have his knees on the ground when he punched him to the body and Shamrock was yellow carded. It was a foul, but inadvertent and probably not worthy of a card. Tamura was on top of Shamrock for much of the rest of the match but work were working for submissions until the end."

and

"The 5/22 RINGS show at Ariake Coliseum has Bitzsade Tariel defending their world heavyweight title against Kiyoshi Tamura and Tsuyoshi Kohsaka vs. Yoshihisa Yamamoto, both of what would figure to be worked matches. In what will be shoot matches, Dan Henderson, an unbeaten MMA fighter (who won an incredibly tough middleweight tournament last year on a UFC show) and a former Greco-roman Olympic wrestler faces Hiromitsu Kanehara in a Vale Tudo rules match, and Randy Couture faces Valentijn Overeem. Henderson vs. Kanehara is interesting because usually the Japanese don't like to risk their guys in a shoot against smaller Americans that have a lot of skill. It's okay to lose to big foreigners since they are bigger, and it's okay to face guys their own size or smaller that have no skill because they can beat them. Kanehara has far more submission experience than Henderson, whose amateur wrestling weight is 187 so his real weight would be about 200 and Kanehara is about 210. At this point it appears Tom Erikson's debut with the group won't happen because they can't find anyone willing to face him. They wanted Joop Kasteel, a 265-pound powerhouse from Holland, but he wanted no part of Erikson."

See you again soon for further RINGS, obviously! My thank to you for your attention, my thanks to you for your time.