PRIDE.20（プライド・トゥウェンティ）2002年4月28日

PRIDE.20
イベント詳細
シリーズ PRIDE（ナンバーシリーズ）
主催 DSE
開催年月日2002年4月28日
開催地 日本
神奈川県横浜市
会場 横浜アリーナ
開始時刻 午後5時
試合数 全7試合
放送局 フジテレビ（地上波）
入場者数 18,926人

AS OUR TREATISE ON THE CRUCIAL MATTER OF PRIDE.19（プライド・ナインティーン） WENDED ITS WAY TOWARDS AND ULTIMATELY ACHIEVED COMPLETION YOU MAY WELL HAVE NOTED IF YOU FOUND THAT YOU WERE ABLE TO STICK AROUND THAT LONG (and if your finding was instead that you very much could not [stick around that long], please know that all is entirely and at once forgiven; more sympathetic I quite simply could not be) that a soon-to-be-vital presence (amidst whatever this is, precisely, that we are doing) has been hinted towards for the first time. "Pride is attempting to lure Hidehiko Yoshida, 32," Dave Meltzer wrote in the April 29, 2002 Observer, "the 1992 Olympic gold medalist at 172 pounds [were we {broadly, but Hidehiko Yoshida in particular} ever so young?] into its stable." I hope that works out for everybody! I jest, of course, in lightness and revelry, as we all know that it totally does. "Yoshida is retiring form judo at the end of the month," Dave explains, before offering information that is both new and wild to me, though I suppose it totally adds up: "New Japan is also interested him." Imagine it! Consider what could have been! It would have been way worse, surely, than what actually happened, and yet what a thing to ponder. "My gut says," Dave offers on the subject of what his gut says, "we're past the point where a judo guy at that age can adapt to Vale Tudo." This is an entirely reasonable thing for it (Dave's gut) to say, or to have said, and yet, as we will learn (together! it'll be fun!), this proves to be very much not the case even a little, in that even the harshest Hidehiko Yoshida critic (please believe me that these existed, once [I have never enjoyed their company]) would have to concede that he adapted to Vale Tudo really quite well, and that he did a good job. Much, much more on that to follow!

Lately I've been thinking about Hidehiko Yoshida even more than the usual amount—which, for me, is already really quite an amount, certainly relative to the general population: for example, I could not really tell you the last time I taught the inner-thigh throw of 内股 uchi-mata without making reference to how one might wish to follow the 小 ko (small, or minor, but in this particular context indicating the near-leg [as opposed to the 大 ō  / major / far-leg]) variation of uchi-mata with either the leg wheel of 足車 ashi-guruma or the bodydrop of 体落 tai-otoshi; and in so mentioning, how could I fail to offer Yoshida, and how he ruled hard[ly] at this very thing:

 

Of course, Yoshida had other approaches to uchi-mata as well (like [such as]):

In any case, Yoshida's judo is never super duper far from mind in my teaching (which is three nights a week like fifty weeks of the year [everybody come out; it's a great group; the club is thriving!]), so there's that, but also: just about immediately after the last time we spoke (on the subject of PRIDE.19（プライド・ナインティーン）, as mentioned previously), the excellent "Grappler Kingdom" YouTube account posted a very fine highlight video called "Hidehiko Yoshida was a true warrior in Judo and MMA" (not to be confused with Grappler Kingdom's earlier [and also very fine] "Judo Legends: Hidehiko Yoshida - Judo and MMA highlights [吉田 秀彦]"), and I found myself communicating this important development to several of my judo pals via SMS text messaging (what a medium, honestly). And then not all that long after that came word that the truly baffling yet genuinely delightful career of 石井 慧 Ishii Satoshi—2008 Olympic gold medalist (the youngest [and I believe lightest?] of Olympic heavyweight judo champions); professional boxer, kickboxer, and mixed martial artist; Croatian citizen; and Mirko Cro-Cop bestie—had come to a close. You can read all about it here (Tokyo Sports!), but the gist of it is that his body is thrashed, and his dream after many years abroad is, if he can at all swing it, to return home and work part-time in a flower shop in Fukuoka. 「花の名前や育て方の勉強ができるじゃないですか」 he says, which Google translates as "I'll be able to learn the names of flowers and how to grow them," which is lovely, but elides the final ですか, which, I think importantly, makes the matter less sure: "I'll be able to learn the names of flowers, and how to grow them, right?" (I hope that he will, and, what's more, I believe in him.) One of the several photographs that accompany this nice story is this one, depicting his mixed-fight début against Yoshida at the expertly named Dynamite!! The Power of Courage 2009 (Yoshida, unanimous decision, by virtue of sagacity and also of point-deduction via groin-knee, amongst other factors):

  

As if all of that were not enough to keep Hidehiko Yoshida top-of-mind, there is also the recent dark matter of Yoshida's 1992 Olympic teammate 丸山 顕志 Maruyama Kenji credibly accused of and indeed arrested for an alleged cryptocurrency swindle; this is of course no good, but coverage of the scandal led me to this profile of yet another 1992 Olympian (indeed, Maruyama's roommate at those Atlanta games), our dear friend 小川 直也 Ogawa Naoya, well known to all who have visited these electronic pages (my thanks to you once more). It's a really good article! Did you know that Ogawa Dojo in Chigasaki City, Kanagawa, will celebrate it's nineteenth anniversary in April? That's great! We also have this excellent photograph: 

Below this photo, there is an explanatory note that reads プロレスラー時代の名残でこんな顔をしてしまう小川直也氏, which tells us that Ogawa's aspect in this image is (if I am reading this right) a 名残 / なごり/ nagori (a vestige, a remnant, a relic, a trace) of his life after judo (or rather his life in-between judo[ings]); but in this instance I defer entirely to the four-squareness of utterance and Odyssean adequacy of the automated Google Chrome translation: "Naoya Ogawa looks like this because of his days as a professional wrestler." 

If this has been too much judo for you already (it sure hasn't for me!), I am a little worried about both your short-and-medium-term plight[s] going forward, because PRIDE.20（プライド・トゥウェンティ）definitely has 菊田 早苗 Kikuta Sanae in it, and I am absolutely guaranteed to carry on at least as badly as I have so far; I am so sorry.

As we begin, a reasonable drum-and-bass score (we need jungle, I'm afraid) accompanies a fairly dopey pre-taped segment that sees our friendly pals Stephen Quadros and Bas Rutten in black suits and dark glasses address an unspeaking group of like-attired Japanese fellows in a small, dimly lit conference room for a dramatic reading of the card that does not really come together, but I bet everybody had a fun time thinking it all up, and maybe even filming it. I really do like an awful lot of the music on these old tapes; the late 90s/early 00s are a strong period in low-cost background electronic composition (the beats in particular), and much of the material we are offered here is essentially BOSS-DR202-preset-core (that's good!). 

All right here we go and oh hey, it's Bob Sapp, who claims ten-percent body fat at three-hundred-sixty pounds. Man I wonder how he manages that! "Sapp was drafted by the Chicago Bears in the third round (69th overall) of the 1997 NFL Draft.[7] He signed with the Minnesota Vikings after being released by the Bears. However, his career took a hit after he was suspended by the NFL in 1998 for steroid abuse. He spent two seasons with the Vikings and only played in one game.[6] He is considered to be one of the worst picks of the NFL drafts.[8]" Oh I see. I do not know the Bob Sapp story well, I will freely admit, though I am aware that he was an enormously famous celebrity in Japan for a time, and was involved in some of the most-watched bouts of the era; I did not see much true K-1 at all (the later HERO*S material is really quite different), and knew Sapp mostly in his long decline, I suppose. Let's see what else we can learn . . . okay, to this point, not that much has happened really: after a toughman-boxing win over Refrigerator Perry (whose send-away G.I. Joe I admired as a lad) and a stint in World Championship Wrestling developmental, which ended with the company's sale, this is more or less what came next for Sapp: fighting in PRIDE as a representative of K-1 against YAMAMOTO YOSHIHISA with whom we are all perfectly familiar from watching him so many times. There have been so many times! Where to even begin! Well actually there isn't a whole lot of "time" for that now, as he is clobbered wildly by the wild clobbering of Bob Sapp, who has trained under the tutelage of Maurice Smith (Randy Couture is in his corner, too, interestingly), and the fight ends in just two minutes and forty-four seconds. Yikes! There wasn't much to it, but Sapp is an enormously charismatic figure, certainly (also just an enormous figure).

Next we have Quinton "Rampage" Jackson, whose pretty consistently vile behaviour makes his work hard to enjoy that much in retrospect, and 佐竹 雅昭 Satake Masaaki, whose 極真 Kyokushin we have come to know well ("It must be understood," we are reminded on the online home of the Canadian branch of International Kyokushin Karate Federation, "that the way of Kyokushin is the pursuit of the ultimate truth" [they are seekers]). I believe the last time we saw Jackson, he was disqualified for kneeing Daijiro Matsui in the groin, but what of Satake . . . well, it looks like his PRIDE record stands at a troubling one-and-six heading into this one, but the crowd is still super into him, and low-key thrills to every strike he lands in the early going. Before too long, though, Jackson hoists and slams, much as you'd expect, and the knees that follow are fairly horrifying. Worse still, though, is the match-ending, back-injuring 裏投 ura-nage that comes late in the first round (our recent ura-nage night at the club [by request! I like to take requests!] went really, really well; thank you so much for asking): 

Quadros suggests that Satake will need to see a chiropractor after this one, which would be true if he were to "rejec[t] the inferential reasoning of the scientific method,[34] and rel[y] on deductions from vitalistic first principles rather than on the materialism of science.[35]" (I recently directed a friend who had found chiropractic treatment unhelpful to the truly wild-ride of that pseudoscience's wikipedia page, and I would encourage you to peruse it also; it's really quite well done). 

And now we have Antônio Rogério Nogueira, not to be confused with his slightly larger twin Antônio Rodrigo Nogueira (whom all rightly admire), making his PRIDE début against Yusuke Imamura (you may recall him from his winning appearance at THE BEST（ザ・ベスト）2002年2月22日). It is but fleeting, though, as Nogueira finishes Imamura in just thirty-five seconds, twenty-six seconds of which were spent applying the guillotine choke of 前裸絞 mae-hadaka-jime, doubted by both Quadros and Rutten until the very moment of submission because of how it was an arm-in guillotine. "It's only half a guillotine!" Quadros insists, and Rutten agrees. I keep coming back to this point (I don't even know how many times now!), but it is so wild that even arm-in guillotine finishes in professional martial arts matches were not enough to prove to some people that this was a viable technique. This seems impossible, but we have been chronicling this ongoing impossibility (I really should be keeping track of how many times). That you wouldn't just mess around with your buddies and figure this out yourself the first time you saw someone apply this technique, and instead go on insisting it was not even a thing nor could it ever be, I continue to not understand even a little. But then again Aristotle famously insisted that women have fewer teeth than men when he could have just counted (we all have our blind-spots).   

  

 

Were I to tell you that Dan Henderson had a match with Ricardo Arona, you might very well expect it to end in a decision, given both men's reputation for super-often having fights that end like that. Well, in this instance, you'd be right! It's great, though, if you enjoy slow, steady positional grappling with the occasional dynamic reversal (and I do). "If you look at each man's physique," Quadros notes, "Arona is muscled up." This is very much the case, of course, and I would have told you as much, but I am nevertheless surprised by just how up[ly] Arona is muscled. It is so up[ly], even in the free-for-all of PRIDE broadly, and a show that has Bob Sapp on it, specifically. Arona, it must be said, never failed a drug test; it could also be said, of course, that Arona never competed in any event that had even a moderately credible drug testing situation, unless I am totally mistaken about Bitetti Combat MMA 4 (Rio de Janeiro, 12 September 2009), and if that is the case I cheerfully withdraw my previous remark in all humility and with all apology. I agree with the judges' (split) decision in this fine bout, which sees Arona emerge the victor. Everybody worked so hard! It occurs to me that I really do like the part at the end of fights that goes to a decision where the referee hold everybody's hands like they are mustering toddlers at a crosswalk (great job pressing the button, pal, but let's just hold on a sec and make sure all the drivers see us):

"They both come from Brazil," is how Quadros introduces our next contest by way of a pre-taped segment (I suppose all things that are "taped" are actually "pre-taped" when you think about it [woah]), "and that's the country of hot blood." Is that what it is the country of? The Brazilians I have trained with have been, on the contrary, cool customers (and let me say that it is a great to have a Portuguese speaker in the room who can help you pronounce, say, Ezequiel Rodrigues Dutra Paraguassu when the name comes up; or, on the rare occasions when one produces a little bit of half-passable grappling-specific Brazilian Portuguese on your own, to have somebody there to say sim). Well either way, here stand Murilo "Ninja" Rua (Chute Boxe Academy) and Mário Sperry (Brazilian Top Team); my heart is for sure with Zé Mario (the Zé is short for José!), not just because every win for Sperry is a win for judo (which of course it is [as he holds 段 dan-rank in that exquisite art), but actually mostly because of the debt I still owe to his VHS tapes (you get low, and you poooooosh [insanely true, king; insanely true]).  

I am for sure pleased but also honestly a little surprised at the crowd's enthusiastic reaction to Sperry. Perhaps they, too, have seen these crucial tapes? Or perhaps they recall fondly his PRIDE.17（プライド・セブンティーン）  肩固 kata-gatame win over the fearsome (and yet nice-seeming) Igor Yaroslavovych Vovchanchyn? The Yokohama crowd is no less enthusiastic for "Ninja" Rua, who has taken the emotional risk of donning a full-on ninja costume; he is movingly pleased about it:

Quadros says that the referee should take extra care checking Rua over for concealed weapons; Bas is particularly (and understandably) concerned about the potential for "the ninja powder, when he throws it and then disappears and then suddenly pops up behind his opponent." Bas further notes that it is a good thing there are no trees. Man, the crowd is really stoked for this one! Me too! 

The opening minute is nuts, with young Rua (he is but twenty-one!) clipping the seasoned veteran (Sperry has thirty-five years [of seasoning]) and sending him wobble-leggedly to the mat; Sperry recovers admirably, and some pretty choice grappling ensues, with Sperry throwing up his hips (the legs, of course, but the hips: so important) for an 表三角絞 omote-sankaku-jime / front-racing triangle choke that really comes nowhere close to finishing but which gets the people going. Before you know it, Sperry is on top—no wait, okay, Rua now—and all of this rules. The vibes alone! 

As "aaf-pride20.cd1" comes to a close mid-fight, and we turn the electronic page to "aaf-pride20.cd2," I find myself in sympathy and indeed deep identity with Mario Sperry as he works to subdue a significantly younger and more athletic man with technical grappling. Been there, buddy! With exceedingly mixed results! And even when it works out, it feels like there is a lot to do! In time, Rua decides he has had more than enough of this 寝技 newaza and quite simply stands up, so that he might stomp. Sperry, though for sure a man of newaza, understandably prefers standing to being full-on trod upon, and so pops up, bodylocks, and takes Rua to the mat with as tidy a 小外掛 kosoto-gake/minor outside hook as you're likely to see. And he could totally finish the 関節技 kansetsu-waza (joint-locking technique ["bone-locking," in the oldest translations]) that follows! It begins as 逆腕緘 gyaku-ude-garami but develops into 腕挫膝固 ude-hishigi-ude-gatame before, oh dear, before falling apart entirely. Great job, Rua, because that one was close for a moment or two! Sperry does better than you'd think in the striking that follows in the ten-minute first-round's closing moments, and I have him narrowly ahead so far in this fairly tremendous contest. 

I was about to say that if the first round was arguably Sperry's, the second clearly belongs to Rua in a more clear-cut way, but just then Sperry did some pretty neat stuff, too, including a repeat of the 関節技 kansetsu-waza sequence we all enjoyed earlier. Quadros incorrectly says that this is a better match than Sakuraba vs. Newton (PRIDE.3（プライド・スリー）) but I really do appreciate his enthusiasm for this one! In the third, Rua's youthful vigour proves ample to subdue the wily Sperry, and Rua is rightly adjudged the winner. Tears of joy and relief from Murilo Rua; tears of tender fellowship from Sperry's pal Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira. Great stuff all around! Were it possible, I would very much like to share with Mario Sperry, if I could, the great Shintaro Higashi's comic-yet-wildly-true "Judo for Old Guys". I bet he'd chortle! "This guy's so strong and athletic, I don't wanna be here. Usually I wanna feint, go fast, kouchi [gari], move, break the grip, and then gain position. Nuh-uh; not for you old guys." But what, then, Shintaro Higashi? What specifically? "I'm gonna do a shitty kouchi, and go over the head. You see that? That was not even a good kouchi; I just literally nailed him in the leg. Now I'm in dominant position. I'm here, I throw my elbow in, and pull the head down, and I'm just gonna hang on him; because I'm a old guy." Again, for you kids out there—well, first and foremost, you kids stay in school—please note that Higashi (and his noble cousin Eugene, professional 受け uke) explain[s] that these "old guy" tactics are only ever truly acceptable from players over twenty-five years of age ("yeah, twenty-five and up, you're already an old guy in judo").  "Don't be that guy," Higashi concludes, "but, you know, if you're gonna be that guy, do it the right way."

OKAY HERE WE GO IT IS 菊田 早苗 KIKUTA SANAE and if I am not mistaken, the first time his works appeared before us in RINGS 4/4/97: BATTLE GENESIS Vol. 1 in 後楽園ホール Kōrakuen Hōru (where better?), we spoke of him thus, didn't we (we sure did!):

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THEY SAY SANAE KIKUTA IS ON THE MOVE, PERHAPS HE HAS ALREADY LANDED and in fact he has and this all comes as an enormous surprise to me. I had read some time ago that Kikuta had considered RINGS as a possible thing to do before he settled into his long career of high-taste-level excellence in a number of endeavours but I had literally no idea that he had ever had a RINGS match (let alone two, which seems to be the case). I am shoot surprised by joy! Sanae Kikuta, oh man, where to begin: Kikuta was a national high school judo champion who then trained at university under Toshihiko Koga (three-time World and 1992 Olympic Champion, the best pure thrower of his generation probably and arguably the greatest ippon seoi nage player ever); Kikuta entered and won both the Lumax Cup: Tournament of J '96 (Ikuhisa Minowa was in it!) [UPDATE: "This video is no longer available due to a copyright claim by 株式会社クエスト"] and Lumax Cup: Tournament of J '97 Heavyweight Tournament (Ikuhisa Minowa was I don't think in it). Actually I guess at the time of this RINGS appearance he is between Lumax Cups (you will recall Tsuyoshi Kohsaka's 1995 win, surely, wreathed as it was in glory). After his brief time in RINGS, Kikuta will go on to fight in the earliest PRIDEs, a tonne of Pancrases (speaking of Minowa, please enjoy this wildly wild Kikuta/Minowa match), and win the Abu Dhabi Combat Club Submission Wrestling World Championship at -88kg in 2001. To win ADCC (a de facto no-gi BJJ world championship) as a judo player is perhaps the greatest of Sanae Kikuta's several great gifts to us, and to me personally, in that it makes for an unreal (and yet all too real) point of trolling betwixt me and my pals who enjoy BJJ. A five-star (I recognize no sixth) Youtube video called "【寝技世界一】菊田早苗 [World's No.1 Ne Waza]" exhibiting Sanae Kikuta's wins over Evan Tanner, Chris Brown (who had beaten Renzo Gracie the round before, so was "legit"), Egan Inoue (finalist vs. TK in the '95 Lumax), and Saulo Ribeiro (an ADCC and Mundials champion several times over, and author of Jiu-Jitsu University, an enormously worthy ne-waza tome) has tragically seen its uploader's account terminated and like a fool I never downloaded it when I had the chance. But it totally happened, Sanae Kikuta did it; he *did* it. What else might we say of Sanae Kikuta? Let's see: i) That his GRABAKA (græppling fool) gym had the best t-shirts (GRAPPLING PARTY the king of them; it served as my avatar on the boards for a time but I never ordered one; no images of it remain on the entire internet; the future is terrible); ii) that GRABAKA remains strong and has a lovely space, and that (iii) his blog is quite thoughtful (this is a google translate situation obviously, given my illiteracy [UPDATE: I have grown significantly less illiterate in the seven years since! you've just got to do a little every day [or at least on lots of the days] but we are sticking with the totally readable google translation on this one):

"February 01, 2017

FIGHTING SPORTS

In earnest, I started judo since entering junior high school, so that was the start of fighting sports life.

However, at that time, I never thought that doing judo was a fighting sports, but rather intense sports, martial arts.

Unlike boxing etc, it was not intended to give pain to the partner.

However, if I think that this is the foundation of my current fighting sports and definitely helped most of my life, I think that he has been fighting fighting again.

It is because judo was there that I can live like this now.

Judo is essentially a game to be beautifully contested so as not to hurt other people. By mastering this, however, you can compete against any genre of fighting sports.

It is nourished for physical strength, sense of balance, and mental, all.

If you master Judo, then you will be transformed into a tremendous one by a shift change within yourself.

Since it was originally used for fighting, it is commonplace to say that it is natural.

So, as a junior high school, though it happened to be a judo I met, I feel like I'm doing judo all the time after all.

Since the origin is judo, its base has been continuing all the time, and only the rest is applied. So, nothing has changed."

Also--and for now, let us agree, finally--his Fire Pro name is "Mad Grappler" Kikuma Kaname and they call GRABAKA "GRANADA"; I would like to get that in, too. I should probably say finally finally that for all the very real enthusiasm I have for Sanae Kikuta and all his many doings (perhaps you are already convinced of this?), maybe don't get too excited about it all because fundamentally he takes people down and lays on them. But so deftly, I love it.

 

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ALL OF THE ABOVE REMAINS EXTREMELY TRUE and, to it, Bas Rutten ads that Alex Stiebling, who trains with Bas (and whose recent work we have very much enjoyed), considers Sanae Kikuta his favourite fighter (oh man, great pick!). Kikuta's opponent this time out is the charismatic and ever-game アレクサンダー大塚 ALEXANDER OTSUKA, who is tricky to finish (at least by submission [he can be hit, certainly {who among us}]), but who rarely runs any real risk of winning. Behind Kikuta stand his seconds, attired in best-in-class GRABAKA gym shirts; behind Otsuka, several gentlemen in lucha libre masks (please forgive me but I do not recognize them [Michinoku Pro guys, maybe?] but I hope Dave Meltzer will in the notes below). I'm stoked!

Quadros makes light of "Larry, Curly, and Moe," as he calls them, in Otsuka's corner, which seems rude! Way more rude, though: Otsuka proffers his hand and then withdraws it, so as to fake Kikuta out and make him look a fool, but it is Otsuka who may well prove to be the fool once he is hugged competitively for twenty minutes (I have not seen this one in years but this is almost certainly the outcome, I am sure we will all agree). The crowd is like oooooh maaaaan about it (and about the whole thing, really), but Kikuta seems characteristically unfazed. I'm sure Otsuka is "doing a bit," but it is also what he is actually doing, and then it will be what he has done, and then that will be the life he has lived. Tread cautiously, please, everybody.

It takes less than a minute, I think, for Kikuta to hit a left 大内刈 ouchi-gari / major-inner-reap from a right stance and 組み方 kumikata, which is actually a pretty interesting thing to hit, and suggests Otsuka will have no answers for Kikuta standing, like, at all. Otsuka ruffles Kikuta's hair as though to rile him up, but Kikuta is expressionless as he moves meticulously to 縦四方固 tate-shiho-gatame (right up on top!). There is some discussion of Kikuta's 2002 ADCC title, and Quadros offers a tantalizing hint of a conversation they had the day before, in which Kikuta enumerated a number of reasons why he thought ADCC champions were not especially well-positioned for success in mixed fighting. I wish Quadros would have listed all of them (perhaps I need to comb through Kikuta's blog for more). Kikuta attempts 腕挫十字固 ude-hishigi-juji-gatame, and it would have been a super tidy finish from there, but Otsuka defends it, and, not long after, sweeps, to the great delight of the crowd that chants his name. They are very much on his side, whereas I choose, as ever, to VOTE FOR GRABAKA (a t-shirt I desperately wish I'd ordered when I had the chance). Their delight is short-lived, though, as Kikuta is all over Otsuka again (in the sense of smothering) moments later. Ah, Kikuta is not without his supporters (aside from me) after all, as the crowd offers a spirited hwaiii to every shot he lands to Otsuka's sizeable bean. Kikuta threatens with first 肩固 kata-gatame, then 腕緘 ude-garami, and again 十字固 juji-gatame in what can only be described as a blanketing. Otsuka's best moments come when he is briefly on top after a valiant juji escape, but as the round ends and he returns to his corner, you really get a sense of the extent to which Kikuta has been messing him up beneath all that blanketing.

"Well, it hasn't been going too good for Alexander Otsuka, has it?" Stephen Quadros asks, noting that it was Otsuka who seemed intent on making this some kind of a grudge match, whereas Kikuta seemed to be like "uhhh . . . okay?" about it. 

Sensing the need for a new plan, Otsuka opens round two with a super direct knee to the groin, but before the referee can separate them, Kikuta scores with that same 大内刈 ouchi-gari that seemed so effortless in the first, and the referee is like, well I guess it maybe wasn't that bad then? And the blanketing proceeds. Let me say this about Sanae Kikuta's base: it's stable! As Kikuta rains unanswered blows upon Otsuka, the referee asks nothing of him (Otsuka, I mean)—no instruction to improve his position or defend himself or anything—but Kikuta does not have finishing power in his strikes, and the result is an endless low-key battering that leaves all kinds of lacey little glove marks all over Otsuka's great big head. Quadros and Rutten are deeply unimpressed with Otsuka, and agree that heart without skill isn't a whole lot to look at. 

Round three begins with not just one, but instead a true series (sequence?) of knees to Kikuta's groin, about which the referee seems oddly unconcerned. Kikuta, though, is not thrilled about it! This time it's a 小外掛 kosoto-gake / minor-outside-hook that scores without any trouble at all, and from there, this round looks much like the previous two, which I do not mean as a criticism, in that I am enjoying all of this plenty, but Quadros' attention is drifting: "Bas, we had sushi last night," he recalls, and Bas is like yes that's true, Stephen. Okay here's a pretty solid 十字固 juji-gatame all of a sudden:

"Alexander should tap," Bas says, and I of course totally agree. As I have mentioned many times throughout these electronic pages, I do not see an unwillingness to tap when you're clearly beaten as a sign of valour, but as an unsportsmanlike inability to acknowledge that you have been bested. It is, I will say again, gross to have to break someone's arm, or to choke them all the way out, to win a game; and, to me, it is rude and inconsiderate of your opponent to "make you" do it (though, as existence precedes essence, man is responsible for what he is [L'existentialisme est un humanisme, 1946]). I will say again, as I always do when this comes up, that I am not trying to convince anyone of this (feel as you will), but these are my long-held views on the matter. But the referee won't stop it, and Otsuka won't tap. It would seem that Kikuta—who speaks in emphatic tones to the referee about his refusal to stop this plainly done match, but who does not raise his hips to finish—emerges as something of a kindred spirit in this regard (the aforementioned regard [that I mentioned afore]). "This is not going to speak well of the finishing ability of Kikuta," Quadros says, but this is a question not of his finishing ability (a night-one beginner could "finish" the hold (break the arm) from this position by, again, simply raising their hips, and to think Sanae Kikuta, of all people, is unaware of this is a silliness) but of Kikuta's willingness, or rather his unwillingness, to break someone's arm for no other reason than that they are a fool acting foolishly. Kikuta, visibly irritated, relaxes his control of the arm and comes back up on top in tate-shiho. "That was sheer guts," Quadros says of Otsuka, but no, it was in fact mercy that was visited upon him. Otsuka can do nothing of substance from this position, nor can he improve the position itself, and, recognizing this, goes back to his little ruffling-the-hair routine; however silly this seemed the first time around, this time it shoots all the way past contemptible and lands squarely on pitiable. Kikuta is again unmoved by it all, so far as we can tell by his demeanour. "If anything, Otsuka has saved face in that he didn't get stopped . . ." is a perfect misapprehension of what happened here, but it is how Quadros begins a sentence that actually ends much better: " . . . but he got smoked in every other way." Otsuka raises his arms as though in victory, and I am disliking this guy so much right now! And he's not done, repeating his match-opening hand-shake feint, but escalating it by ending this time with the dreaded bird.   

I guess he is being "a heel" and specifically one trying to "get his heat back" but it's like, if the point of a pro wrestling heel is to make you want to see someone beat him, this is exactly what I have just seen for the last half hour, right? I have no need to see that again, and am instead all set. And with Otsuka's record now standing at a tidy two-and-ten it is pretty much all we've ever seen, isn't it? Otsuka losing? So he's not so much a heel as just a jerk, then? He loses the crowd with this one, and not in a chorus-of-boos-for-the-dastardly-villain way so much as a smattering-of-boos-amdist-light-laughter-at-this-bozo (what, is he a clown?) situation. 

Our メーン・エベント MAIN EVENT(o) is a special-rules match between PRIDE Middleweight Champion Wanderlei Silva and K-1's dauntless Mirko "Cro Cop" Filipović (by the way *do not* accept K-1's challenge to your fledgling Stoic Style promotion in ファイナルファイヤープロレスリング～夢の団体運営 [Final Fire Pro Wrestling: Yume no Dantai Unei! {Final Fire Pro Wrestling: Organization of Dreams / Final Fire Pro Wrestling: Dream Organization Management}] unless you want to see your beloved little guys get utterly cooked): we're looking at three five-minute rounds, standing restarts (rather than a stop-don't-move, scooch-to-the-centre-of-the-ring restarts) should the fight go to the ropes whilst on the mat, and no judges' decision in the event that we go the distance. The crowd is very into this, as you might well expect! There is for sure an air of menace and danger! This contest unfolds as essentially a kickboxing match (hey: fair enough) and so I am in no position to offer anything for you here other than a vibe report, really (and they are strong, the vibes), other than to say that Silva controls the pace of the whole thing, and would almost certainly have been awarded the decision had that been a thing to be awarded (it was not). Kazushi Sakuraba, who once again seems nice, is on hand to literally give everyone their flowers.

And that's that! A good show! It is of course only natural at this point to wonder WHAT DAVE MELTZER HAD TO SAY ABOUT IT (turns out lots):

May 6, 2002:

"PRIDE 20 ARMED AND READY [I have at no point mentioned this event's English-language subtitle because of how it is "cringe"—ed.]

Thumbs up 119 (100.0%)

Thumbs down 0 (00.0%)

In the middle 0 (00.0%)

BEST MATCH POLL

Murilo Ninja vs. Mario Sperry 75

Vanderlei Silva vs. Mirko Cro Cop 24

Dan Henderson vs. Ricardo Arona 11

WORST MATCH POLL

Bob Sapp vs. Norihisa Yamamoto 38

Antonio Rogerio Nogueira vs. Yusuke Imamura 20

Pride became the first promotion in the nearly 15 year history of Observer big show polls to garner two consecutive 100% thumbs up with its Armed & Ready PPV show on 4/28 from the Yokohama Arena.

The show was a huge success live, setting the all-time attendance record for the building of 18,926 fans crammed into the 17,010-set arena, paying north of $2 million. Not even talking about show quality, where the show really stood out was the heat in two of the matches without any Japanese fighters or pro wrestlers involved. The Mirko Cro Cop vs. Vanderlei Silva main event had the ultimate showdown, with Pride's biggest foreign star facing K-1's leading star, which turned out to be a huge success as a draw. Neither Cro Cop nor Silva have performed as pro wrestlers, usually a prerequisite for Pride's biggest gates. However, both did make their reputations by scoring a series of wins over pro wrestlers, Cro Cop with wins over Kazuyuki Fujita, Yuji Nagata and Ryushi Yanagisawa and a draw with Nobuhiko Takada. Silva scored two wins over Kazushi Sakuraba plus wins over Alexander Otsuka and Kiyoshi Tamura. The wins made both well known to the pro wrestling audience, but there was question how well Japanese wrestling fans would support a match involving them without a Japanese pro wrestler as each's opponent. The other big match live was another grudge match with no ties to pro wrestling, but the audience clearly understood the Brazilian Top Team (Mario Sperry) vs. Chute Box Academy (Murilo Ninja Rua) angle because they were buzzing. The pro wrestling angle on the show involved Otsuka, who as a defender of pro wrestling actually played heel against pro wrestler hater Sanae Kikuta of Pancrase [I am intrigued by this! I am 100% certain I am missing context here!—ed.].

Cro Cop vs. Silva seemed on paper a questionable fight even though it did figure to draw, because one of the two big heels to wrestling fans would be eliminated by a non-Japanese pro wrestler. Whomever were to beat either would become an instant superstar. As it turned out, things probably couldn't have worked out better as the no judges rules saw them have a better fight than expected, and battle to a five round draw. The Pride crowd took to Silva as the biggest babyface on the show, a role reversal, apparently with the idea he was representing Pride against K-1. Silva did an amazing job, more than holding his own standing with possibly the best all-around stand-up fighter on Earth, at least based on Cro Cop's recent win over K-1 Grand Prix champ Mark Hunt. Giving up about ten pounds, on paper, Silva's only chance appeared to be on the ground. While he did dominate the ground work, and was faced with rules that favored Cro Cop, both shorter rounds (three minutes instead of five) and rope breaks calling for re-starts, he scored what everyone considered a morale victory, and would have won the fight had their been judges. But in wrestling terms, Cro Cop still wasn't beaten and didn't lose any heat, and boy did he have it coming in.

Pride's next show will be 6/23 at the Saitama Super Arena, with the planned main event being Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira making his first defense of his world heavyweight title against Semmy Schiltt. They have also proposed a Don Frye vs. Mark Coleman match with the winner getting the next shot at Nogueira's belt. Unlike the past two shows, which aired on a same day tape delayed basis in the U.S. (and this show in Canada as well), the next show will air on a week tape delay, on 6/30, avoiding going head-to-head with WWF's King of the Ring.

1. Bob Sapp defeated Norihisa Yamamoto (Yoshihisa Yamamoto) in 2:44. Both men have pro wrestling backgrounds. Sapp, 6-5 and 365 pounds, with supposed 10% body fat (seriously, he looks like Brock Lesnar if you were to pack on 60 more pounds of muscle in his arms, chest, shoulders and back) also played a few years in the NFL. Yamamoto has the long-time RINGS background. Sapp is totally inexperienced, with his only previous fight being a knockout of William "Refrigerator" Perry on FX's "Tough Man." He was with WCW until it folded last year, working as a developmental talent in Wildside. Although for some reason this was edited off American television, Sapp got over instantly by coming out in a Ric Flair robe to Flair's entrance music [again I bemoan the disappearance of the Japanese-language broadcasts from the internet—ed.]. Kazuyoshi Ishii of K-1 hired him based on his size, to create the foreign monster gimmick that worked so well with Rikidozan and Antonio Inoki. He's been training only since November in Seattle under Maurice Smith. With a 130-pound edge, he was just too strong for Yamamoto, scoring what most considered big upset. His punches lacked form, but didn't lack power as he moved Yamamoto every time he hit him, cut his right eye, and put him down with a wild punch and started pounding him on the ground when he ref stopped it.

2. Quinton Jackson defeated Masaaki Satake in 7:27. Satake was in better shape than usual. Jackson bulled Satake into the corner and hit him with a few body blows, then scored with a spectacular powerslam and threw some knees to the head and head and body shots on the ground. Jackson even tried a spinning toe hold at one point, before nailing Satake with a Greco-roman backdrop, with Satake landing badly on his shoulder. Jackson threw a few punches on the ground when the ref stopped it.

3. Antonio Rogerio Nogueira beat Yusuke Imamura in :35. Nogueira, seconded by his twin brother with the same name and nickname (just wonderful, both are called Minotauro), only difference is this guy is a 205-pounder so he's after Silva's belt. He literally trapped Imamura at the bell in a guillotine like position, but took him a while to lock the move on for the tap. About the only thing we had time to learn was that even though the two brothers look almost exactly alike (the champ is a little heavier, but same kind of body, has a bullet wound and worse looking ears), they've never played tricks on girlfriends.

4. Ricardo Arona won a split decision over Dan Henderson in 20:00. Very exciting back-and-forth fight although Arona won the fight in my book. Arona had about ten pounds on Henderson and was able to out muscle him and get the top position, even with Henderson's Olympic wrestling background. Henderson reversed him several times. First round was even, with Henderson nailing a good punch to end the round. Second round saw Henderson bust Arona's eye with a punch, and nearly get a guillotine. They stopped the fight to check Arona. Third round saw Arona get the mount. Henderson tried to grab a headlock from the bottom to reverse positions, which he had done successfully earlier. This time Arona was ready, and pulled out of the headlock as Henderson turned his body, getting his back, and nearly got a choke. Henderson managed to escape, but Arona had him mounted the last several minutes and did the ground and pound on him.

5. Murilo Ninja (Murilo Rua) beat Mario Sperry via unanimous decision in 20:00. People were buzzing for this one before it even started, with Ninja a total babyface in a Ninja outfit. Up until the last five minutes, where Sperry had gassed out and was just holding on for the finish, this was a match of the year calibre bout. They traded punches, like Shamrock and Frye, with Ninja decking him with a left in the opening seconds. First round went back-and-forth, with Sperry going for several submissions including a triangle, guillotine and armbar. Ninja got away from the armbar and managed to get to his feet, and rocked Sperry again with punches and stomps. Sperry came back and rocked Ninja with punches. The two traded punches again, with both taking shots and getting rocked before Sperry got on top on the ground and threw punches. Sperry was bleeding from the cheek. Ninja got Sperry's back in the second round. Sperry went for a kneebar but Ninja attacked him with punches and got his back, going for a choke. Sperry reversed, but was tiring at this point. Third round saw Ninja dominate, taking him down and stomping his face. The two traded, with Ninja getting the better of it. Ninja controlled most of the rest of the round on the ground.

6. Sanae Kikuta beat Alexander Otsuka (Takashi Otsuka) via unanimous decision in 20:00. Only the third round aired on TV. What didn't air included Kikuta going for a handshake, and Otsuka blowing him off. Otsuka played heel wrestler, even though in a sense, Kikuta would have started as a heel as his heat they've tried to give him, because he's a technically good but bland fighter, is that he hates pro wrestlers and doesn't think they should be involved in MMA, which is probably his company (Pancrase) trying to make a name for him by getting a showdown with Kazushi Sakuraba [okay so this is almost nothing; I withdraw my earlier interest in this aspect of things—ed.]. Kikuta dominated the fight in every aspect. When they picked it up, Otsuka's face was marked up and Kikuta's was a little. Otsuka, knowing he had no chance, kept throwing knees to the groin, but couldn't get the spot as Kikuta never sold them. Kikuta took him down and bloodied his nose. He went for an armbar and had it locked in for a long time, but Otsuka survived. I've got no idea how Otsuka got out of it. Otsuka then kept messing up Kikuta's hair and slapping his face and talking to him to annoy him while on the bottom for the rest of the fight. When the bell rang, Otsuka jumped up and raised his arm like he'd won, and the crowd booed him heavily. He had Solar (the Mexican pro wrestler who played total heel at the Deep show against Pancrase's Minoru Suzuki by just trying to get out of the match he couldn't win with low blows, which seemed to be Otsuka's idea but in his case it didn't work) in his corner with the mask and they tried to play heel pro wrestler. Kikuta went to shake his hands after being declared the winner, but Otsuka pulled his hand away and flipped him off. They edited the post-match mic work off the PPV (and it was in Japanese). As best I can tell, Otsuka got more heat by saying that since Kikuta couldn't stop him after all he said about pro wrestlers, that morally, he was the winner. Kikuta said something to the effect that he beat him for three straight rounds, and he won the fight.

7. Silva drew Cro Cop over 15:00. Super heat from start to finish. Under Vegas rules, had their been judges, I had it 49-47 for Silva. Silva, who usually fights like an undisciplined wildman, which would have gotten him knocked out here, fought his smartest fight ever. He was more aggressive standing. He took Cro Cop down early and missed on two soccer kicks to the head. Crowd chanted "Silva" like crazy and popped for every blow he threw on the ground. Cro Cop got to the ropes to get a stand-up rope break, but Silva went right after him standing. Silva took him down again in the second round but Cro Cop proved to have a good guard and good defense on the ground. Silva pounded on him with the crowd rocking in this round. Third round was standing. Cro Cop managed to avoid a takedown by shoving off Silva in the clinch. But Silva's stand-up clearly had him rattled by this point. Silva connected with a good kick and rocked him with a right. Fourth round saw Cro Cop's best, rocking Silva with a scary hard kick above the ribs which left Silva's ribcage indented with a Croatian footprint. Fifth round saw Silva score go at him and take him down again. After Cro Cop got a stand-up after a Silva head-butt, he came back with some hard kicks before the fight ended. After the match, Sakuraba came into the ring and said it was a great fight and he can't wait to come back himself."

and

"There are reports that New Japan has offered $750,000 (be very suspicious of that as a real money figure) for a three-match deal for Hidehiko Yoshida, the 1972 [oops!1992!—ed.] judo gold medalist and that Pride is also bidding for him. Pride is hoping to get him to debut on its big November Tokyo dome show. Yoshida retired from judo on 4/29. He once did a pro wrestling angle on an FMW show [this is totally new to me and I am intrigued by it if it is true, which I am admittedly skeptical about!—ed.]."

and

"Gary Goodridge wound up not getting married in the Pride ring, as had been talked about a few months ago, but instead got married the next day at the Tokyo Hilton Hotel [we wish him and his bride the best all the same—ed.]."

May 13, 2002:

Excerpted from the Lou Thesz obituary:

"Thesz did basically the same angle in Japan that he had done nine years earlier in Texas, but this time got far more publicity for it and it had major long-term repercussions. With Gary Albright as UWFI champ, a 340-pounder who had strong wrestling credentials, Thesz issued the grandstand challenge, ironically to Chono (who held the NWA title then recognized by New Japan and WCW). While Chono was the focal point, holding the title Thesz made such an important part of the Japanese business as it was the title he held in his most famous match, he also challenged champs from the WWF, WCW, All Japan and New Japan. Once again, he said he'd present his title belt that he wore in the 50s, as a prize to the winner. When Takada beat Albright, he presented him the belt, and as silly as this sounds reading it today, that credibility was part of the reason Takada became such a huge draw, and is still a drawing card today in Pride. It was a public chess game. Thesz, who believed in a shoot Takada could beat Chono having worked out with both, said New Japan could name the time and the place for the match and that Takada would do it for free."

and

"Several sources very close to Goldberg (and we're at this point scheduled to interview Goldberg this week live on radio) have indicated after the latest breakdown in WWF negotiations, that he's thinking more along the lines of Japan. But that could change by the end of the week depending upon the offer the WWF comes up with, because there is clearly internal thought they badly new a new top babyface for Smackdown. Goldberg is not particularly knowledgeable about the machinations of Japan, but his agent, Barry Bloom, is involved with the Pride organization. The word we received is that Goldberg is leaning toward Pride more than New Japan, although would probably like to do both [lol—ed.]."

more on the above (so many reflections):

"New Japan is a good option to a degree, but Goldberg got used to earning so much money in wrestling, that they couldn't afford him for regular touring shows that draw 3,000 fans. Of the new generation wrestlers, the three that got over big among Japanese fans through photos and cable broadcasts were Austin, Rock and Goldberg. Before WCW died, Goldberg was actually the most over of the three, although without wrestling for a year and with Rock appearing in Japan and becoming a movie star, he's probably now a distant third. New Japan needs something new, and he'd do well as a Tokyo Dome attraction. In addition, the booking concepts required to get maximum value out of Goldberg are better understood by Antonio Inoki than anyone, because he created foreign monsters from dust with no name or ability, and the idea of having a superman like in the old days of Bruiser Brody ready-made to come in is something he's got a good track record of making work, at least, short-term. There will come a point where, say, $125,000 per match or whatever they'd have to pay for him, won't be worth it, just as it eventually wasn't for Hogan when he came after quitting WWF (before WCW) and was brought in as a major big show attraction.

Pride, because of its salary scale for foreigners, designs on the U.S. PPV market and huge live gates, could actually pay him far more. Ken Shamrock earned $350,000 per match in Pride, largely because of the belief he'd open the American doors on PPV because of his name value and drawing power with the UFC audience. However, Shamrock didn't have the drawing power they hoped for, and when they tried the dream match scenario with Don Frye, while a tremendous show, the U.S. mainstream media wasn't interested. Goldberg, on the other hand, can get on nearly every major sports talk show that Shamrock couldn't, and give Pride a publicity boost and name recognition boost that UFC, its rival, could never match with any other fighter.

That's the upside. The downside is that Pride is a shoot. If Pride were to work a match at this point, as they have done to protect big drawing pro wrestlers like Noaya Ogawa and Nobuhiko Takada, in the past, would likely kill their ability to promote live events in the mainstream U.S. Of course, that may no longer be a goal either. But they haven't protected anyone to the degree of working a match in nearly two years. They could bring Goldberg in with big fanfare and give him someone, like say, Osamu Tachihikari, a big pro wrestler who can't fight a lick, that a nearly 50-year-old Canek beat, and expect a quick squash. If Goldberg can be explosive with a win in Pride, it would help him as an attraction for New Japan. But ultimately in Pride there is a problem. While Goldberg is no doubt a very tough guy, he is not experienced at the sport of fighting and at 35, and with all his various injuries, it's a longshot he could pick it up to the level to compete with the top guys. With the money he has in the bank, why would he make the physical sacrifices necessary to do so? So the only thing in Pride for him is short-term, maybe win two easy matches and get out. Matches with Kazuyuki Fujita or Yoshihiro Takayama could be big draws in the Pride ring if he looked good in early squashes, but at that level, the aura would be gone because he's not going to bulldoze Fujita [the very notion of Goldberg vs. Fujita is criminal; my word—ed.]. The idea of Inoki getting behind Goldberg and use Pride to make him the first legitimate monster foreign pro wrestler since the advent of Vader, is viable. Maybe even the most viable. But even then, it may only be short-term.

The other negative about Japan is that no matter what he does in Japan, unless he's the savior of Pride and can make them (and stranger things have happened, the media got behind Ali and Frazier's daughter as a PPV novelty and it was a big success and freak shows if the public gets curious can draw), means nothing here for his name. For life after wrestling, making a celebrity name in the U.S. is the most important thing, and the only avenue for him to do it would be WWF. It's doubtful UFC would touch him because of the backlash among its hardcore fans and because they don't want to be the freak show that Pride can be since it understands it's doing real pro wrestling as opposed to trying to create a new sport. Because of business reasons, no matter what people may think today, there will come a day, like this past January, where they'll say screw the locker room, we need something, and bring him in, and we're he'll realize that for whatever goals he wants in life, unless he's content to live off his money, and more power to him if that's all he wants to do, I believe it's an inevitability."

May 20, 2002:

"A movie called "The Specimen" [this is of course known to us as The Smashing Machine, and it is sort of a masterpiece—ed.] about the life of Mark Kerr debuted over the weekend premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York on 5/9. I don't know much about it other than it tackled the subject of Kerr's drug use head on, showing him sliding downward from alcohol and recreational drug abuse as his fighting career slid. Mark Coleman is featured and the film ends up based around the 2000 Pride Grand Prix tournament where Kerr was the favorite going in, but his body shut down in the middle of a match with Kazuyuki Fujita and he didn't get out of the first round. It is next scheduled for CineVegas International Film Festival on 6/8."

and

"Regarding Goldberg and shootfighting, one top star in that world said that Goldberg told him when the subject came up that he's talking publicly about it, but deep down is not going to do it. In the current Fight Sport magazine, in a crazy interview with Tank Abbott (who now looks like Jim Duggan if Duggan did nothing but drink beer and eat pizza and never trained for eight straight years), when asked about Goldberg going to Pride, said, "Bill's a pretty cool guy. As far as the fighting world, though, he should steer very (clear of) it. It's not his cup of tea. It's not professional wrestling. He would get squashed very quickly by just about everybody in the fight world. I think Bill's a really cool guy, but the truth is the truth, that's all." Abbott said if he ever fought Goldberg, it would last 15 seconds, three punches and that's it. Abbott said when he was in WCW, everyone was totally professional with him. "I'm pretty sure they all know I could beat them up and, well, let's put it this way: If they didn't, then they were pretty stupid." Of course, he also claimed that he could have drank a fifth of vodka and beaten everyone in UFC 35 up on the same night."

and

"The planned Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira (now that both twins are in the same promotion, we have to use middle names to differentiate) defending the heavyweight title on the next Pride PPV is out the window. Nogueira suffered a back injury in training and is off the show. Mario Sperry also injured his knee in the first round of his 4/28 match against Murilo Ninja, and had to undergo surgery and he'll be out for several weeks. On the next Pride show on the 6/23, the current plan is to match up Mark Coleman vs. Don Frye. Doesn't look like anyone from Pancrase will be on that show and the working relationship appears shaky. Masami Ozaki of Pancrase protested two things in the Sanae Kikuta vs. Alexander Otsuka match on 4/28. First, he was mad that Otsuka wasn't penalized for a low blow (and for a number of reasons, including Mexican wrestler Solar in the corner of Otsuka and Solar blatantly giving Minoru Suzuki vicious low blows to get DQ'd and playing heel pro wrestler to avoid a clean loss at the Deep show, Ozaki was totally right about this one) and also at Otsuka's overall behavior [I didn't like it either! not one bit! but I'm not mad about it; please nobody say that I'm mad about it!—ed.].

May 27, 2002:

"Pride has officially applied for a license to promote in Nevada which means they will almost surely be expanding to doing live shows in the U.S. There will be a hearing scheduled before 7/1, and if approved, and there doesn't appear to be any reason that wouldn't be the case, they would likely run their first event by the end of the year. There is also an interesting offshoot of this as it relates to Josh Barnett, whose hearing related to the failed steroid test has not been scheduled but they are hopeful of that taking place within the next several weeks. If Nevada suspends Barnett, any promotion also licensed in Nevada couldn't use him for the duration of the suspension or they would risk losing their license. In other words, even though it's a Nevada suspension, the approved groups in Nevada, which would be UFC, King of the Cage, WFA and likely Pride, would risk losing their license if they used him not only in Nevada, but anywhere, including Japan. It would be a commission suspension, not a UFC suspension which is something that far too many people have gotten confused on."

and 

"Pride is attempting to put together a Kevin Randleman vs. Vladimir Matyushenko match for 6/23."

and

"Last update on Goldberg is they are attempting to set up a meeting with Vince and Goldberg to hammer out a deal. WWE has sent word to Goldberg to set up a meeting but Goldberg hasn't cleared his schedule and as of the weekend no meeting date was set. Sounds like Goldberg recognizes he's in the drivers seat on this one and the expectation is WWE is more likely to make a strong deal now than at any point in the past. Several different WWE officials have called Goldberg and he hears from the company on a daily basis. He was invited to a TV taping and turned it down. He's asked that Vince comes to him for negotiations, so that psychological game is being played. Those close to the situation say that in his mind, he still is looking at doing something with both New Japan and Pride. I should mention that nobody in the fighting world is taking any Goldberg to Pride stories with any seriousness [I should note that I have certainly brought a free-agent Goldberg into the Stoic Style fold to get creamed in ァイナルファイヤープロレスリング～夢の団体運営 / Final Fire Pro Wrestling: Yume no Dantai Unei! /  Final Fire Pro Wrestling: Organization of Dreams / Final Fire Pro Wrestling: Dream Organization Management to compete under the noble banner of 技 フレンズ・クラブ / 技FC / Waza FC / Waza Faza Friends Club and can report that, say what you will, the man is a draw—ed.]."

June 3, 2002:

"Antonio Inoki came to Japan on 5/22 and announced he had a new protege from the Brazilian amazon, 23-year-old Ryouto Machida. Inoki said he has a great attitude and knows karate, Jiu Jitsu and sumo and wants him to be the first three sport superstar (K-1, pro wrestling and Pride). The gimmick is that they are trying to recreate Inoki because Inoki was a Japanese boy who gained some fame as a high school track star in Brazil and was recruited back to Japan by Rikidozan and became the biggest wrestling star of our this era." 

and

"Don Frye vs. Mark Coleman and Shungo Oyama vs. Renzo Gracie were announced officially for the 6/23 Pride show at the Saitama Super Arena. Frye vs. Coleman is a rematch of a July 12, 1996 match on a UFC show in Birmingham. Both had fought twice already, with Frye beating Mark Hall and Brian Johnston and Coleman beating Moti Horenstein and Gary Goodridge. Coleman gave Frye a brutal beating in 11:36, resulting in him being hospitalized with both a fractured orbital bone and exhaustion. It remains Frye's only MMA loss in his career. On that night, Coleman had an announced 31 pound weight advantage, and it appeared the weight edge was even greater in reality. Of late, Coleman has been fighting at 235 and Frye at 230, so it's a chemically much more even match-up this time."

and

"K-1 announced a Pride vs. K-1 show for 7/14 in Fukuoka at Marine Mecce (where the Pride December PPV show took place from) as a best-of-seven series. The only match announced is Musashi of K-1 vs. pro wrestler Josh Dempsey, who has a background as a heavyweight boxer in the U.S. (great grandson of Jack Dempsey as well) that had been working for Zero-One. Rumor has the Pride side including Quinton Jackson, Tra Telligman, Guy Mezger, Gilbert Yvel and Semmy Schiltt. With the exception of Jackson, all of those names have either boxing or kickboxing backgrounds. The K-1 side is said to be headlined by Mirko Cro Cop, Peter Aerts, Alexey Ignashov, Cyril Abidi and Glaube Feitosa. Of course rumors also have Aerts being Naoya Ogawa's opponent for the 8/8 Tokyo Dome show and it's doubtful he could do both."

and

"Pancrase drew a legit SRO crowd on 5/28 to Korakuen Hall for a main event where Mitsuyoshi Sato won a close decision over Ikuhisa Minowa. Minowa is all banged up for being totally overworked. Because of his charisma to pro wrestling fans, Minowa, who always states he is primarily a pro wrestler, has been booked constantly as the company's top draw. After the match, the doctors ordered Minowa to rest and not train or fight for at least three months. Pro wrestling is the big theme that has revived Pancrase over the past year. Sato said that he was a fan of pro wrestling and had nothing against it. Sanae Kikuta is established as the head of the anti-pro wrestling faction. Regarding Pancrase pulling out of working with Pride, their belief is that Shimada of Pride, who also comes from pro wrestling (PWFG promotion) had a longstanding hatred of Minoru Suzuki and Masakatsu Funaki from the days they worked together, and they believe he was responsible for referees favoring Alexander Otsuka over Kikuta in their match. However, in the Minowa fight, because he appeals so much to the pro wrestling fans, fans were screaming at him to do dropkicks, enzuigiris and piledrivers."

June 10, 2002:

"It's expected that Rodrigo Gracie vs. Hiromitsu Kanehara will be added for the 6/23 Pride show at Saitama Super Arena. At press time, we were less than three weeks from show time and only two bouts had been announced, so we're going to have that last minute thing all over again. Kanehara is a former pro wrestler from the UWFI days, who in recent years has done RINGS. Win or lose, Kanehara has a style that usually lends to having great fights, but he's had so many great fights he's beaten up and past his prime."

and

"UFC got an out of court settlement from the San Jose based manufacturers of Fire Pro Wrestling for a trademark violation [FIRE PRO YESSSSSSS {this must have been about the use of the octagon, which was later extremely removed—ed].. Fire Pro is a pro wrestling video game that uses characters from numerous pro wrestling promotions as well as UFC, Pride and I believe K-1."

June 17, 2002:

Excerpted from an article about NWA/TNA:

"Pride, despite generally great shows and strong word-of-mouth among hardcores, and using former UFC big draws like Gracie and Shamrock, never did strong enough on satellite to where In Demand was willing to cut them a viable deal, and are probably doing about 15,000 buys in a very limited universe. Pride is on PPV in the U.S. solely because they have to support their American merchandise such as the popular video game by having some exposure in this market, not because they are making a profit running such shows. And Pride is running huge money shows in Japan, with live gates that sometimes run into the several million dollar mark, a benefit NWA TNA will never have."

and

"Some background of Takashi Suguira, who debuts on 6/23 with Pride. He competed in the Japanese national championships in Greco-roman wrestling from 1993-95, placing third at 165 pounds the first two years before winning at 187 pounds in 1995. He also took the National Athletic Meet Greco-roman championship in both 1997 and 1999 at 180 in Greco."

and

"More bad news for both New Japan and Pride is that Kazuyuki Fujita re-injured his achilles tendon, and if may have been a second tear, and will be out of action for a long time."

and

"Mark Coleman suffered a serious neck in training on 6/6. Coleman was dropped on his head in a sparring session with Kevin Randleman and his entire body went numb. He was left paralyzed for about ten minutes and rushed to the hospital. He was able to walk later that day but was hospitalized for three days. As of the weekend he still had numbness in his hands and tingling in his left arm and shoulder. Coleman is talking about returning from the injury to fight again. Of course he had to cancel his 6/23 Saitama Super Arena main event match on the next Pride against Don Frye. Coleman, who had previous neck problems, was being lifted up by Randleman. Randleman's feet slipped out causing Coleman to fall on the top of his head. Initial X-rays indicated a broken neck, but an MRI only revealed bone spurs and a bulging disc. He's planning on not having surgery since neurologists advised him it's not necessary, and is planning on returning to fighting although there is no timetable as to when it would be possible."

and then a whole bunch:

"Frye on Observer Live said he'll be fighting either Yoshihiro Takayama, Heath Herring or Randleman as a replacement. Takayama would likely be an exciting fight as he's bigger than Frye and can take a punch, but doesn't have much offense or any defense [for better or worse, and I am not really a fan of this fight, Dave sure called this one—ed.]. He's also the best drawing card which is important since the show isn't sold out. Herring is the best of the three, but would go in with the huge disadvantage of no training time. Randleman has been training with Coleman, so he's probably the most dangerous because he's in the best condition of the three.

They announced six more matches for the show so the only one left to announce is the main event. Announced were Kiyoshi Tamura vs. Bob Sapp, which is outright criminal, since Sapp outweights Tamura by probably 190 pounds. Sapp has potential because of his look and charisma to be the ultimate foreign monster, but it's criminal to put him in with a guy that size who has a big name to get him over. Also Gilbert Yvel vs. Jeremy Horn, Anderson Silva vs. Paulo Filho (a Brazilian grudge match), Takashi Suguira (NOAH, first MMA match ever) vs. Daniel Gracie (real name Daniel Simoes, but he is cousins with Renzo Gracie and was the 1996 and 1998 world champion in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, and is also said to be a powerful striker), Semmy Schiltt vs. Fedor Emelianenko (Pancrase world open champion vs. the last RINGS world heavyweight champion and Emelianenko is also 1996 Russian judo champion [third place in 1998 was his best result to my knowledge, and I just checked Judo Inside to be sure—ed.] and 2001 Rings heavyweight tournament winner) and Gary Goodridge vs. Armed Labazanov of the Russian Top Team. The match we wrote about last week regarding Rodrigo Gracie vs. Hiromitsu Kanehara is off because Kanehara suffered a training injury.

They are beginning to work on plans for the biggest MMA show in history on 8/11 outdoors at Tokyo National Stadium which is where they are holding major World Cup matches which holds 100,000. There has been talk the past few years of such an undertaking by both Pride and New Japan of trying to break the Tokyo Dome attendance records and neither has ever followed through with it. This would be a major war because it would be three days after the UFO date at the Tokyo Dome and the same day as the new G-1 finals (moved from 8/8 so they wouldn't have the competition from the UFO show). The idea is to do a major series of K-1 vs. Pride matches, with the battle plan including Mirko Cro Cop vs. Kazushi Sakuraba in the main event, plus Vanderlei Silva vs. Ray Sefo (one of K-1's biggest stars). There is serious talk of Frank Shamrock returning on that show against Kiyoshi Tamura as well as Frye vs. Cyril Abidi under K-1 rules (Frye beat Abidi on 12/31 under Pride rules). Sakuraba believes he can beat Cro Cop, which he probably could if he can get him on the ground, but he's giving up 35 pounds at least and Cro Cop as a couple of years of ground training to go along with his tremendous kickboxing skills. They are hoping for a Sakuraba win to set up Sakuraba vs. Silva III at the Tokyo Dome later in the year. Keep in mind all of these matches will probably change half a dozen times between now and August.

Frye's actual injuries in the 2/24 Ken Shamrock match were a hairline fracture of his right ankle, a sprained left ankle, and a partially torn meniscus and while he's largely recovered, it did set back his training for the upcoming Pride. 340-pound King of the Cage champ Daniel Bobish is scheduled to debut on the August Pride show with Sapp being talked about as a possible opponent. Bobish was asked to face Gilbert Yvel on the 6/23 show, but turned it down."

June 24, 2002:

"It was confirmed this week that Don Frye vs. Yoshihiro Takayama would main event the 6/23 Pride show. There was really little choice from a business perspective, as they had far too weak a marquee show for a 27,000-seat Arena because of so many injuries. They were nowhere close to sold out and of the three opponents they came up with for Frye, Takayama was by far the best ticket seller. Lots of the MMA hardcores in the U.S. who have no business sense are hating this, but they still don't understand that it is still largely the pro wrestlers who pay the freight that allows matches like Anderson Silva vs. Paulo Filho that they rave about but that nobody pays money to see, happen. It's as silly as hardcores complaining about Hogan vs. Piper in WCW when it was still drawing huge money (when it stopped, that was another story). Besides, even though Frye is something like 15-1 and Takayama has never won a real match, it is on paper an exciting match because both will throw down and both, being wrestlers, have the understanding that an exciting fight and losing can be better for them than a dull fight and winning, which is a good attitude for fans at least. Takayama has never had a bad match in Pride, largely because he has no defense and can take a hell of a shot. Takayama held a press conference on 6/15 saying that he's a better puncher and a better kicker that Frye, but Frye is a better wrestler than he is.

The Bob Sapp vs. Kiyoshi Tamura match, on the other hand, is criminal. Even if Tamura wins, and I've talked with a few experts on this subject who believe Tamura has a chance (largely the idea he runs from him for ten minutes, Sapp gets tired and can't hold his gloves high and Tamura batters him at will in the latter half, and that is a possibility). Anyway, I'm betting strongly against that happening. The Silva vs. Filho match on the undercard is out, by the way, as Filho tore ligaments in his left knee on his final day of training in Brazil. Rumors at press time were that Alex Steibling would take his place, which is a good insiders match since Steibling bills himself as "The Brazilian Killa," which means just about every fighter in Brazil wants a crack at him.

Naoto Morishita did an interview on 6/18 saying that he had wanted Takashi Suguira ever since he started as a pro wrestler, but Mitsuharu Misawa would never allow it. Misawa finally allowed it for this show. He also defended the Tamura vs. Sapp match by claiming it was Tamura's idea for such a match.

Ken Shamrock should have little problem fighting Tito Ortiz for the light heavyweight title with a 205-pound weight limit. Shamrock has gone into the ring in his recent matches in Pride at 209-212 pounds. Ortiz cuts usually from about 220 down to 205 to make weight, and is back up by fight time, so it's actually more likely Ortiz will be the bigger of the two.

Royce Gracie, UFC's first superstar and biggest drawing card, was on Jeff Marek's non-wrestling sports talk show in Toronto and said that he's negotiating with UFC for a comeback, which would immediately make people think a match with Ken Shamrock would be part of the deal. Gracie and Shamrock fought twice, once in 1993 in the first UFC, which Gracie won quickly, and the second time they went to a 33:00 time limit draw in 1994 in a match with no judges (which Shamrock would have won had their been judges). Gracie never fought from the Shamrock match in 1994 until his two matches in 2001, wins over Nobuhiko Takada in a very weird ending (Takada basically just quit) and his famous loss to Kazushi Sakuraba in the classic 90 minute match when his family threw in the towel. In between, he did have a highly publicized 1998 submissions only match where he was easily choked out by Wallid Ismail in Rio de Janeiro.

Mark Coleman's doctor reported to DSE that he had nerve injury over a large osteophyte at the C-6 and C-7 level and that it wasn't recommended that he fight again without undergoing neck surgery."

That sure was lots, wasn't it! I suppose the amount of old Observer material each of our posts contain will decrease as the shows start running closer together, but until then, holy moly, right? Anyway, much to consider, as always! Thank you once again for your time and for you attention to these matters. I hope to speak with you again soon.