WE SPOKE SO RECENTLY AFTER OUR LONG ABSENCE FROM EACH OTHER'S LIVES (THOUGH NOT HEARTS) AND HAVE CAUGHT UP WITH ONE ANOTHER SO THOROUGHLY THROUGH THAT SHARED ENCOUNTER (why are we so afraid: to be known?) THAT IT I FEEL AS THOUGH THIS POST NEEDS NO PREAMBLE AND INSTEAD WE SHOULD DIVE RIGHT INTO THIS SEEMINGLY MUCH SHORTER PRIDE FC JUST IN TERMS OF HOW LONG THESE FILES THAT I HAVE ARE and oh wow a moment of silent prayer (黙祷 mokutō) in honour of those lost in the attacks of 11 September 2001 is asked of those gathered in Osaka-jō Hall (大阪城ホール / Ōsaka-jō Hōru). It was a strange time, to be sure, and I do not mean to speak critically of Stephen Quadros when I note his opening remarks here as anything other than emblematic of the strangeness of that strange time, but also, this is fairly wild: "Hi, my name is Stephen Quadros, and welcome to the Pride Fighting Championship's 'Beasts from the East.' We're here at the Osaka-jō Hall in Osaka, Japan. I'm here with my partner, Bas Rutten. I spoke to every single fighter competing tonight—we've got fighters from Japan, fighters from Brazil, fighters from Europe, fighters from the U.S.A.—they are all united in opposing these unlawful and cowardly acts that have been perpetrated against the citizens of the world. But the fighters are still gonna throw down!" To which Bas adds, "Oooooh yes they will!" A relief to us all, surely, that they will so throw (in the agreed upon best direction [down]), but there is also consolation to be had in the knowledge that the fighters are united in their opposition to these attacks, and we don't have, I don't know, Richardo Arona or Yoshiaki Yatsu, let's say, as nihilist accelerationists who favour thousands of murders over the alternative (of none). I would be sadder if that were true of either of those gentleman (haphazardly selected for this purely hypothetical proposition). In the language of the era, let us refuse to let the terrorists win and, instead, collect ourselves, and move ahead with our evening.
It is not for the first time, I don't think, that the haunting tones of NOU DRUMMER / HOLDER OF INTANGIBLE CULTURAL ASSETS OKURA SHONOSUKE are visited upon us, and my sincere hope is that neither shall it be the last. I like the braziers in the corners quite a bit, even if one has gone out (it's okay: nothing lasts, nothing is perfect, nothing is finished).
I claim no expertise in these matters but I think he's doing a good job! These sounds of old Japan call to mind the just excellent fact recently revealed to me that one of my judo students is also a student of the exquisite 尺八 shakuhachi, if you can believe it! This lovely fellow expressed to me the challenge of an entirely unfamiliar sense of tonality, having studied the violin for many years along European lines at home in China. Who knows what you'll get into ten-thousand kilometres from home, I guess! I have a great affection for a particular shakuhachi record that I would like to share with you now, and I would also like to mention that one day I sat in the parking lot outside of a grocery store I no longer go to (it occurs to me now that it has been literally years since I have been there) for the better part of an hour as the peerless Dalhousie University campus/community radio station CKDU played nothing but shakuhachi music with no explanation before or after. It was an experience I found to be, in the words of the occasional host of the two-hour Sunday-night bro-step block whose name I have never caught, weighty weighty (feel the weight of it).
A fine and simple parade of fighters (this is my favourite kind) appears before the lore-wise 大阪 Ōsaka crowd, who receive them eagerly. Bas seems particularly impressed by the reception of Don Frye, fighting for the first time in just over four years, but as Quadros is quick to note, Don has done a fair bit of professional wrestling in Japan during that interregnum. And indeed he has! For 新日本プロレスリング株式会社 / Shin Nihon Puroresuringu Kabushiki-gaisha / NEW JAPAN PRO WRESTLING specifically! And we have addressed ourselves to a small but worthy portion of those græpplingz in perhaps our least-read post: here it is now, from 3 September 2018, "TK SCISSORS LABOUR DAY SPECIAL: 小川直也 vs. ドン・フライ OGAWA NAOYA vs. DON FRYE"
I found those matches wildly exciting at that time, and reading about them again just now, I am honestly feeling pretty fired up! For those of you disinclined to "click thru" at present (no worries, I get it), I would like to partly quote a part from a part partly at the end, wherein I partly wrote (in part): "For more on both Don Frye and Naoya Ogawa please join me in the coming months and indeed probably years as I am now really pretty sure I'm going to go through all the PRIDE shows and there are actually kind of a lot of them, if you do literally every one, which I plan to do but at a pace that will certainly be 'at my leisure (please pronounce it 'leh-zhure' in this instance, thank you). Anyway Don Frye won a five-minute match by TKO and then got to lose to Antonio Inoki in 4:09 (an honour, obviously). THANKS EVERYBODY LET US ENJOY AUTUMN." I still mean every word of that. Those are things I wanted to say to you then, and again to you now.
Our first bout is a rematch the people simply demanded, presumably: Gary Goodridge, about whom we are often sad, will once again face 谷津嘉章 Yatsu Yoshiaki, about whom we have been sad, certainly, but far less frequently. You may recall the first one! From earlier! If so, you are ahead of me, because I do not, exactly, except for a generalized sense (of sadness). And so let us revisit it together! It seems to have taken place at PRIDE.11（プライド・イレブン）2000年10月31, at which time we explored it thus[ly]:
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THE AFOREMENTIONED 谷津嘉章 YATSU YOSHIAKI IS NOW BEFORE US and what can we say of him, in brief: Japanese wrestling Olympian at the 1976 Montréal Olympics, a games notable for being low-key æsthetic, first of all, but also for being the games competed at both by my first sensei Jorge Comrie (-93kg draw here) and "Bad News" Allen Coage (+93kg draw here); and later Yatsu tagged with Jumbo Tsuruta in All-Japan as a team called "The Olympics" (that's so great). There is a Meltzer bit from one of his Olympic-specials that I should just repost here, shouldn't I:
"Montreal, 1976: [. . . ] Yoshiaki Yatsu, at the time only 19 years old, represented Japan in the unlimited weight class in freestyle wrestling but failed to place. Yatsu turned pro after the boycotted 1980 Olympics, debuting in Madison Square Garden on December 29, 1980 against Jose Estrada. After a few years in the United States, he returned to Japan in 1984 a top worker. At his peak in 1985, he was probably one of the top five workers in the entire business. Because Yatsu was considered by Japanese amateur wrestling officials as the greatest superheavyweight the country ever produced, but his timing was bad, as he was too young in 1976, was expected to medal in 1980 but Japan boycotted the Olympics, and he went into pro wrestling without achieving his goals in amateur, he made a somewhat risky move going back into amateur wrestling in 1986, and easily captured the Japanese freestyle tournament breezing through the competition. However, in preparing for the Asian games and the 1988 Olympics, the International Olympic Committee struck him down, ruling that pro wrestling was a sport and by the bylaws at the time, he was ineligible for amateur competition. While Yatsu remained a star in All Japan, first as Riki Choshu's regular tag team partner and later as Jumbo Tsuruta's regular tag team partner called "The Olympics," the latter team holding the All Japan Double World tag team titles on five occasions over a two-year period as well as beating Bruiser Brody & Jimmy Snuka for the 1987 Real World Tag League tournament, he was never the performer in the ring he was before being struck down by the IOC. Yatsu quit All Japan in 1990 to join Super World Sports, and when that group folded, largely worked indies and a few New Japan matches, largely as part of Masa Saito's final run, after that point. In 1992, the IOC reversed its ruling and allowed pro wrestlers to compete in the Olympics (which is why Russia allowed Svetlana Gundrenko and later Aleksander Karelin to do pro wrestling in Japan and why Dan Severn, who still had Olympic goals at the time, went into pro wrestling), but by that point, Yatsu had suffered health problems and was 35 years old. Yatsu still wrestles and is the owner of the indie group, the Social Pro Wrestling Federation."
That's from the September 4, 2000 Observer (the Pride of our present writing is only the next month after! weird!). To wikipedia, now, to bring us up to speed on the years since:
"In recent years, Yatsu has been the president of a transportation company.[2] On November 30, 2010, he returned to the professional wrestling ring to wrestle his retirement match.[2] The match took place in front of 500 fans at Shinjuku Face in Tokyo, and saw Yatsu and Koji Ishinriki losing to Tatsumi Fujinami and Tiger Mask, when Yatsu submitted to Fujinami.[2] In September 2015, Yatsu came out of retirement and began competing for smaller promotions. In April 2019, he debuted for Dramatic Dream Team (DDT), but after a show on June 2, Yatsu's career may have ended a second time."
and:
"In 1991, at the age of 35, Yatsu was diagnosed with diabetes. On June 25, 2019, Yatsu underwent an operation to amputate his right leg below the knee, as bacteria had entered his bloodstream and his right toe was progressively necrotic.[3]"
and indeed:
"In December 2015, he became a supervisor for DEEP."
That part's neat at least!
I would add to that only, as my friend Cory shared with me (and I believe I may have in turn shared with you previously), that Yatsu now has a wrestling-specific prosthetic and, according to DDT Pro, is ready to go! As soon as things are able to once more go!
I would reiterate once again that this forty-four-year-old Yoshiaki Yatsu is very much loved in 大阪城ホール Ōsaka-jō Hōru circa October 2000 as he steps in the ring to face Gary Goodridge carrying, as Stephen Quadros rightly notes, a somewhat fatalistic look on his face. It quickly becomes apparent that Yatsu has no idea about striking at all (I say this in all sympathy, without an ounce of condemnation) and his only hope, if he can be said to have one, is to take Goodridge down, which he doesn't come especially close to, but when he ducks in (a little) and grabs a leg (a little) the crowd is so happy for him. Yatsu is felled by a low kick, but while down there grabs an ankle as though he were young Sakuraba (he is not). What a gamer though! The crowd just loves him, and if I may be so bold as to speak for the group for a moment, so do we. Yatsu, we're told, has trained three months for this match, and the first six weeks of that was all just cardio, no technical work. The uppercuts Yatsu is absorbing and walking away from right now are just shocking, and the crowd, as you might expect, are like HWAAAAAIIIIIIII. YATSU WITH THE SINGLE-LEG TAKEDOWN! HE DROPS BACK FOR SOME MANNER OF ASHI-KANSETSU THAT MAKES MAD THE GUILTY AND APPALLS THE FREE and nobody knows what kind of leg-lock it could actually be; the commentators are unclear on it and so am I (it may not be a thing). Oh dear, Gary Goodridge has escaped and delivered an illegal knee to the head (when did they bring those in permanently?); this is the last thing Yoshiaki Yatsu needs. That's a yellow card and a restart standing, and Goodridge unloads on Yatsu's poor bean (the bean of the human head) until the referee has no choice but to finally call it at 8:51. Wikipedia has this one down: "After spending multiple years out of the spotlight, Yatsu, aged 44, received a big money offer to fight for mixed martial arts promotion Pride Fighting Championships.[2] On October 31, 2000, Yatsu faced Gary Goodridge in Osaka.[2] Yatsu, who hadn't had any stand-up training at all and hadn't wrestled in 13 years, was defeated at 8:58 in the first round.[2] Despite being dominated, Yatsu received a standing ovation from the crowd due to the amount of damage he absorbed without quitting, even trying a leglock at a point.[2]" The cheers as he leaves the arena are moving to me.
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We should probably expect more of the same! It does appear that, betwixt and between these two bouts with Gary Goodridge, Yatsu also entered the +99kg division of the 2001 ADCC submission grappling competition (I see this as a very strange choice!) and lost on points to a then-young Ricco Rodriguez, who had all the world (of professional martial arts fighting [a blessedly minute component of the world in summa, but still] before him. What might Yatsu have gleaned from it? And will those gleanings manifest here? They do not, no, not really: this goes not unlike GOODRIDGE/YATSU ONE as it has come to be known in myth and legend, although this time around, Yatsu's corner throws in the towel about three minutes in. Yatsu did not seem to be in immediate danger at that precise moment, in the sense that he had just shot in for a low 朽木倒 kuchiki-taoshi ("dead tree drop") only to be met by Gary Goodridge's 前裸絞 mae-hadaka-jime (this is all perfectly familiar, as match-occurrences go), but in the medium-term, Yatsu was of course in radically immense danger (of being hit by Gary Goodridge). The replay reveals that Yatsu was motioning towards his corner to throw in the towel, a fairly ludicrous request (the mental contortions required to think it somehow face-saving to have your corner throw in the towel at your quite obvious [upon review] request [rather than simply signal 参った maitta through a tidy little taptaptap on your buddy] sure are something to consider!), but it's all for the good, as Yatsu, we are told spent two weeks in hospital after their first fight, so easy does it, everybody; easy does it.
An interesting segment follows in which OFFICIAL JUDGE OF PRIDE (and AMC Pankration fight-gym guy, and submission grappling trainer of Prince Sheik Tahnoun Bin Zayed Al Nayhan of Abu Dhabi) Matt Hume, backed by the spirited-but-never-attention-seeking musical genre of Corporate Training Funk, explains the idiosyncratic PRIDE scoring system for our education and enjoyment. I like this part, and will post a lot of images from it! Perhaps a tiresome amount of them! Hume explains that, for matches that do not end in the symbolic death of 一本 ippon, the principle judging criteria will be the earnest pursuit thereof (that said, let's keep the death of 一本 ippon nice and symbolic out there, boys; please be careful). Other areas of interest to our judges shall be "damage points," whether inflicted through 固め技 katame-waza (grappling techniques) or 当身技 atemi-waza (the dreadful art of hitting); "combinations and ground control" which are plainly two different things grouped together somewhat unartfully here but nevertheless; "takedown and [takedown] defense," understandably; "weight points," in that in bouts contested in fellowship between fellows whose mass differs by 10kg, the lighter of these two fellows shall be advantaged by a single point at the outset of each round (of their fellowship); and, also (not really "finally," in that I have changed the order of presentation here a little), "aggressiveness," which is not to be confused for our purposes here with the earnest pursuit of the symbolic death of 一本 ippon: as Matt Hume clarifies, "aggressiveness is a criteria that we use that is similar to 一本 ippon, however aggressiveness is in general, whereas 一本 ippon is specific aggressiveness to finish the fight," and actually that makes, like, a world of sense to me actually. The general guidelines for yellow cards are offered, too, in due course, both in terms of stalling (depicted: Mark Kerr atop Heath Herring), and "Intentional Rule Breaking" (depicted: Branko Cikatić grabbing the ropes whilst elbowing pitilessly). This segment was fantastic! Thank you, Matt Hume!
Among the several things TK SCISSORS: A BLOG OF RINGS constitutes, surely one of them is a chronicle of the strange path of 山本 宜久 Yamamoto Yoshihisa, a somewhat undistinguished martial artist (within the overall context of professional martial arts mixed fighting of the 1990s and 2000s; I certainly do not wish to be unkind towards him), who nevertheless holds the distinction of having gone nearly twenty minutes against Rickson Gracie, reputed by many to be, well, Rickson Gracie (I hasten to add that when I met Rickson Gracie briefly before the seminar I was graciously invited to participate in [at no cost], because of how our club had helped supply 畳 tatami [specifically the grey/green kind] for this really very large event, he was nice). It is worth noting, I believe, that of the twenty-three other times Yoshihisa Yamamoto lost by 一本 ippon in the context of mixed fighting, it happened more quickly, and, indeed, often much much more quickly, than it did against Rickson Gracie. We have addressed all of this previously, and in considerable detail; we have chronicled, too, how this showing against Gracie made Yamamoto's career, and also made it weird, as he adopted Gracie's style, both æsthetically and in terms of demeanour, for some good time after their contest at Vale Judo Japan 1995. If fact it got really weird in that respect to an extent that took me very much by surprise as we sounded the great depths of the RINGSbox. The Coles Notes, as we used to say, of the Yasuhisa Yamamoto story may well be that his somewhat frightened (I do not fault him, and say this in sympathy, not condemnation) rope-clinging, twenty-minute-or-so effort against Rickson Gracie cursed him with enough fame that he remained a viable booking for years and years longer than he was a viable professional fighter, as his 15W-26L-1D record, and the horrible beatings visited upon him throughout the long years it all took, both attest. Let's see what he's up to this time!
Let us welcome Assuerio Silva, victor by means of the 足関節技 ashi-kansetsu-waza of the inside heel hook in our previous PRIDE, who enters to techno that would be a credit to this the year of our lord 2023, and yet here it is more than two decades prior. Ah, okay: this match ends in a TKO eleven seconds after it began, and if anything it was stopped late. Poor, poor Yamamoto. Matt Hume, who had joined Stephen and Bas at ringside to explain the PRIDE scoring criteria in further detail throughout the match, notes that "there was definitely effort to finish the fight." I note Anderson Silva in Assuerio's Chute Boxe corner, emblematic of a simpler time (of that gym [and those guys]).
And now our old friend 松井 大二郎 Matsui Daijirō awaits Murilo Rua (here billed as "Murilo Ninja" [we are told it is an old nickname based on his childhood fondness for ninja movies {they can be quite sikk!}]), who enters to music no less indebted to club culture than that of his countryman and Chute Boxe training partner in the previous bout. Excuse me, Matsui comes out second; my mistake! Another mistake: Stephen Quadros mistakenly calls him Akira Shoji (it absolutely happens), but quickly corrects himself (it's all we can do). Shoji is seconded by 桜庭 和志 Sakuraba Kazushi, and is greeted warmly; Rua is cornered in part by Wanderlei Silva, and I am a little scared. Quadros reminds us that, prior to his decision loss to Ebenezer Fontes Braga, Daijiro Matsui (I initially wrote Akira Shoji! this is ridiculous!) holds a decision win over José Landi-Jons, another of Rua's training partners, so all are well known to each other here. The first round is a pleasure, marked by dynamic grappling exchanges in both 立ち技 tachi-waza and 寝技 newaza, and the Ōsaka crowd is so deeply into Matsui (MA-TSU-I! MA-TSU-I! they intone whenever feasible) that every movement is heightened, especially those brief moments in which Matsui remains grounded whilst Rua makes his feet, as these are the moments in which Rua visits truly horrific soccer kicks, stomps, and in one instance a spinning back kick upon their seated guy (whom they like). The first round ends with Matsui in all kinds of trouble from all of those awful things I have just now mentioned in the sentence that concluded previous to this one. Matt Hume, who remains at ringside, offers a running commentary to further clarify PRIDE scoring criteria, but the specific application proves far less rewarding than the suggestion of guiding principles we were offered earlier. Seemingly sunk and o'erwhelmed in a sea of troubles to end round one, Matsui looks entirely composed as round two begins, and yet it does not go well: despite the crowd's great enthusiasm for him, and the promise of his works, Matsui is hit so hard, and so many times. The inevitable finish comes early in round three, as Rua, still fresh as a daisy (think about how fresh that really is), slips off of Matsui's 払腰 harai-goshi / sweeping hip attack, kicks Matsui more or less in the eye, and that's that. I don't feel good about it at all. That was an unweeded garden by the end there, in that things rank and gross in nature possessed it merely. Exemplary sportsmanship follows from all concerned, but that was tough to see all the same.
Next we have Guy Mezger, and if you think his 90210 sideburns are something (honestly I take a catholic approach to all such matters, and admire anything and everything that can be said to constitute "a look" in any way), I would invite to behold the situation unfolding to either side of his Lion's Den 先生 sensei Ken Shamrock.
My inability to find Ken Shamrock even remotely interesting has entered its fourth decade now, I suppose, which is really quite a run (it would be strange to break the streak now, but who knows how any of this [by which I mean consciousness, broadly] will go). Mezger comes to the ring carrying an American flag as an accent piece atop his American flag t-shirt and shorts (they say "Fairtex" on them also [at least the shirt does]). His opponent is Ricardo Arona, who enters with a mixed fight record of 5W-1L, and I suppose we have seen all of them together, haven't we, as they have all been in RINGS, with wins over Andrei Kopylov, Jeremy Horn, 金原弘光 Kanehara Hiromitsu, and Gustavo Machado alongside a perfectly understandable (though as I recall, closely contested) decision loss to Фёдор Влади́мирович Емелья́ненко / Fyodor Vladimirovich Yemelyanenko / Fedor Vladimirovich Emelianenko. That's all pretty good! Also, it occurs to me that, although we associate Guy Mezger most closely with パンクラス PANCRASE (Yes, he is hybrid wrestlers)—or at least I do (I should probably not speak for the group!)—he really had quite a few PRIDE fights, didn't he: losses to Shoji, Sakuraba, Wanderlei Silva, and Chuck Liddell, with wins against Masaaki Satake, Alexander Otsuka, and Egan Inoue coming into this match. That's a bunch already! With more to come!
As Mezger and Arona stand clinched and straining in the corner, it occurs to me once again that they really didn't a whole lot of testing for performance-enhancing drugs in the PRIDE, did they? One's thoughts turn to Pawel Nastula's objection to his positive test for, let's see, "nandrolone as well as banned stimulants phenylpropanolamine, pseudoephedrine, and ephedrine," in which he made public his PRIDE contract that expressly stated he would not be tested for anything like any of those things, but the Nevada State Athletic Commission (this was a late-stage PRIDE show in Las Vegas) felt otherwise about that? But we'll get there! All in due time! For now, we bear witness to a first round in which Ricardo Arona would very much like to be in 寝技 newaza, whereas Mezger would very much like to stand and strike; and so they danced. Not a bad round by any stretch! But that's what was going on, for the most part.
And yet as Round Two begins, it is Guy Mezger who scores the first takedown with a fine 小外掛 kosoto-gake (minor) outside hook, and Arona, who seems eager to return to the feet and yet when he does so he is kicked in the head, yikes, maybe keep it on the mat, Arona. Ah yes, very good: Arona does so, and threatens with a 膝挫十字固 hiza-hishigi-juji-gatame knee-bar for a few moments, and this seems better for him. As the action slows, I will note that, midway through the first round, Stephen Quadros mentioned that Mezger finds himself unable to go on the internet for the purposes of #MartialArtsChat anymore, in that he finds himself overwhelmed by the negativity he encounters there. "The boards" certainly could be full of nonsense, even then! I imagine that Mezger, and in turn Quadros, would be speaking primarily of The Underground forum? It truly was a sewer, so it would all add up!
Coming out for our third and final round, Arona looks like has made his way through a solid warmup at the start of class, but nothing more than that, whereas Mezger looks dangerously exhausted. Arona's 小外掛 kosoto-gake (minor outside trip) scores effortlessly (easy for me to say!) as Mezger isn't fading so much as he has already faded, like he is a faded guy right now. I imagine Arona would be content to hang out between Mezger's legs and engage in periodic hitting while the remains minutes slip away (where do they go?), but should he wish to pass guard / enter 押さえ込み osaekomi it seems likely his great skill plus Mezger's weariness would equal exactly that. Arona, though, is ever cautious, by no means a poor trait in this line of work. He takes the split decision victory, Arona does, and I would say deservedly so, whereas Quadros and Rutten seem quite surprised, thought unupset. I think we can all agree that it was a close fight, and a pretty good one! Arona does a cool backflip that he ends in A Little Karate Pose.
小路晃 SHOJI AKIRA! FOR REAL THIS TIME! It isn't Daijiro Matsui! His little intro video is set to some excellent stock jungle / drum and bass. "Probably the truest warrior from the PRIDE fighting circuit," is how Quadros decides Akira Shoji, which explains the great affection the Ōsaka crowd directs towards this judo 四段 yondan throughout his 道着 dо̄gi'd entrance. I'm sure this is all very nice for him! I do worry, though that he is going to be kicked directly in the head by Semmy Schilt, who is really tall.
大内刈 OUCHI-GARI! THE MAJOR INNER REAP OF 大内刈 OUCHI-GARI! LET'S GO AKIRA SHOJI! I do feel for Schilt in a sense here, though: nobody is rooting for the giant; it is hard to be Goliath (emotionally, I mean; not actually [in the context of fighting people for money {air travel is probably a drag}]). Schilt does a fine job of reversing position with a well-timed hip-bump sweep just as Shoji moves from 胴抑え dо̄-osae (full guard, top) to 二重絡 niju-garami (half-guard) on his way towards 押さえ込み osaekomi. Maybe Schilt's super long arms will prove especially susceptible to 腕挫十字固 ude-hishigi-juji-gatame? Early returns, at least, suggest that no, this is probably not the case. We're five minutes into the ten-minute first round, and this has been pretty interesting! In time, the fighters are returned to the standing position, which probably augers poorly for Akira Shoji oh no here come the knees; my goodness. Quadros reminds us that Shoji has taken this fight as a late replacement for the injured Igor Vovchanchyn, who I cannot help but note is also pretty short. It is hardly the time to speak of that now, though, as it continues to be just an awful lot of knees, and Shoji looks pretty dispirited as he is asked to return to his feet. Yep, okay, a little over eight minutes in, the finish comes, and it is indeed knees, just the worst knees. Brutal.
In anticipation of their upcoming rematch (hey it's on our next show! oh no!), Wanderlei Silva and 桜庭 和志 Sakuraba Kuzushi address the crowd. Silva seems pretty intense, which, as you may well recall, was a significant portion of his deal. Saku is characteristically chill, and has the quiet confidence of a man who knows he is wearing the nicer shirt (it isn't even that Silva's is bad!).
Hey it is Don Frye, and as I have already linked to "TK SCISSORS LABOUR DAY SPECIAL: 小川直也 vs. ドン・フライ OGAWA NAOYA vs. DON FRYE" in this very same post we are every one of us engaged in at present, I will not belabour the matter of Don Frye generally, but I will note that Frye appeared in my timeline just the other day with this clip, in which he addresses matters concerning judo and Brazilian Jiu Jitsu about as tactlessly as anyone could possibly manage in 2023; his are the words, truly, of another time (the 1990s) and place (the aforementioned Underground Forum [a sewer]). Although, as my old friend Dave noted when this clip made the rounds, it feels like it's the first time in years Don Frye has completed a thought without uttering any slurs or dehumanizing anyone at all, really, so we should be thankful for that much, and encourage Don to pursue this direction further (proud of you, bro). He's in against Gilbert Yvel, who has attempted a flying knee before I was even able to finish typing the sentence that introduced him. You will perhaps recall him as an utter menace in RINGS? And also how he defeated Kiyoshi Tamura for the RINGS Openweight Championship and then showed up in PRIDE like six weeks later? (That was bad news for RINGS, certainly, but I am confident Yvel would have stuck around for an appropriate fee, had it been proferred.) His time in PRIDE has been up and down, and it is his "no contest" with Wanderlei Silva that is perhaps the most memorable (thunderous groin strikes). In this contest, Yvel receives a yellow card for a fairly deliberate-looking series of thumbs (and fingers! let's just say "digits") to the eyes. Soon thereafter, Yvel is offered once more the guidance and caution of 指導 shido, which looked at first like it may have been for grabbing the ropes to prevent a takedown, but referee 島田 裕二 Shimada Yūji's gestures suggest it was maybe for an illegal headbutt? Either way, he is one further 指導 shido away from a full-on 反則 hansoku. Whenever Yvel is not actively cheating, Frye does really well, clinching and twisting to the mat, and landing some fairly mighty knees once down there, like so:
Yvel doesn't do a very good job of following the referees instructions! I think that is something he should think more about later once he's settled down. Ah, and here it is, a disqualification win for Don Frye (in his first mixed fight in a little over four years) as the result of relentless, remorseless eye gouging, which is probably the worst kind of that. "Gilbert, settle down [thank you, yes, exactly—ed]. We can do it again, brother," are the comfortable words Don Frye speaks through the house microphone, at which point Yvel grabs that same microphone, unleashes several profanities, and is tremendously booed.
As we ponder <<le fait cinématographique>> of Mark Coleman, let us too ponder an observation made by Stephen Quadros late in our previous PRIDE show: to the extent that Antônio Rodrigo Nogueira enters this contest as the WORLD MEGA-BATTLE OPEN TOURNAMENT KING OF KINGS 2000 GRAND FINAL KING OF KINGS champion (or indeed king [detailed amidst our pages here]), and Coleman the surprising (at the time! it kind of was!) winner of the PRIDE GRANDPRIX 2000 決勝戦 (addressed here), the winner of this impending match really must be seen as just about as <<heavyweight championesque>> as is possible given the splintered legions of mixed fightsport (I shudder to even think who the UFC was running out there as its heavyweight champion at the time [ah well okay it was Randy Couture; fairplay! my mistake! {although let us also recall that Couture was finished by Valentijn Overeem in the WORLD MEGA-BATTLE OPEN TOURNAMENT KING OF KINGS 2000 GRAND FINAL KING OF KINGS semi-final}]). The great Mario Sperry (you get low, and you pooooosh, his VHS tapes wisely instructed) is in Nogueira's corner, and I believe I espy Josh Barnett in Coleman's. Everything about this bout, so far, is suggestive of it being neat.
And they're away! And clinching in the corner! That's the kind of thing I like, though I appreciate that tastes differ (you wouldn't believe how much time I spent clinching just last night [it was a big randori class {my hands are a mess today—oh hey, here is Keanu Reeves on judo hands, powerfully]). Nogueira briefly breaks the clinch to throw a number of what seem to me fairly quick and compact punches, though of course a true evaluation of such techniques is far beyond my expertise (such as it is). I am so struck (word play!) by a lovely image of Wanderlei Silva looking on with a settled calm that I feel compelled to share it with you even though it is, superficially, merely an image of two mean leaning:
Silva is on the far right of the image, and just above the middle of it, in case you are someone who is unable to identify Wanderlei Silva at a distance, and are yet somehow a reader of this weblog (this possibility feels vanishingly minute).
We are now several minutes into this really-very-interesting-to-me match, and perhaps surprisingly (consider which guys it is), it has all been contested standing! Just as I share this observation with you, Nogueira swings and misses with a right high kick, but slips, and Coleman dives right in betwixt his legs. A dangerous place to be! And yet Coleman is dauntless. He tries a little 首挫 kubi-hishigi "can opener" neck cranking to loosen things up a little, but Nogueira is happy enough to open his guard, as it allows for rad things, like raising his hips with an eye towards 腕挫十字固 ude-hishigi-juji-gatame, reaching across to attempt the 逆腕緘 gyaku-ude-garami often called "Kimura" in tribute to the great 木村 政彦 Kimura Masahiko (let's pause for a moment to admire a low-resolution but lovely picture of Kimura with the late great Doug Rogers, who passed July 20, 2020, in Vancouver, BC . . .
. . . and, for those of us so inclined, we could maybe even revisit a local news report detailing Rogers' 2011 visit to Sensei Bill Anderson's Halifax Judo Academy training out of the University of King's College gymnasium [you may even catch stray glimpses of your correspondent, then a much younger man, first chatting amiably with Big Mike [great guy] behind Judo NS President Jack Cameron, then low-key Hindu squatting over Sensei Rogers' right shoulder, and, finally, seated with two of his own students at the end of the mats, listening intently, not long before tears came to Doug Rogers' eyes as he spoke of his memories of Kimura Sensei [the only way he spoke the name to us], and what those memories had come to mean to him in the many years since. A true blessing to have been there that night. I remain grateful for it).
BUT LET US NOT LOSE OURSELVES TO REMINISCENCE AS THE ACTION CONTINUES VERY MUCH IN THE PRESENT BY WHICH OF COURSE I MEAN THE PAST BUT OF COURSE THE PAST IS WHERE LITERALLY EVERYTHING THAT HAS EVER HAPPENED WENT DOWN AND AN ESTIMABLE AND DISTINGUISHED SCIENCE EDUCATOR RECENTLY MENTIONED TO ME OVER DINNER THAT THIS IS THE CRUCIAL FIRST STEP TO TRULY UNDERSTANDING PHYSICS AS A DISCIPLINE AND IT IS POSSIBLE I AM INADVERTANTLY MISREPRESENTING THIS IDEA BECAUSE I TOOK NO FURTHER PHYSICS AFTER MY FIRST YEAR OF UNIVERSITY STUDY THOUGH I SOMETIMES THINK I WOULD LIKE TO COMPLETE MY ASTRONOMY/ASTROPHYSICS DEGREE AS A RETIREMENT PROJECT WOULDN'T THAT BE A LOVELY THING TO DO but before any of that we must address ourselves to the relentless threat posed by the glorious 寝技newaza of Antônio Rodrigo Nogueira. An up-kick causes Coleman to stagger back momentarily and then fall into a fine 表三角絞 omote-sankaku-jime (forward-facing triangle choke) attempt that Coleman does well to evade through posture and, crucially, composure.
This is really great is the thought foremost in my mind as these two fine competitors are stop-don't-move-stop-don't-move repositioned towards the middle of the stately ring (though it cannot match the peerless sky blue of Fighting Network RINGS, the white PRIDE canvas is itself a truly classic look). Hey I wonder why Nogueira is minorly harassing Coleman with little pitter-pat punches to distract him about how he is low-key securing his right wrist haha oh no I do not as it is triangle time and I hope you are ready for an excess of pictures of it:
You will note that the finish comes not from the 絞め技 shime-waza strangulation technique of 三角絞 sankaku-jime but instead the 関節技 kansetsu-waza joint-locking technique (or "bone-locking" as it is oddly yet ideally translated in Illustrated Kodokan Judo [Kodansha Press, 1955]) of 腕挫三角固 ude-hishigi-sankaku-gatame, the triangle armbar. Coleman taps first Nogueira (a little) and then referee Yuji Shimada (a lot). Quadros and Rutten state definitively, and certainly I believe correctly, that this win positions Antônio Rodrigo Nogueira as the top heavyweight mixed fighter in all of that (mixed fighting). Who could doubt it! Certainly not me, circa 9/24/2001, that's for sure! We are left with the deeply poetic images of one Mark Coleman fading into another, and then of Antonio Inoki just sitting there.
What a lot of fun that one was! I suppose we could just leave it there but I do that we would be remiss were we not to consider WHAT DAVE MELTZER HAD TO SAY:
October 8, 2001:
Our "ctrl+f 'Pride'" method yields the following top-notch パンクラス PANCRASE update:
"Pancrase drew a sellout of about 4,500 on 9/30 at Yokohama Bunka Gym for its eighth anniversary show headlined by Sanae Kikuta beating Ikuhisa Minowa to win the vacant light heavyweight championship by dominating him to win via second round knockout. They also held two rounds of a tournament to create the new heavyweight champion (last champ Semmy Schiltt left for UFC and Pride) and the tournament came down to Pancrase original Yoshiki Takahashi vs. Katsuhisa Fujii. The two are scheduled to meet for the championship on 12/1 in the same building, although Takahashi had his eye attacked by Marcelo Tiger (causing a DQ) in the semifinals on this show, and was injured, severity unknown. Apparently it was a great show. The theme is that Minowa is now the star of Minoru Suzuki's camp, which has the original pro wrestling tie-in and calls themselves pro wrestling based MMA, making them babyfaces against Kikuta, who represented anti-pro wrestling MMA. Kikuta was the heavy favorite to win, although Minowa had 90% of the support, which tells you what the majority of the audience wants. They did something of what in U.S. circles would be considered a legends match with one of the original founders, Minoru Suzuki (who started as a highly touted pro wrestler with New Japan and later UWF) facing Takaku Fuke, another Pancrase original who came from worked pro wrestling. The match was done under 1993 rules, which were the old pro wrestling rules they used at the beginning when starting the first non-predetermined pro wrestling promotion in the modern world, with rope breaks. Suzuki went over."
and
"Don Frye wants to face Gilbert Yvel in a rematch as soon as his torn quad heals up. Yvel has said he's willing to fight Frye as well. Frank Shamrock looks to be fighting on the Pride 11/3 Tokyo Dome show as mentioned last week. He did a radio interview and talked about possibly facing Dan Henderson. That is only a rumor and Pride hasn't even suggested an opponent for him yet and I don't believe a contract has been signed but he has publicly mentioned planning to fight on that show several times. At the UFC show, Allan Goes was telling people he had signed to face Shamrock on 11/3."
October 15, 2001:
DAVE GETS TAPE:
"After watching the New Japan PPV the previous week, the difference was astounding watching the Pride PPV which was held on 9/24 at Osaka Castle Hall and airs on 10/13 on PPV in the U.S. (only to those with satellite dishes) and 10/20 on Viewers Choice-Canada.
The atmosphere difference was like night-and-day. The New Japan crowd in Nagoya, traditionally the company's best city, was dead. Japanese crowds do have a reputation as being quieter, although my experience is that it isn't so much quieter, but different, in reacting. Generally speaking, they are more intense into a good match. You don't see crowds walking out in the middle of matches to get food, or paying no attention to matches, as crowds in the U.S. do for matches they've decided ahead of time not to be interested in. But New Japan was Baton Rouge Raw level of dead. Pride was the opposite.
When Yoshiaki Yatsu came out in the opener, they reacted to him much better than in the days when he was a superstar pro wrestler in the 80s. His opponent, in the opening match, Gary Goodridge, who admittedly is among the most charismatic of the Pride fighters, got a reaction that was equivalent to a Terry Gordy or a Jumbo Tsuruta (as in, not quite Stan Hansen or Bruiser Brody) for a big show in the glory days of All Japan wrestling.
The show was more action-packed than the last UFC, which wouldn't be hard. But this product couldn't fly in the United States. In particular, the Murilo Ninja (Murilo Ray) vs. Daijiro Matsui match, while applauded by those into true anything goes combat, was too brutal, particularly the field goal kicks to the head and stomps on the face by Ninja, to ever be allowed in a commission state. In addition, there is no way they would ever allow Semmy Schiltt, at 6-11 and 257 pounds, against Akira Shoji, all of 5-7 and 200 pounds, even if it did make an entertaining visual.
The show was middle ground for a Pride event. It wasn't on the level of most of the previous shows, but it had a good main event, no bad matches as far as being boring although the opener wasn't good, and I think most would consider it a thumbs up show.
Goodridge vs. Yatsu was a rematch of a bout that was one of the most brutal in company history one year earlier. Yatsu, and 80s pro wrestling star and former 1976 Olympian in wrestling, now 45, showed an unbelievable ability to take punishment in the previous fight, which made it legendary in Japan, and scary as well, considering his age. It was clear this was a different Yatsu, in just for the payday, looking for the first chance to get out. Because of all the injuries suffered in the previous match, he seemed to have no intention of doing it again. He seemed to go in with the idea he couldn't take Goodridge down at his age, so only made half-hearted attempts. He ate a few shots, shot in, and Goodridge caught him in a guillotine. He motioned to his corner to throw in the towel, as if it was a pre-planned strategy, which they did.
Assuerio Silva destroyed former RINGS wrestler Norihisa Yamamoto in a legit 11 seconds. The highlight for the Japanese audience was Yamamoto coming out to Akira Maeda's old music, which got a huge reaction. Yamamoto got decked and cut with a right to the eye, and then on the ground took 10 unanswered punches before it was over.
Ninja was scary in his brutality, stopping the previously unstoppable Matsui. Ninja dominated, and it probably should have been stopped late in the first round after punches, knees and a brutal stomp on the head. Matsui was bleeding real bad from the nose. He took more of a pounding in the second round, ending with eggs under both eyes and his face totally messed up. After some knees, sick kicks and stomps, it was stopped at 50 seconds of the third round. If you're into brutality, you'll find it a great match. If you're into it as sport, you'll hate this for the barbarism.
Ricardo Arona's win over Guy Mezger was a very close split decision. First round was standing, with Mezger mainly as the aggressor. Arona made it close landing a flurry 9:00 in. Second round was close again, with Mezger maybe having a slight advantage. Third round was Arona's solidly, as he got the top position and hammered a tired Mezger till the time ran out.
Schiltt vs. Shoji looked ridiculous, but Shoji deserves credit for lasting 8:00 against a guy with such a reach advantage. Shoji took him down immediately, but his advantage was short-lived. Mainly Schiltt catching him with knees, putting him down once at 7:00, and finally putting him away with a knee and punch combination.
The pro wrestling content of the show was the Inoki interview, which got the exact same late 2000 "Rock reaction" that he pretty much always gets. They also did an in-ring joint interview with Vanderlei Silva and Kazushi Sakuraba to build up their Tokyo Dome match on 11/3. Silva spoke in Portuguese, so I've got no idea what he said, but his delivery was tremendous. Sakuraba is a riot anyway. Segment got a great reaction. It's really a shame they are doing this match, because Sakuraba is so marketable, and he's probably going to lose again because he's just giving up too much size and firepower. As a draw, Sakuraba has so much more going for him than Silva, but I'm sensing he's going to turn out now like Kiyoshi Tamura, a really talented super charismatic guy, whose career burned out early because he fought too often against bigger guys and took too much punishment. The fighters of today are too good to give away 20 pounds against a top name.
Don Frye vs. Gilbert Yvel was at least interesting. It wasn't a great match, but it was intense. Frye was nearly in tears when they played the "Star Spangled Banner" as his entrance music. It was clear that Yvel was way too quick for Frye on their feet, but Frye has incredible guts in the ring. Yvel got his eyes for the first yellow, so at this point Frye's eyes were all red, he wasn't seeing well and his quad was torn. Frye heated up like a pro wrestler and came back with a head-butt, clearly not accidental, as retaliation, as they were clinched in the corner, and didn't get a yellow card, which caused Yvel to freak. Totally out of control at this point. Yvel blamed the ref. Frye took him down and started punching. Yvel surprisingly reversed it and got up, but Frye took him down again. After Yvel got up and nailed Frye with some shots, Frye went for another takedown. After being warned and two yellow cards (he got a second earlier for hooking the ropes to avoid going down), Yvel again hooked the ropes trying to avoid going down and since it was his third card, he was DQ'd. Yvel was mad, because he dished out more than he took and Frye, being older and carrying so much mass on his not that large frame, was getting tired quicker. Yvel appeared to have the best chance to win, although with Frye's mentality, it's not a cliche to say you can never count him out. He screamed about always getting "f***ed" and shoved the ref. Unlike in our previous report, there was nothing post-match involving them other than Frye telling Yvel they could fight again. Definitely heated and entertaining while it lasted, but unsatisfying ending. Probably good to build up a rematch, though.
Main event with Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira over Mark Coleman was pretty much as described. Nogueira was dominating the stand-up, much to Coleman's surprise. Nogueira missed on a kick and lost his balance, causing Coleman to pounce on top. Coleman threw some punches but Nogueira tried one triangle, Coleman escaped, got a second, and when he tried to escape he left his arm behind and got armbarred. Nogueira looked super impressive and it was quite a decisive performance in a match which many felt would determine who the best heavyweight in the world is."
and:
"Here is the basics of the Japanese political situation involving K-1, Pride and New Japan. K-1 promoter Kazuyoshi Ishii is concerned they are losing the casual fan audience to Pride because of the magical box office of pro wrestler vs. non-wrestler in a true shoot that Pride builds around. Right now, three Japanese networks (Fuji, Nippon TV and TBS) are interested in Pride because of the feeling it'll be the next K-1 phenomenon. Inoki, of course, is playing all three sides of the fence, K-1, Pride and New Japan, using his power in K-1 and Pride to manipulate New Japan. Inoki's game is just to control and gain as much power for himself to manipulate everything since he's the master manipulator, but even though his decisions are usually not good for business, he did manage to make Kazuyuki Fujita and Tadao Yasuda somewhat legit pro wrestling stars this year through using them in Pride, which both killed and revived Kendo Ka Shin's career. Insiders aren't high on Naoya Ogawa, but to the general public, he's really famous as the closest thing to a modern Antonio Inoki in pro wrestling and is all over television as a big star. The New Japan people would rather not deal with Ogawa, but TV-Asahi wants him because he means ratings. Fujinami will always defer to Inoki at the end. With four different bookers, nobody is really the boss and it's WCW-like chaos. Muto and Chono are using their association with All Japan to manipulate what they want, and Inoki still hates the idea that New Japan does business with All Japan because he lived the old war (probably the same reason that even though it was good for business, ultimately, Vince McMahon couldn't put over WCW as a separate entity without involving his kids and Austin and making it WWF)."
Anderson Silva news and notes:
"Some changes in the 11/2 UFC show. The Carlos Newton vs. Anderson Silva [oh thank goodness, imagine what would have become of poor Carlos! we love that guy!—ed.] match has fallen through, and Newton will instead face Matt Hughes. While Pat Miletich, as the ex-champ who scored a big comeback win, would seem the obvious contender, the idea was not to do two rematches as the top two matches since Couture vs. Rizzo is also a rematch. Since Miletich had a tough time getting down to 169, they are likely going to slot him as a possible contender for Dave Menne at 185. The Silva situation was more of the contract problems. Silva's manager, Rudimar Fedrigo, signed a deal with UFC before Silva beat Hayato Sakurai and made his name. But after the win, he was brokered to Pride, who offered a lot more than UFC and Silva himself signed with Pride. Pride backed off at first when UFC claimed he'd previously made the deal with them. Fedrigo then tried to claim that while he signed, he didn't have power of attorney for Silva, even though he claimed he had when he signed. Even last week, Fedrigo had told UFC they had agreed to deal and would sign the contract for the fight itself in specific, but never sent in the contract on 9/28, and later claimed they didn't like the exclusive nature of it and backed out. Joe Silva said UFC may take legal action against them if they fight elsewhere over the first contract. Bobby Hoffman is now official as Josh Barnett's opponent in a heavyweight match which looks good on paper. Igor Zinoviev suffered an injury, so Evan Tanner's new opponent is Homer Moore, who has a 17-0 record in smaller events and is a wrestler who is said to look like Kevin Randleman's stunt double who has a wild stand-up style. 1996 Olympic silver medalist Aleksei Medvedev pulled out of his dark match due to an injury so Roberto Traven faces Frank Mir, a local Vegas fighter."
and:
"Nobuhiko Takada vs. Mirco Cro Cop (Filipovic) was officially announced for the 11/3 Tokyo Dome show. It is probably a ticket selling match due to Takada's pro wrestling popularity from the early 90s. Takada is now 39, and has fought many times in Pride, but has never won a legitimate match. Although Takada has some kick boxing training, at his age and skill level, no way can he stand with Cro Cop for any length of time. Theoretically he should be better on the ground, but that's an unknown since fighters generally speak of Takada privately as if he's a joke and he's old now to boot. From a booking standpoint, it would be a second strong win for Cro Cop to build up a rematch with Kazuyuki Fujita which will draw big money. If Takada wins, the Fujita rematch won't mean nearly as much. Because he's taking the 11/3 booking, Cro Cop was pulled from the 10/8 K-1 tournament, which theoretically was his final chance to qualify for K-1 Grand Prix tournament finals on 12/8 at the Tokyo Dome. They're keeping Cro Cop out of the Grand Prix so nobody beats him and will likely go with Cro Cop vs. Fujita in a rematch to headline the 12/31 show that Antonio Inoki is putting on, which makes sense because it's a K-1 vs. Inoki theme, plus it's at Saitama Super Arena which is the building their first match took place in. Also, some talk of Mario Sperry vs. Assuerio Silva for 11/3."
BOB SAPP news masquerading as Sam Greco news:
"Sam Greco, who had been training at the Power Plant in WCW since debuting with the company on the Australia tour, is back working for K-1 but training mainly in groundwork. They've also signed former WCW developmental wrestler Bob Sapp, all 370-pounds of him, to train him for K-1, which figured since they introduced him at the Las Vegas show for no apparent reason. Sapp, a few of you may recall, was involved in one of the worst interviews ever on Thunder, when Lenita Erickson talked with him, in his first appearance, as if he was Randy Savage and we all knew him, about a match with Refrigerator Perry (on the FX Tough Man show) like it was the Wrestlemania main event and we all knew about it. The idea is to make Greco into another ringer, to have him able to defend on the ground, and use his stand-up skill for the Pride vs. K-1 shoot feud. If Greco can compete on the ground, he'd be a huge draw because he has a lot of charisma and he was one of the most popular K-1 fighters in its glory days because of his wide open style."
also, from New Japan's 10/8 "INDICATE OF NEXT" Tokyo Dome show:
"3. Gary Goodridge defeated Michiyoshi Ohara in 3:36. They are trying to get Ohara over as a shooter. Ohara got a lot of early offense including a knockdown right away. Goodridge made the comeback from the mount with a lot of punches before getting the choke in, and the ref stopped it. This win was payback for Goodridge doing the job for Manabu Nakanishi on the PPV.
4. Kendo Ka Shin (Tokimitsu Ishizawa) won the IWGP jr. title from Masayuki Naruse in :26. Ka Shin came out without his mask and was attacked, but made a quick comeback and got the quick armbar to win the title. This continued the huge Ishizawa push ever since his Pride win over Ryan Gracie."
October 25, 2001:
"[新日本プロレスリング株式会社 / Shin Nihon Puroresuringu Kabushiki-gaisha / New Japan Pro Wrestling] are doing a four-man one-night tournament with Sasaki, Yuji Nagata, Manabu Nakanishi and Tadao Yasuda as the PPV main event on 10/28 in Fukuoka. The bracketing won't be announced until the day of the show. This replaces the cancelled Nagata vs. Don Frye match. The tournament winner will go into a three-way with Fujita and Naoya Ogawa as things stand now as the main event on 1/4 at the Tokyo Dome (so it appears Ogawa won't be doing Inoki's New Years Eve big show). Boy that's a real break in Japanese tradition to do a three-way as a Dome main event, especially since it's a three-way with worked shoot style and thus a contradiction in many ways. Frye signed a three-match deal with Pride but will be allowed to work New Japan shows as well, but his New Japan contract has expired."
more from New Japan, which is impossible to speak of in this period without reference to PRIDE (you may have heard about this!), and so a surprising amount of Dave's PRIDEtalk actually occurs in the context of NJPWtalk (I am of course here for all of it [so say . . . we all?]:
"10/8 TV show from a 90-minute special from the Tokyo Dome. Kind of had a 50th anniversary of pro wrestling theme to the show and aired a lot of old clips. Seemed from TV to be a good, but not great show. They showed a lot of historical clips, mainly based around New Japan's history in the 70s and 80s (they did show Rikidozan and some Baba clips, but no Jumbo Tsuruta or the 90s All Japan stars or even Tenryu). It's really clear from watching it that while this show drew good numbers, it just came across that pro wrestling was something in Japanese culture that peaked in the 80s, which from a TV standpoint, is the case. All the memorable clips seemed to be from the prime time network days with Inoki, Fujinami, Akira Maeda, Seiji Sakaguchi, the original Tiger Mask, Riki Choshu and Nobuhiko Takada as the featured Japanese and Tiger Jeet Singh, Abdullah the Butcher, Stan Hansen, Bruiser Brody, Hulk Hogan and Andre the Giant as the featured foreigners. Interesting that they didn't go back to Lou Thesz and Karl Gotch like they usually do. Watching clips of Andre, which was important on this show because of the debut of The Giants tag team, you could see he had a girth and thickness and a feel of inhuman power that Show and these giants don't have, even though Singh has a muscular physique. Andre was not the athlete legend probably has made him to be and his great matches were few, he had tremendous innate ability of how to work an almost perfect style for himself, which none of his giant followers can even come close to. Giants Singh & Silva beat Tanahashi & Inoue & Yoshie & Suzuki. They came out to Andre's old Japanese music and were continually referred to as Heisei Andre's (which translated, and I don't know Japanese at all, I think means like modern day version of Andre). They aren't and won't be the draws he was, but this was acceptable. Singh did no sell spots. He looked green but not awful and Silva looked better than his previous TV bouts. *. They showed clips of Inoki's famous MMA (all worked except Ali) matches with Willem Ruska, Muhammad Ali and Willie Williams as well as Maeda's match with Don Nakaya Neilsen (probably the best of the super famous mixed matches in history) to set up the Fujita vs. Sasaki match. Ogawa, Murakami and Yasuda all came out with Ogawa cutting a promo to a big pop and then leaving when everyone wanted to come after him. No matter what insiders think, the general public clearly sees Ogawa as a major superstar even though he seems to never wrestle. Nakanishi also came out during this to go after Ogawa. Sasaki vs. Fujita was the worked shoot style and really good for what it was. Sasaki got a huge pop coming out for his first match back since April with his new look and shootfighter style. Match was just super stiff with the punches, even to the head. Sasaki did a stiff lariat at the bell but the crowd didn't seem to really buy his Power strangle as a submission anymore, at least not big. Big pop for a german suplex by Sasaki because it was in context of a shoot style. Both guys threw real hard punches and forearms and crowd got into it like a shoot. Fujita did a sidewalk slam and threw the Pride knees from side mount. Funny that Fujita's headlock, because it has beaten people in Pride, was more over than Sasaki's Power Strangle, that has had something like ten years of TV. Sasaki did an STO into an armbar as well as the old Masa Saito prison deathlock from the 80s. Sasaki was grounding and pounding real stiff, when Fujita threw real hard punches from the bottom, causing Sasaki to lose his position, and Fujita kept punching hard from the top till the ref stopped it. ***1/2 for the style they were doing. Even though he won, Fujita was carried out by Yasuda and with stiffness like that, nobody felt disappointed it only went 6:36. This was not the pro wrestling we know in this country and you have to be a Pride fan to understand the psychology, but match got over real big. But it's a style you can't do very often and can't do at house shows or regular TV tapings. They showed clips of Funks vs. Backlund & Fujinami. Funks came out with Dory's Florida protege Adam Windsor and got a huge pop. All that aired on TV was everyone doing their signature 80s spots and crowd knew all of them and seemed to enjoy the match a lot. It was really nice to see the respect the fans had for these guys. They showed clips of finishes of the rest of the matches except the main event. Couldn't really tell much other than the entire Kendo Ka Shin vs. Masayuki Naruse (all 26 seconds) IWGP jr. title change aired. Ka Shin came out with no mask, and they didn't pop for him surprisingly. Naruse did his moves right away including the spinning back chop and looked bad, and then Ka Shin got the flying armbar. But the place went nuts for the tap and title change and seemed like they were super into Ka Shin after the bout. Crowd was also into the finish of Nakanishi vs. Yasuda. Main event with Nagata & Akiyama vs. Muto & Hiroshi Hase was the typical old style slow build match. They aired about 16:00 of it. Typical Muto match where halfway through you're going, what's the fuss, this is nothing, and then by the end you think it's great. I'd give it ***3/4. Crowd was more into the Fujita-Sasaki style than the old psychology, but it did work and these four built an excellent match. I think at Budokan, this would have been considered a classic because of how well it was put together. Muto seemed to blow out his left knee several minutes before the end, doing a moonsault and not getting the right spring and landing with his knees on Akiyama's stomach which looked to really hurt. Because of the injury, Muto looked bad for a few minutes. Hase came in and saved the day, including a four german suplex spot on Nagata for a near fall. Hase and Nagata really carried it down the stretch. Muto did almost a Jeff Hardy poetry in motion of Hase's back but hitting Nagata with the wizard knee. After a lot of great submission spots that worked, Nagata pinned Hase after two back suplexes."
and
"OTHER JAPAN NOTES: The Battlarts promotion is the latest in jeopardy after its 10/14 biggest show of the year at Tokyo Bay NK Hall didn't draw well. The company announced its final show would be on 10/26 except for some spot shows already contracted for as part of entertainment at popular boat races. All the wrestlers would become free agents at that point. There has been talk they'll re-start next spring, but at this point that's only talk. The show drew about 2,500 fans (announced at 4,868) because the focal point of the show, the idea of bringing shootfighters into pro wrestling, has been done to death. Main event was a former K-1 fighter called Muhammad Ali beating president Yuki Ishikawa when Ishikawa's second threw in the towel. Quinton Jackson of Pride fame with the last Sakuraba fight beat Alexander Otsuka in what was billed as a Pride rules match when the doctor stopped the match. I haven't seen tapes yet, but from the description, these two main events may have been legit. Ali vs. Ishikawa was one-sided, with Ishikawa once getting close with an armlock, but he took 43 punches over seven rounds in what was described as a boring match before his seconds threw in the towel. Jackson low blowed Otsuka twice in the first round getting yellow cards, but eventually got the mount and started punching and kneeing Otsuka's face including breaking his nose and there was blood everywhere. Dos Caras Jr., who made a name winning a shoot match this summer, beat former Pride guy Kazunari Murakami via DQ when Murakami unmasked him. Bas Rutten, in his second pro wrestling match, in a bout billed as under UWF rules, beat Carl Malenko with a liver kick as the finisher, Tadao Yasuda beat Mohammed Yone in 1:26 and Daijiro Matsui of Pride beat Shannon Ritch (who was Frank Shamrock's recent opponent in K-1) with an STF. Yasuda and Caras were said to be the most over."
小川 直也 Ogawa Naoya news is inherently PRIDE news:
"Naoya Ogawa's opponent on the 10/25 Zero-One PPV from Budokan Hall will be Josh Dempsey. Anyway, this Dempsey is a former UPW guy that trained in Southern California who is actually the grandson of the famous boxer, but reports we've heard when he did wrestle last year were terrible. He's has boxed as a heavyweight, and reputedly was once ranked in the IBF ratings (which have been exposed as being totally corrupt) and done one shootfight with King of the Cage. Takayama vs. Otani, Tom Howard vs Bruiser Alfalo (a guy from the L.A. boxing gym that Antonio Inoki has ties to who has never done a pro match--why Zero-One brings in guys like this on PPV when there are so many people out there who could have a better match with Howard and help get him over is beyond me) and Tatsuhito Takaiwa vs. Yoshiaki Fujiwara were also added to the show which also has Noahiro Hoshikawa vs. Mikey Henderson, Kohei Sato vs. Nazuki Okubo (Kiyoshi Tamura protege), Masato Tanaka vs. Humbert Numrich (former huge K-1 guy), Mark Kerr vs. Dick Vrij (major RINGS star in early 90s) and Hashimoto vs. Gerard Gordeau as the main event. Even with Ogawa appearing, because he's against a no-name, and because people have seen Gordeau do enough pro matches over the years to where he's no novelty, there is no advance."
DAVE GETS [ENGLISH LANGUAGE] TAPE:
"Once again, due to post production, English language interviews and commentary and also better sound quality where you can hear the punches and kicks making the fights more compelling, the American version of the Pride PPV show was far more entertaining than the Japanese version for an English language fan. It was a really strong show, more if you're a fan of Pride as pro wrestling than as a straight sport. UFC is the more sports-like of the two, while Pride has stronger personalities, more babyface vs. heel stuff and the freak show element like when 5-6 Akira Shoji faced 6-11 Semmy Schiltt in a match that UFC would never put on. The negative is that Pride is so obscure to the casual fan because nobody knows what it is, that even if the shows were tons better than UFC every time out (and it was a lot better this time out), it's not going to make any difference at this point. And for the hardcore fan, the problem is airing the shows three weeks late on PPV isn't going to lead to a lot of buys either. On the DirecTV preview, they advertised this as the return of Frank Shamrock, which was blatant false advertising since Shamrock was never booked on the show and nobody seemed to have an explanation as to why. Also, in the category of what the show was, it was listed as pro wrestling and not MMA, and of course, Pride is something of a hybrid of both. The time delay was weird, because the first part of the show was so heavily talking about the events of 9/11, which when the show was taped, were on the forefront of everyone's mind, but now it's three weeks later. They had all the North American fighters (Don Frye, who was a firefighter before becoming a fighter and pro wrestler wearing a "terrorists suck" t-shirt, Gary Goodridge, Mark Coleman and Guy Mezger) comment and they came off similar to most of the WWF wrestlers on 9/13. They had a Japanese speech by President Naoto Morishita, which was obviously 180 degrees different from that of Vince. The show closed with a Frye interview about the events of 9/11 which turned out to be something along the effects of we're gonna find those guys and rip their balls off speech. Frye vs. Gilbert Yvel came off as a total babyface (Frye) vs. heel match which garnered awesome emotion like old-time pro wrestling. Yvel was a heel from the start, first doing an interview where he called others fighters cowards because they always take him down rather than stand with him, and then, once the match started, flagrantly violating the rules from attacking Frye's eyes and holding the ropes to avoid a takedown, crying about it whenever a foul was called, shoving the ref, and finally throwing a temper tantrum and going on the mic and swearing when he was finally DQ'd, which in reality was a call that should have come several minutes earlier. I don't know what his problem was, but with Frye having the torn quad, limiting his leg strength and making it difficult to keep Yvel grounded, and Yvel's far superior stand-up, it was a fight Yvel should have won. Steven Quadros, in doing interviews, was again trying to push future matches, in particular Frye vs. Coleman (a rematch of a 1996 UFC fight which Coleman won which is Frye's only MMA loss) and they showed the Vanderlei Silva-Kazushi Sakuraba interview even though it was in Portuguese and Japanese and pushed it as the main event on the next show. They kept talking about 11/3 at the Tokyo Dome, but to their credit, for the first time, they actually had the next PPV date, as a graphic kept airing on the show saying "Pride: Chaos" on 11/24, again a three week tape delay. One thing I like about the announcers is they talk freely about pro wrestling and, while they acknowledge its predetermined nature, always put over the heart and skill of the wrestlers that come in, and don't knock it at all."
and
"Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira, coming off his win over Mark Coleman, against Heath Herring, which would likely decide Pride's world heavyweight title is a done deal for 11/3. Also added this week to that show is Schiltt vs. Masaaki Satake and Renzo Gracie vs. New Japan's Michiyoshi Ohara. Gracie will be giving up a ton of size here. Ohara is listed at 237 pounds while Gracie usually fights at about 172. Not announced, but most likely is Dan Henderson vs. Murilo Ninja, both of whom were offered as opponents to Frank Shamrock before being matched with each other and on paper sounds like a great fight. Shamrock's appearance on the show is in jeopardy. Pride officials at press time called it unlikely because he has yet to accept an opponent. It is believed they have suggested four names, two of whom are Akira Shoji and Daijiro Matsui. Shamrock was still in intense training expecting to do the show as of the last word. There are three matches yet to be announced. It appears Shoji will face Mario Sperry as the latest rumor. Yuki Ishikawa of Battlarts wants to face Quinton Jackson on this show going for revenge since Jackson destroyed tag partner Alexander Otsuka on the 10/14 Battlarts show. Pride is attempting to put a deal together for Bill Goldberg, using its ultra successful strategy of building around pro wrestlers doing real fights to break into the U.S. market with a live show next year in Las Vegas. Goldberg has expressed interest in the past in doing shootfights, but at 35, with no high-level experience in either wrestling or kickboxing (football doesn't count) makes it a difficult proposition. It's hard to say what his Time Warner contract would allow as well, and he can't afford to put that at risk. The Ohara match has the proven lure of a Gracie against a pro wrestler, with New Japan taking the gamble that the size difference will work in their favor and make Ohara into a superstar if he can win, or they can push him with the shooter gimmick if he at least looks competitive."
October 29, 2001
I'm sure we included this is in the RINGS news at the time, but nevertheless:
"The RINGS promotion, clinging to life, is still doing their annual King of Kings tournament which started on 10/20 in Tokyo. The tournament was its highest profile event of the year going back to its inception as a pro wrestling tournament which often came down to Akira Maeda and Volk Han in their peak period. Over the past two years, it was replaced by a shoot tournament, which ended up being won by Dan Henderson in 2000 and Antonio Nogueira (who probably should have on in 2000 but was robbed of a decision in a match with Henderson) in 2001, both of whom ended up jumping to Pride after winning the tournament and having some pretty good success. This year, with the company in financial straights and probably one of many companies right now clinging to existence, there were no huge names involved in the show, which saw a lot of long-time RINGS regulars like Lee Hasdell of England, Chris Haseman of Australia and Hiromitsu Kanehara advance along with Fedor Emelianenko (the company's current world heavyweight champion from Russia), Egidijus Valavicius of Lithuania. Han, who put up a much better showing against Nogueira in a shoot than either Mark Coleman or Gary Goodridge [what an excellent observation with regard to Volk Han—ed.], is not entering the tournament this year and has basically said his shooting days are over. Maeda did manage a promotional tie-up with Caesar Takeshi's Shoot Boxing Alliance which sent a fighter to his show."
and
"Regarding Goldberg and Pride, there has been talk, but it doesn't appear to have reached the serious standpoint. Goldberg's Time Warner contract is exclusive for sports entertainment as a category. If Pride is sport, the feeling is that he would be able to do it and not risk his contract. Goldberg is still looking more into trying for acting roles than fighting. Pride was interested in using Rock as an announcer for its shows, but I would think WWF wouldn't allow him to do it, and Rock was invited to the Tokyo Dome show. Goldberg may be a better choice for the announcing role, not as much because he would be a good announcer (no way of knowing although he is a fan of the product) but because if he's willing to do the media work, he may be able to help get the sport over in the way Jim Brown did originally for UFC because he is enough of a name that he can get on higher profile media shows than, say, Don Frye or Guy Mezger. Still, Pride has no chance to be a serious PPV player with shows airing three weeks after they happen."
and
"Frye suffered a scratched cornea from the eye gouge from Gilbert Yvel. He hasn't been able to train hard yet due to the thigh tear which made it impossible to do a match Pride proposed with Ken Shamrock on the 11/3 Tokyo Dome show. While not announced, it appears they are looking at Igor Vovchanchyn vs. Mario Sperry (former BJJ and Abu Dhabai world heavyweight champ) on the show. The Yuki Ishikawa (pro wrestler from Battlarts) vs. Quinton Jackson match was officially announced. Frye is looking at returning on the 12/31 Pride vs. K-1 event promoted by Antonio Inoki. Frank Shamrock is officially off the 11/3 Pride show due to a rib injury suffered in training, adding him to the list which includes Nino Schembri and Ricardo Arona who were being considered for spots on the show. Shamrock has torn cartilage in his rib area and was told no training for eight weeks. He was punched during training on 10/11 and knew he was hurt but continued training through it, but after a wrestling training session five days later, he was in so much pain he had to get it checked out. He's also hopeful to be back for the Inoki 12/31 show. He was most likely facing either Johil de Olivera or Jackson, looking for it as a match to potentially set up a bout with Kazushi Sakuraba down the line. This didn't do him any favors with Pride management, because, for better or worse, his last name works against him with their frustrations of previous dealings with Ken, who was also injured right before a big fight with Igor Vovchanchyn and who they signed at huge money ($350,000 per fight) with the idea him being a regular star would open up the U.S. market, which hasn't really materialized. Pride is definitely taking the tact of outspending UFC and trying to lock up the top fighters."
and
"Renzo Gracie was arrested on an assault charge. As the story goes, the owner of a gas station said something to his wife and Gracie went back to the station to confront him, the guy put his hands on Renzo and Renzo punched him, and waited for the police to arrive."
and
"Tra Telligman, who upset Igor Vovchanchyn earlier this year in Pride, was knocked out by unknown John Williams, who went into the fight with an 0-1 record, in 1:59 of the first round in a boxing match in Las Vegas. Telligman went into the fight with a 4-0 record as a boxer since moving away from MMA."
and
"After the Tokyo Dome, Pride has events scheduled on 12/23 in Fukuoka and 12/31 in Saitama (co-promoted with K-1 and Inoki)."
and
"UFC released several fighters from contract including Vladimir Matyushenko and Dennis Hallman, who were the losers in the two top matches at the last PPV. Another UFC regular, Jeremy Horn, has agreed to a two-fight deal with Pride. There was consideration of Horn vs. Kevin Randleman for the January UFC show. At this point, if everything goes smoothly, and it never does, the Caol Uno vs. B.J. Penn winner would face Jens Pulver for the lightweight title in January."
November 5, 2001:
"Royce Gracie claims to be negotiating with Pride about a return in what would be a middleweight tournament next year."
and
"The 12/31 K-1 vs. Inoki show is thought by many to be the biggest televised martial arts event of the year. It is believed Inoki's team of seven will come from these names, Tadao Yasuda, Tokimitsu Ishizawa (Kendo Ka Shin), Yuji Nagata, Manabu Nakanishi, Renzo Gracie, Kazuyuki Fujita, Naoya Ogawa, Don Frye, Antonio Nogueira and Mark Coleman."
and, finally, tantalizingly:
"The Kazushi Sakuraba vs. Vanderlei Silva match on 11/3 at the Tokyo Dome looks to officially be the biggest business match in the history of MMA. Sakuraba is now officially and without any close competition the biggest drawing junior heavyweight in the history of pro wrestling. The advance for the show was well ahead of any previous shows in history and there is a legitimate chance of selling out the Tokyo Dome. The show, called "Championship Chaos," is believed to be available on In Demand cable PPV for the first time on tape delay on 11/24 as well as on the dish networks, but only in homes with digital capability. The rest of the card is Nobuhiko Takada vs. Mirko Cro Cop (with a new twist, Takada is saying that if he loses, he WON'T retire), Heath Herring vs. Antonio Nogueira to create a Pride world heavyweight champion (the middleweight title is the main event over the heavyweight title due to Sakuraba), Igor Vovchanchyn vs. Mario Sperry, Masaaki Satake vs. Semmy Schiltt, Dan Henderson vs. Murilo Ninja Rua, Quinton Jackson vs. Yuki Ishikawa and Renzo Gracie vs. Michiyoshi Ohara."
Won't that be something! At the moment of our next encounter! At the famed 東京ドーム Tōkyō Dōmu! See you then! Thank you as always for your attention to the several matters we have addressed in our time together today. You could have been literally anywhere reconsidering PRIDE.16（プライド・シックスティーン）twenty years after the fact of it, but you chose to be here to do that, and I want you to know that I appreciate it when you make choices that are like that.
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