史上最大の格闘技ワールド・カップ Dynamite! SUMMER NIGHT FEVER in 国立
イベント詳細
シリーズ PRIDE（Dynamite!）
主催 TBS
開催年月日2002年8月28日
開催地日本
東京都新宿区
会場 国立霞ヶ丘競技場
開始時刻 午後6時30分
試合数 全8試合
放送局 パーフェクト・チョイス（PPV）
TBS（地上波）
入場者数 91,107人 (haha just kidding! [more on that later])
PPV購入数10万件
WERE WE TO CONSIDER ONCE MORE THE TRUE DHARMA EYE TREASURY OF 正法眼蔵 THE SHŌBŌGENZŌ (as translated by Kazuaki Tanahashi and John Daido Loori, with commentary and verse also by John Daido Loori [he is a busy bee]) we would find as the ninety-third entry within that (unreal) tome "Dongshan's 'Each Stitch,'" which would unfold thus (more or less):
Shenshan was sewing when Dongshan Liangjie said, “What are you doing?”
Shenshan said, “I am sewing.”
Dongshan said, “What is sewing?”
Shenshan said, “Each stitch follows the other.”
Dongshan said, “If my companion of twenty years says so, I guess there is a point.”
Shenshan said, “What would you say, Elder?”
Dongshan said, “Each stitch is like the earth exploding."
Bas Rutten said, "The earth should definitely explode right here."
Oh man, Bas Rutten! What is he even doing there! What a surprising guy! And yet, alas, it seems that we will be without his further company as we encounter 史上最大の格闘技ワールド・カップ (Shijō saidai no kakutōgi wārudo kappu/History's Greatest Kakutōgi World Cup) Dynamite! SUMMER NIGHT FEVER in 国立 in the Japanese home-video-release format that made its way into the truly enormous (and impressively well numbered and organized; I am so grateful) torrent (of information) that made its way into our possession (though who could truly be said to "possess" it?) really quite a number of years ago now. Should you find that you miss him, and his ways, and that this absence is too much to bear, it has come to my attention that earlier this very year in the month of May ("gonna make a record in the month of May," a since-disgraced guy once sang compellingly), the confoundingly undersubscribed "Old School MMA" YouTube account has made available the full English-language broadcast, which offers us both Stephen Quadros and Bas Rutten, with whose charms and imperfections we are already well acquainted, but which sadly inflicts upon the viewer Bill Goldberg, for whom I have no affection, and about whom I have no desire to speak (for the only Bill Goldberg updates that genuinely matter to me personally, please consult the "Does Bret Hart Like Bill Goldberg?" @GoldbergHart Twitter account, "Letting the world know one day at a time that @brethart doesn’t care for Bill Goldberg"). Suffice it to say that I am pleased to have the Japanese-language broadcast available to me for really any number of reasons (one is of course that I remain a poor but enthusiastic student of the language [who has recently mastered the phrase なごやで父とみそかつを食べる, "I'm going to eat miso pork cutlets in Nagoya with my dad," so look out, everybody!), and although it is slightly disappointing for it to be the lightly condensed home video release, rather than the sprawling, endless original Japanese live broadcast, honestly this is probably for the best: the files I have before me suggest a total running time of two hours and ten minutes, rather than the four or five hours this show probably went live, and my practice (perhaps, indeed, our practice) is to carry on doing whatever it is precisely I am (we are) doing here for roughly as long as the files run (and so long, I suppose, as we are spared); there is arguably a point of diminishing returns (he wrote, several hundred thousand words into his RINGSblog). [UPDATE: I totally paused and continued writing to egregious excess a whole bunch of times. Oops!—ed.] Anyway, I'm excited! This is a really big show! By attendance, it is the biggest: although the oft-repeated number of 91,107 is surely false (I expect Dave Meltzer will have much to say on that in excerpted notes that are to follow), so too are the numbers of each of the top-five attendedmost events listed at the Wikipedia page that addresses this topic: each of the top-five events were in Tokyo, decades ago; each has made-up numbers that were no doubt considered part of "the entertainment portion" of their respective evenings; each has a little note on Wikipedia mentioning this; and, after allowing for all that fakery, this almost certainly remains the largest crowd ever assembled for this sort of thing, safely surpassing the more reliable numbers we have from enormous shows in Warsaw, in Melbourne (twice), and in Toronto (to cheer on GSP [understandably; he is an easy-to-cheer-for creaturely guy]). It's lots of people! Many of them stoked! About it! Let us join them!
Opening remarks are delivered by tonight's "executive producer," K1 founder 石井 和義 Ishii Kazuyoshi, called to a life in karate by Sonny Chiba's portrayal of Mas Oyama (having seen 空手バカ一代 Karate Baka Ichidai, I extremely understand [come for the karate, and Mas Oyama's refusal and indeed incapacity to subdue his own fighting spirit sufficiently to allow him to work matches in Okinawa for the entertainment of American serviceman; stay for Mas Oyama's little judo buddy who hits a 飛び十字固 tobi-jujigatame whilst leaping off of an indoor staircase), and who later figured, well, not prominently, but beyond-the-scenes-ishly in our own beloved Fighting Network RINGS (a notion revealed to me through old Observers alone; I do not recall encountering it elsewhere). To mark the scale of this SUMMER NIGHT FEVER, an Olympicesque cauldron is lit jointly by 猪木寛至 Inoki Kanji (later Inoki Antonio, and finally Muhammad Hussain Inoki [may Allah be pleased with him]), almost certainly the most interesting person to ever arise from ("gestures broadly" haha) whatever all of this is (ably chronicled in Dave Meltzer's extraordinary obituary of this towering figure), and Hélio Gracie, who "was a member of the Brazilian movement Brazilian Integralism, which first appeared in Brazil in 1932[36]" and who, in his final years, "was quoted as saying: 'I never loved any woman because love is a weakness, and I don't have weaknesses'[35]." Guess which guy I like more!
Hey did you catch the Olympics? The Paris ones, I mean? I sure did! We had them on pretty much constantly the whole two weeks, streaming events both pleasingly familiar and delightfully strange through the CBC website. The opening ceremonies somehow seemed to capture every single conceivable way of being French, and culminated, you may recall, in Teddy Riner co-lighting the flying (flying!) cauldron alongside sprinting great Marie-José Pérec (hey I just checked and yes they are both from Guadeloupe) after a parade of torch-bearers that included the great judo champions David Douillet (of the past [also of this, which is also of the past {as most thing are}]) and Clarisse Agbegnenou (very much of the ever-unfolding present). "With a Flying Cauldron, we wanted to pay tribute to the spirit of daring, creativity, innovation — and sometimes madness! — of France," were the entirely plausible words of Tony Estanguet, President of Paris 2024. But don't get me started on the Olympics, lest we spend the rest of our time together talking about how this fifteenth appearance of judo at the Olympics was an utter triumph from beginning to end in front of perhaps the world's best audience for the sport (the French know their judo and are a boisterous sporting people), and that the moment the +90kg division was selected for the deciding tiebreaker between Japan and France in the mixed-team final was the loudest ovation of the entire Olympics (despite the judo [and later wrestling] taking place in Champ de Mars Arena, a much smaller venue than the Palais Omnisports de Paris-Bercy the French fill annually for le Tournoi International de la Ville de ParisITIVP/Paris Grand Slam). A pal at the club who is of a similarly advanced age to my own and of similar tastes in several regards agreed that in that moment it was as though Teddy Riner had been revealed as the final entrant in the Royal Rumble, if the Royal Rumble wasn't just a silly thing that we knew about, but instead a moment of national sporting significance and the final crowning moment for the most decorated (summer) Olympic athlete in the history of France. If you have access to a Canadian IP address, the CBC has the moment here. It really is something. Perhaps we should further explore the judo mixed-team final as an entry within these electronic pages of the TK Scissors blog?
But that's for another time, I suppose. In the matter that lies before us today, I can report that in our opening contest, Wanderlei Silva has overwhelmed Tatsuya Iwasaki in short order; I don't know if the words "TKO (Head Kick and Punches), R1, 1:16" have ever before or since been so fully realized. Tatsuya Iwasaki felt totally unknown to me, though I am sure I have watched this event before. The only material of any substance I am able to find on him comes from Fire Pro Steam-Workshop-legend "CarlCX," who has been enormously kind to our project in his writings and linkings over the years (thank you, Carl, whom I consider a friend of the blog). On the subject of Iwasaki, he writes:
"Tales from the MMA jobber file, #24: This is our last entry for the Pride/K-1 Shockwave/Dynamite 2002 supershow, and it's...really anticlimactic.
Seriously. For all the hype both promotions put into their BIG CROSSOVER SUPERSHOW, the opening match not only was the polar opposite of super, it wasn't even a crossover match. Wanderlei Silva faced Tatsuya Iwasaki, a former karateka--and not even a particularly notable one, as despite fighting in the All-Japan and World Karate Open kyokushin tournaments he never placed any higher than 5th place--and that was in 1991. Eleven years later he was a slightly pudgy 33 year-old with no MMA training facing Wanderlei Silva at the height of his power. It's a quick and terrible massacre, with Iwasaki TKOed in a little over a minute after a barrage of knees, punches and a well-placed soccer kick. It left the MMA world mostly wondering why the fight had been made.
The answer is simple: Because the people running Pride and K-1 were insane and Shockwave/Dynamite was their crazy magnum opus.
To support this, I present the following evidence:
-The show's full, actual name was Dynamite! Biggest Mixed Martial Arts World Cup - Summer Night Fever in the National Stadium
-The show opened with Antonio Inoki and Helio Gracie lighting an Olympic-style torch
-The show was co-hosted and had all interviews conducted by WCW star Bill Goldberg
-The mid-event intermission was ended by Goldberg cutting a promo and Antonio Inoki leaving the arena just so he could parachute back into it
-Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira faced Bob Sapp at a 100-pound weight disadvantage
-Co-main event Royce Gracie vs Hidehiko Yoshida ended in either the biggest ref screw-up in MMA history or a real-life Montreal Screwjob [I have a different interpretation of these events that I will share in due course, but I totally accept the validity of our friend Carl's line of analysis here—ed.]
And once again, because it bears repeating:
-The show opened with Wanderlei Silva, the baddest man on the planet, fighting a man whose only MMA or kickboxing experience was a three-minute sparring exhibition with Sanae Kikuta.
It was supposed to lead to an annual tradition of co-promoted Shockwave/Dynamite events, but the two organizations fell out of cooperation quickly, leading to separate Pride Shockwave and K-1 Dynamite events taking place concurrently as competing new year's eve specials for the rest of each promotion's existence. Each would individually do crazier things than the 2002 supershow--but for one brief, shining moment, all the insanity was contained in one building, and it was glorious.
And terrible. Really pretty terrible. But glorious.
Moveset, stats, logic and four attires (Shockwave 2002 vs Wanderlei / same outfit with UFC gloves because there's only so much I had to work with don't judge me / Pancrase 2002 exhibition vs Kikuta / Kyokushin '91 championships vs Stanislavovich)."
Here's to CarlCX, a 総合格闘技 / そうごうかくとうぎ / sougoukakutougi scholar working in the crucial medium of making-guys-for-Fire-Pro (in another era, he would have been a hero of Game FAQs character creation formulas, I'm sure of it).
Our second contest sees spirited undercard favourite 松井 大二郎 Matsui Daijirō set against K-1's Jerrel Venetiaan, a Dutch kickboxer (I believe that to be one of the better kinds?). My knowledge of pre-HERO*S K-1 is not so much imperfect as non-existent, aside from when K-1 sends a squad of absolute killers to mess up your game of 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}]) beyond all recognition. I am learning just now of this limby-yet-exceedingly-well-shouldered Venetiaan's accomplishments, which include second place finishes in the 2004 King Of The Ring World GP and 2003 King Of The Ring Europe GP tournaments, championships in both the 2003 K-1 World Grand Prix in Basel and 2001 K-1 Holland GP in Arnhem, and a drug test failure in which his testosterone levels were deemed excessive by a factor of like five-hundred. I am pretty sure a member of the commentary team, I believe the ringside guy who fulfills a rôle similar to that played on Iron Chef by 太田 真一郎 Ōta Shin'ichirō ("Fukui-san?" he was heard to interject sometimes), utters the words "寝技に行きます / newaza ni ikimasu" or something close to them, suggesting that Matsui's game plan, as our ringside friend understands it, is quite sensibly to get this match to the ground early and, if necessary, often. And Matsui does okay at it! This back-and-forth affair sees each fighter best the other in the areas you would expect: Matsui's the better grappler, though unable to finish; Venetiaan the better striker, and, though unable to stop his opponent, does super duper soccer kick him in the face this one time. Although I join Matsui and the crowd broadly by being a little surprised at Venetiaan's split-decision win, what can you do? Both guys worked hard.
In a battle of journeymen, Gary Goodridge, who always makes us a little sad (due to basic human compassion), wrestles Lloyd Van Dams to the mat early in first round and stops the 寝技 newaza-untutored kickboxer with punches a short time thereafter. I am further saddened to learn that Van Dams succumbed to heart disease at the age of forty-nine in late 2021, an especially lonely time to have been ill.
A lighter note: something I enjoy about the Japanese home-video versions of these shows is that they intercut all kinds of backstage footage free of commentary, and the overall impression is less that you have watched an event than that you have watched fairly tasteful documentary about an event. It's neat!
Our next bout sees 6'11" Dutch kickboxer Semmy Schilt, with whom we are well acquainted, and Ernesto Hoost, also Dutch, also a kickboxer, and, though noticeably less tall (still 6'2"), widely recognized as one of the all-time greats of his sport, which should help. It takes me longer than you might expect (midway through the opening three-minute round) to notice that both athletes are wearing boxing gloves, on account of how they are having a kickboxing match. So ill-informed am I with regard to K-1 rules that I was unsure if knees are allowed, but there do seem to be a lot of them here, and the way the commentator is exclaiming HIZAAAAAAAA with excitement (rather than, say, shock and horror) suggests they are totally okay to do. Long-time readers will know (and new readers are quickly learning) that I am entirely incapable of evaluating the merits of a contest of this sort, but I would describe the crowd as attentive but unstirred, and at the end of this five-round unanimous draw (what a weird result that is), I am most struck by how charming it is when Ernesto Hoost is referred to enthusiastically by our commentators as ミスター・パーフェクト (mi-su-tā・pā-fe-ku-to).
Hey here comes our problematic fave Don Frye, and brother, he is "over": the huge crowd responds with a full-throated HWAIIIIII each time he raises a fist, which of course only encourages him to do so further, which the crowd then continues to like, and so we dance. In its overall presentation and vibe, this is among the best walkouts I have ever seen, probably?
His opponent in this kickboxing bout (oh no) is to be enormous French kickboxer Jérôme Le Banner (oh no). A familiar figure, perhaps, but how much do we really know? Let's explore together: "Jérôme Le Banner was born in the French city of Le Havre, in the région of Normandy and began training in judo at the age of five. When he was fourteen, Bruce Lee's Fist of Fury influenced him so much that he became interested in striking instead and started trying to incorporate the techniques of Jeet Kune Do he had seen in the film. At sixteen however he started practising kyokushin, while Jeet Kune Do gave him the southpaw stance which he has maintained throughout his career, even though he is right-handed. He eventually took up Muay Thai at the age of 18.[1] Le Banner holds a black belt in the Kyokushin Kaikan karate and in judo.[2]" And so it is quite reasonable and rational to interpret Le Banner's ninety-second, fairly upsetting dismantling of Don Frye with truly horrifying punches as yet another triumph for judo (besting even Don Frye's own).
Between bouts, Antono Inoki, who obviously parachuted into the stadium earlier—why wouldn't he have?—addresses the crowd, who are into it. "Ichi, ni, san, da!" they are heard to remark in unison.
And here we have one of I suppose the most famous Pride matches of all, as fifth-degree (as of our time of writing; I am unsure of his precise rank in the summer of 2002) Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu black belt/judo shodan ("I am a judo guy; I am a judo guy," he insisted to the delight of all [chiefly me] in a fantastic episode of The 3rd Degree that took him to 東海大学 Tōkai Daigaku) ANTONIO RODRIGO NOGUEIRA, the most keenly admired mixed-fight submission artist of his day, addresses himself to the daunting matter of BOB SAPP, a truly enormous (and quite nice-seeming) man whose martial credentials include having taken too many steroids for the National Football League to be able to just be cool about it (that's not nothing). Sapp is cornered by Josh Barnett and (friend-to-TK) Maurice Smith (Barnett may well be a TK-pal too; I can't recall specifically but it would definitely add up [oh wait okay wow: "Come 2002, a good friend and one of my old training partners, Tsuyoshi Kohsaka, was doing some work in New Japan," Barnett recalled. "I reached out to him and said, 'Hey. I would really love it if I could get an opportunity to go and wrestle in New Japan. Would you put out a good word for me?' And he said, 'Sure.' He got me in touch with them, and from there, it moved incredibly quickly. As soon as I knew it, I was headlining at Tokyo Dome." Read more here!). Okay away we go! I am humbled in appreciation of the richness of this text immediately, as I have an entirely different understanding of the famous opening seconds now than I did whenever it was I first saw this bout (something on the order of twenty years ago, though that is not a precise figure). I would have told you that Nogueira begins the match by diving in for a low, tackling 双手刈 morote-gari, an act of sheer folly against a dude so truly enormous he could either simply squish you, or, worse yet, deliver a shoot "ganso bomb" (although I suppose the trouble is that they are all in a sense "shoot" ganso bombs) in the mode of 川田 利明 Kawada Toshiaki (who I understand now runs a ramen shop [a noble calling]). Sure enough, Nogueira dives low, and yes indeed, he is scooped aloft and dropped upsettingly (if I'm upset, imagine how he felt about it), but I can see now, though I hadn't before (or if I had, I had totally forgotten), that Nogueira's plan wasn't to put Sapp on his back by blasting through him with a double-leg takedown; instead, it was to perform a 腰切りkoshi-kiri hip-cut ("just like in our warm-up, remember this movement?" you may find yourself asking hundreds of beginners over the many years as regards koshi-kiri) whilst trapping the near-side arm. Once you've got that, you can sit through to 腕挫腋固 ude-hishigi-waki-gatame (the famed Fujiwara Armbar), or take the back ("hooks! hooks!" you will urge your pals or young charges), or roll through to the 抑込技 osaekomi and maybe even (if uke has, in their folly, clasped the hands) attack from that pinning position with 腕緘 ude-garami. It's actually a super clever way to go about the problem of Bob Sapp! And you can see him really give it a try with his left arm, for the literally less-than-two seconds it takes Bob Sapp to hoist and wreck him from there. Well, I say "wrecked" (or indeed wrekt), but Nogeuira is absolutely sticking to the plan, and keeps wrapping the arm to attempt the sit-through. Is this actually how he ends up on top, in the end? Have I somehow overlooked all these many excellent examples of a core newaza movement present in this famed bout? It could have pedagogical value! UDE-GARAMI-GA! UDE-GARAMI-GA! is the call both from the booth and within my heart. Sapp is no less committed to his own approach (of hoisting), which gives Nogueira enough space to slide into guard. "すごいですね!" is the call, and the colour commentator agrees that this has all been quite sugoi, yes. At the risk of interrupting the flow of things with a technical digression (I would usually never), let's go back to the opening sequence for just a moment, and look at the following sequence of captures, in which I would direct your attention to the way Nogueira wraps Sapps right arm with his left in shots two and—heroically undaunted by having just been tremendously smooshed—five:
If you already totally understood this as what was going on in this one, forgive me, as I had not seen this in ages; if these ideas are unfamiliar to you, here is a really nice breakdown of the fundamental movements. ANYWAY, BACK AT IT: Sapp understandably backs out of Nogueira's guard, but after a restart standing and another lightly-bailed-upon-double-leg, that's where we are once again. There's actually more up-and-down to this one than you might think in the first three minutes, as Sapp, though he scores with a few punches from the top, isn't wild about fighting Nogeuira on the ground (hey fair enough), and so backs out of things before they can really develop. I can't believe we're only three-and-a-half minutes in when Nogueira hits just a picture-perfect koshi-kiri hip-cut sit through and comes up on top in 横四方固 yoko-shiho-gatame, working for the 腕緘 ude-garami immediately, peppering Sapp all the while with small hammer-fists (which, you will recall, are fine). Oh dear, a nasty cut: was it one of those little punches that sliced up Sapp's forehead, or maybe a little bit of a headbutt as they grappled snugly? Either way, referee 島田 裕二 Shimada Yūji (whom we have known since RINGS) gets everybody all cleaned up, and we are restarted in that same position, with Nogueira on top. Just as the thought of transitioning from 横四方固 yoko-shiho-gatame (the side) to 縦四方固 tate-shiho-gatame (right up on top) is evidenced in Nogueira's aspect as much as his movements, Bob Sapp just literally pushes him up and over and away, like it is absurd that he was able to do this just with his arms. Though I do not have Bas Rutten's commentary on this file, this is surely one of the finest instances ever of someone simply choosing to "explode right here." My goodness. Sapp does a decent job on top, honestly, switching his hips into a 袈裟固 kesa-gatame configuration to hold the position while Nogueira shrimps in to avoid Sapp's blows, but Sapp makes the mistake of taking the back without working towards either i) hooks, or ii) something very particular he had in mind that does not involve hooks (there are options!), and Nogueira rolls through and has his guard back an instant thereafter. Still getting punched, though, and it looks like absolutely no fun. Sapp stands, and tries to jump through the guard a couple of times, though not enough times for our really-very-stoked commentator: "もう一度 !もう一度!" (mō ichido, one more time, he both announces and pleads). In time, Sapp settles in atop his fairly battered foe (he is a battered guy; he is a battered guy), and just as the pace of things drops slightly, you can see Nogueira inch his left knee up into just the faintest hint of an 表三角絞 omote-sankaku-jime, a front-facing triangle choke. Sapp wants no part of this, but after a little more up-and-down just as before (I note that Nogueira's straight punches are connecting more than they had been), here's Nogueira attacking with the sankaku in earnest, and, no less earnestly, here is Sapp slamming his way out of it. We are eight minutes in, and these guys look weary. Also Nogueira is cut somehow? With a minute to go in the ten-minute first round, Nogueira tries perhaps somewhat desperately rolling through for an 足関節技 ashi-kansetsu-waza leg-lock of some description, but the specifics of his attack elude me (I'm sure he knew). Sapp pounds away to end the round, leaving the ruggedly handsome Nogueira looking a little more rugged than he might ordinarily prefer.
After a little bit of fairly exhausted boxing to open round two, Nogueira's super low 踵返 kibisu-gaeshi ankle pick is sprawled atop of, but enough space remains for Nogueira to slip into the guard. And threaten with sankaku-jime! Oh no he has been slammed. He's trying again though! Okay no that didn't work either. He turtles, tries another sit-out, then slips back into the guard. 逆腕緘 GYAKU-UDE-GARAMI! Not so much to finish the armlock (not that he would be upset that it happened, I'm sure), but perhaps to sweep, hip-bumpingly? Yep! It all unfolded in slow motion (these are big-to-cartoonishly-huge men, and tired), but it unfolded. Sapp forces his way back up top, though, and after stacking Nogueira up, we are in another turtle-with-a-sit-out situation, only this time Nogueira manages to get right up on top, not so much because he has done anything different technically this time, but because Sapp just completely accepts the position, one would assume out of sheer fatigue (no diss whatsoever). We are in the fairly high form of yoko-shiho-gatame colloquially known as mune-gatame (literally "chest hold," and I have never heard that term used by a Japanese speaker [not saying it hasn't happened]), and if Nogueira spins through with a far-side juji-gatame (made possible by the underhook over there) I will be even more delighted with the finish of this match than I remember being (or having been [being]). No, it is the near-side juji, which you may dismiss as relatively standard, but the gyaku-ude-garami grip he employs to secure it is a really lovely detail, both an exceedingly effective control but also, to me, æsthetically unassailable. I have never once doubted Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira's taste level (his eventual "Gimme Shelter" walkout was not so much revelation as confirmation).
In a post-match address to the crowd, accompanied by a deeply shirtless Mario Sperry, Nogueira suggests that with this his fight, he has proven that he is the best heavyweight in the world right now (he means back then), and who could (have) argue(d then)? The eager crowd certainly seems open to this possibility, and they're pretty into his dōmo arigatō gozaimashita. This one was really wonderful to revisit! Not just emotionally, but technically (oh man this isn't another real techniques plus real emotions situation, is it?)
Oh hey look who's next:
It's of course impossible to say just what 1992 Olympic Judo Gold Medalist (-78kg) and 1999 World Champion (-90kg) 吉田 秀彦 YOSHIDA HIDEHIKO is thinking as he makes his entrance into both the 国立競技場 Kokuritsu Kyōgijō specifically and the world of mixed fight more broadly in this début bout against Royce Gracie, but here are a few of the things I'm thinking about as he does so, mostly revolving around just how dated any real rivalry between judo and Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu now feels, certainly compared to how it felt then; or, perhaps, more to the point, how we were asked to feel about it then. A promotional tactic, it was of course always fairly fake (check the judo 段 dan ranks of every Gracie you can remember by name, and then ask yourself why they bothered to have those), and honestly not even all that interesting technically, in that, if the idea is that by training almost exclusively in newaza, you will in time come to excel in newaza, I think we would all agree, wouldn't we? This notion conforms to both reason and experience, right? And if, conversely, you devoted a higher proportion of your training to tachiwaza, then that is likely to be your strong suit, <<n'est-ce pas>>? Why wouldn't it be true? The super-famed-on-one-side, largely-footnoted-on-the-other clash between Hélio Gracie and 木村 政彦 Kimura Masahiko that we are asked to consider and commemorate and revisit here as part of this SUMMER NIGHT FEVER IN 国立 isn't anywhere close to the most interesting part of the Kimura story, even if we restrict that story (there is of course literally no reason to ever do so) to non-judo-Kimura-happenings (please see 増田 俊也 Masuda Toshinari's brilliantly titled 木村政彦はなぜ力道山を殺さなかったのか / Why Didn't Masahiko Kimura Kill Rikidozan? [single volume hardcover or two volume paperback] for more), and might not even be the most intriguing thing that happened to Kimura in Brazil in 1951. For example, here he is on that same trip playing 碁 go . . .
. . . and we have literally no idea how that game went, unlike his Gracie bout ("I applied gyaku-ude-garami," Kimura would later account). This screams out for further investigation (the go, I mean).
Another factor in all of this feeling less important, I think, is the extent to which so many of the Gracie family's bold claims, and certain high-profile Gracies themselves, have been in one way or another discredited in recent years by extensive research conducted by diligently scholarly members of the Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu community through rigorous primary source research, the conclusions of which have been enthusiastically shared online. I don't think I would have believed, twenty years ago, the general air of ill repute that hangs over much of the Gracie family name these days within such a large proportion of the (online, at least) jiu-jitsu community itself, a community that initially took shape in no small part as a result of the half-truths and mythologizing attached to that name (in addition to the directly verifiable performances that one would think might have been enough? but I am no businessman); that that selfsame community have since worked to analyze and often overturn those notions in a kind of minor reformation (peruse the relevant subreddits, if you dare) is no small thing. I do wonder if this partial (ongoing? maybe it has run its course?) unseating (or at least unsettling) of the Gracies from their place of prominence within the jiu-jitsu community would have been quite as thorough had the competitive results of succeeding Gracie generations kept pace with those of their forebears (though a common thread in Gracie-traditionalist discourse is that the "sportification" of Jiu-Jitsu and its focus on competition has led to a watering-down, a straying from true principles [arguments I am unsympathetic to, honestly, given my experience with similar discussions in the judo context]) but who can say? It's also worth noting, I think, that some of the most influential voices in the worlds of both Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu and mixed martial arts—including the one with the widest audience by far (you are, for better or almost certainly worse, familiar with at least the objective fact of his podcast)—have for at least a decade now heaped praise on judo's value for its own sake and also for its applicability to other martial (and "real world" [gross]) settings in at seemingly every opportunity, if the clips YouTube thinks I am eager to see and hear are any indication (I have YouTube nearly trained out of this behaviour but you have to stay vigilant; you can't ever be caught slipping). So there's certainly all of that.
But the decisive thing, I think, in at least the way I feel about all of this, so many years later, has been my own direct experience of the extent to which, in actual real life, everybody just trains together, and gets along great. As judo 投げ技 nagewaza (throwing techniques) broadly but 足技 ashiwaza (foot and leg techniques) specifically have become a more and more important element of both sport jiu-jitsu (too many guillotine/front-choke specialists at the highest levels to risk the double-leg, I was told by a student who had been amidst exponents of DanaherISM, and so the posture has risen, and so ashiwaza) and mixed martial arts (you will find, if you seek them out, full instructionals outlining contemporary trends of clinched ashiwaza against the cage, branded, fairly charmingly, as "Wall Waza"), this high-level interest has wended its way down to the hobbyist, and, at the club level that I experience, has led to an even greater influx of jiu-jitsu players who want to add judo of this kind to what they're already studying ("well that's great, guys, thanks for coming out," I am heard to remark with ever-increasing frequency to this idea). One of my senior students, who is also a dan-rank holder in BJJ (I'm not totally sure they say that, exactly; I will ask! anyway you know exactly what I mean), said by way of welcoming a new club member who has a few years of jiu-jitsu, "eighty percent of what you've learned there will help you here, and eighty percent of what you learn here will help you there" (he did not specify what one might do with those remaining fifths, but I figure you can probably just keep them for yourself as a little treat). THIS IS ALL TO SAY: as a staunch judo partisan (you may have noticed this), I am all for extolling the virtues of judo over and above more or less any other organized human activity (you may have noticed this), but all the same I am very much struck by how dated the online dо̄jо̄ wars of decades past feel to me now as I settle in to watch one of the central texts of that era, and indeed of this whole deal; this is no doubt in part because I am simply an older, considerably more tired person, but also because of some real shifts that have occurred in, what shall we say, the martial culture? But again, to return to the initial point (I think this was the initial point; it was at least one of them), any idea that Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu and judo players were every wholly distinct communities is demonstrably false (and, weirdly enough, false in a way that actually undersells the newaza achievements of the Gracie lineage [look at how much they made of their brief, basic judo instruction from 前田 光世 Maeda Mitsuyo! that's way more impressive than if Maeda had disclosed to them the unspecified secrets of an unspecified, non-Kōdōkan koryū jujutsu {in which he had not trained}!]); there is beyond that, though, to restate my final point on this for now (I think this is my final point on this for now [it had better be at least one of them]), an ever-increasing openness (I say ever-increasing, but it feel like it may just be close enough to total so as to functionally be total) to the obvious benefits of participating in both communities, should one feel so called ("It’s an aesthetic judgement as much as anything," as Haydon tells Smiley). Also when I met Rickson Gracie he was nice to me.
That if-anything-too-brief prelude now behind us, what are we actually looking at here: okay so we've got a "special rules match" in tribute to the 1951 contest we have mentioned a little already, which means both athletes will wear the 道着 dо̄gi (yes please!); there will be no dropping to the mat without first taking grips (even better!); striking will be limited (sounds good to me!); and the referee is afforded no power to end the match (wait what?). Yes, that is for real the stipulation, somehow. You do not have to think about this for very long at all to foresee problems, on account of how it doesn't bear even the slightest scrutiny or make any sense at all. Is the referee supposed to be like oh dear one of the athletes has literally perished before me of an emergent medical condition unrelated to this bout and yet I am powerless to intervene because his seconds have not yet consented this intervention? Sounds awfully goofy! And yet here we go.
The crowd is deeply stoked for Yoshida, this thirty-two-year-old who once had knees that allowed him to train and compete on the world stage but is no longer exactly a person with those knees (still a gamer though!), and Royce Gracie, two years his senior, whose loss to 桜庭 和志 Sakuraba Kazushi lies three years behind him, while his losses to the California State Athletic Commission ("Both 'A' and 'B' test samples provided by Gracie 'had a [nandrolone] level of over 50 ng/ml and we were informed that the level itself was so elevated that it would not register on the laboratory's calibrator,' said the CSAC.[65]") and the Internal Revenue Service ("On April 1, 2015, the IRS sent Royce Gracie and his wife a Notice of Deficiency claiming they owe $657,114 in back taxes and $492,835.25 in penalties for Civil Fraud, based on IRC 6663(a).[90] The case was settled on March 31, 2023, and Royce Gracie agreed to pay $461,611.80 to the US government.[91]") remain some years off. I cannot help but notice that Yoshida is seconded by our own dear 高阪 剛 Kōsaka Tsuyoshi, under whose scissors we of course here gather. Kohsaka (let's go with the common transliteration as we move forward), I recall reading years ago, a friend from Yoshida's collegiate days, was essentially brought on board as Yoshida's mixed-fight-specfic newaza coach, which a) makes a lot of sense, for sure (especially if I am remembering this correctly), and b) is a reminder that, heading into this contest, none of us (almost nobody outside of Japan, certainly) had any real idea about Yoshida's newaza! I know that sounds wild, but please consider that, long before the days of complete access to all high-level judo competition on the more-or-less faultless Judo TV platform (or the ippon.org that preceded it), and super useful highlights compiled by judo YouTubers (who do a great job), the only access we had to elite judo competition was whatever we could grab on 101 Ippons VHS tapes, or snag on VCD from Byrd's Judo Shop in Hong Kong (man oh man that stuff cost me), or what made it onto the CBC Olympic broadcast (they do a great job; I am not complaining). The only Yoshida who could be known from those materials is the Yoshida who visited upon his opponents the symbolic death of 一本 ippon with a truly best-in-class left-handed 内股 uchi-mata quickly and often. If you managed to step off of it, he might follow with his tai-otoshi that was finishing people so quickly that it often looked more like an 足車 ashi-guruma (the leg presses, 醍醐敏郎 Daigo Toshirō explains, but it does not reap). And a pretty mean 大外刈 osoto-gari, too, actually. I don't see why I wouldn't just post a bunch of gifs I have made over the years for the Let's Play Judo tumblr; actually yeah, here's everything there that's tagged 吉田 秀彦 Yoshida Hidehiko:
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| 1992 Olympics Barcelona |
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| 1996 Olympics Atlanta |
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| 1999 World Championships Birmingham |
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| 第67回 全日本実業柔道団体対抗大会（2017/6/3-4）1日目 男子第3部 決勝戦 67th All-Japan Business Judo Group Counter Competition (2017/6 / 3-4) Day 1 Men's Part 3 Final Fight |
Pretty nifty, right? And yet nary a newaza highlight to be seen. Even if you'd been following international judo about as closely as the era allowed, and somebody had asked you about Yoshida's newaza ahead of this one, you'd probably have to be like, "you know what, it's honestly never come up."
AND WE'RE OFF! As the crowd venerates Yoshida as though he were mother of the heir and widow to the Lord Taikō (太閤), the Japanese commentator, totally understandably, is pretty much just listing different throws he hopes Yoshida might do: uchi-mata! osoto-gari! Yeah man let's do all sorts of those! Gracie, however, sensibly declines any position or even approach that might lead to that at all, electing instead to take a seat, and not in the mode of say 角田夏実 Tsunomi Natsuda, who in a sense did that all the way to an Olympic championship in the hotly contested -48kg division in Paris: in Tsunoda's case, it was a sitting back that was also a 巴投 tomoe-nage, and, from there, truly beautiful transitions from that noble 捨身技 sutemi-waza into juji-gatame (here is an excellent fifteen-minute highlight that suggests to me that Tsunoda is the best tomoe-nage player since at least 柏 崎 克 彦 Kashiwazaki Katsuhiko and arguably ever [I think it's ever!]). 引っ込む! 引っ込む! "Hikkomu! Hikkomu!" (to draw back; to sink; to cave in) is the word on commentary that accompanies Gracie's sitting, which might sound like a diss, but it's the same root as 引込返 hikikomi-gaeshi, a technique which everybody enjoys, so let's go with that. And plus you can't fault Gracie for this tactic (dropping) in service of his broader strategy (to remain unlaunched). Would it merit the caution and guidance of 指導 shido as a false attack in the context of judo 試合 shiai? Well sure, but that's neither here nor there (and yet there it is, right here [much like ourselves]). I recall that in his brief, uncharming pre-match video, Gracie claimed that his plan was to place his hand deep across Yoshida's collar, and then place his other hand deep across the other collar (sounds like a 逆十字絞 gyaku-juji-jime / reverse cross choke to me! or maybe he was thinking 片十字絞 kata-juji-jime? or even that rarest of birds, 並十字絞 nami-juji-jime? sadly he did not specify), and that he would strangle him, and that, rather than tap, Yoshida might perhaps go unconscious rather than tap if he wishes to prove himself possessed of sufficient honour (oh brother!), and the reason I am recalling this at present is that it is instead Yoshida who has secured a deep left-handed cross-grip (for he is a lefty), which seems a better point of control than Gracie's "literally nothing at present" (Yoshida has the sleeve on the other side as well; Gracie has encircled Yoshida's ankle with his right arm but does not have any real purchase on it so far [watch this space, though!]). I know that many people prefer no-gi newaza because it quickens the pace, and clearly favours youth and athleticism to the extent to which it eliminates the old-man gi-gripping tricks that so often serve only to to slow the match, but I think you can tell from how this sentence has developed (also from my advanced age) where my feelings fall on this question. Yoshida is "stacking" Gracie, as we say, bringing his weight to bear as he leans forward, but his left leg is already through the guard, and not just in the sense that he is using the shin to "staple" Gracie's thigh to the mat or anything (a classic for a reason); it's just all the way through. Gracie seeks to turn this positional disadvantage to a submissional advantage (I feel like this is important new language we have just uncovered together) by maybe starting towards a 片足挫 kata-ashi-hishigi / single-leg-crush / straight ankle-lock? Ah, he makes a cuff with his grips on either trouser-end (way down by the "selvage"! we've been watching a sewing show lately!) and extends his legs way up to attempt what I have heard referred to with the I suppose ablest term "the idiot sweep" but I think we can do better, and indeed perhaps must do better; how about the tippy-tippy-day-day sweep, on account of how it is so tippy?
It is not super tippy in this particular case, as Yoshida's base is strong (one could argue that his base strengthened throughout the nineties, as indicated by his honestly heroic climb through the weight categories, which I hope you will join me in celebrating and supporting; as we will discover together, his base will continue to strengthen in this way throughout his time in PRIDE). A fairly interesting position now, as Gracie has "turned the corner" and would have Yoshida's left arm available for an 足三角絡み ashi-sankaku-garami / triangular-leg-entanglement / omoplata were it not for how his own arm (Gracie's, this is to say) is kind of getting squished under Yoshida's leg, the one that is already through. Gracie starts fishing around in greater earnest for that straight anklelock we mentioned a few moments ago, and Yoshida, rather than twisting out or driving forward, drops back and attacks with, of all things, a heel hook! Yoshida, you old so-and-so! You have been hanging out with Tsuyoshi Kohsaka, haven't you, you sly boots! The crowd is lit at this unexpected development, and our commentator, much to his own surprise, it would seem, calls "ヒール・ホールド! ヒール・ホールド!" (heel hold, rather than heel hook, is the only way I've ever heard it in Japanese; a fairly nasty business either way, certainly). Even though they have not been a part of judo 乱取り randori or shiai for decades upon decades, I do like to teach 足関節技 ashi-kansetsu-waza / leglocks, not for their renewed relevance in contemporary no-gi grappling (curiously, there has been no analogous resurgence in mixed martial arts, probably on account of how while you are fishing around back there you just get smashed [indeed, smeshed]?), but instead for the old-timey-ist of reasons: that they are addressed by the father of French judo 川石 酒造之助 Kawaishi Mikinosuke in his classic Ma Méthode de Judo. I am so pleased to have my own copy, which I found for a very reasonable price, but I have also posted the complete PDF at the Let's Play Judo tumblr (here); the leglock material in particular, if that's all that you, the modern leglock enthusiast with an eye to towards tradition, would like to explore, that's been posted at the old Judo Info site here. Super neat old book! Intensely idiosyncratic! Tremendous æsthetic sense, too, as you can see below:
"GIVE UP? GIVE UP?" Royce Gracie is asked, but declines. We are in a truly Fighting Network RINGSesque leglock battle, rolling about and everything. After a good bit of that, there is a scramble back to the feet once the position collapses (neither fellow is really getting anywhere with their respective ashi-kansetsu), and the crowd is like HWOOOOAAAHHHH, pretty stoked about how their guy is doing thus far against someone who, let us recall, still had just the one loss on his record, and that was the ninety-minute bout against Sakuraba (though one could argue, I think, that a fifteen minute decision win over 高田伸彦 Takada Nobuhiko is a kind of loss)—there was certainly still a measure of mystique here, even allowing for Sakuraba's comic romp through a selection of Gracies. Royce throws a few of those stompy front kicks you may well recall from the earliest UFC days; Yoshida, adjusts his collar and shuffles his sleeve a little. When they come to grips again, the crowd buzzes, and the commentator again gets his hopes up for an uchi-mata, but Gracie once more elects to sit (again: I get it). This time, though, Yoshida's approach has changed: rather than trying to slip a leg through, he grabs high on both lapels, lifts and slams a little, a form of daki-age that was actually captured beautifully in ファイプロ・リターンズ / FaiPuro Ritānzu / Fire Pro Returns (the one for PS2 but that you can also download on the Playstation Network broadly [or at least for PS3 {I actually have some very exciting Fire Pro news to share with you below but I will set it to one side for now}]), and possibly before, but I certainly associate it with the new shoot-fight positional options that first appeared in Returns (honestly a heck of a game). In 2017, the 講道館 Kōdōkan finally deleted daki-age from its syllabus after about a century (give or take) of it being recognized not just as a foul but as a genuine hazard, but they didn't say you couldn't do it on crash mats as an interesting historical note for your students in the low-key summer months! Either way, here we have Yoshida, slamming lightly. Gracie has again taken that left-hand cross grip he assured us was the first step towards choking Yoshida out entirely; it is palm-up, and as he reaches (unsuccessfully) palm-down with his right, we have the answer to an earlier question that it may surprise you to learn was something I was actually wondering about pretty hard: it seems it is 片十字絞 kata-juji-jime specifically that he favours as his cross choke! Hey, me too! Attaboy Royce! Yoshida's posture is pretty good though, and yep, there's the left leg coming through (white-gi on white-gi really can be tough to sort out sometimes, and though I am not really a blue-gi guy for everyday wear, it really is beneficial for judo as a spectator sport [easier to referee too, honestly {I hold but the lowest possible provincial refereeing certification, and am very easily confused]). Immediately following the referee's call for ACTION!, Yoshida makes a cuff at Gracie's far-side knee, pushes it to the mat, and establishes the close chest-to-chest contact and shoulder pressure (dubbed "The Shoulder of Justice" at another club some of my students train/have trained at) you're going to need to really squish your pal as much you'd usually like to in niju-garami / half-guard. At this point, what he have is a half-guard in only the loosest sense, as Gracie's legs are no longer tight, and his back is truly flat atop the mat, a tough position for sure (usually in "half," one would like to have shrimped back up onto one's side, and maybe even work an underhook in there so you could scooch up and away and back onto your feet, if sweeping did not seem to be in the cards). The merest hint of gyaku-ude-garami to the far side does not go unnoticed by the attentive cameraman, the enthusiastic commentator, or the astute crowd (they all seem to dig it). Gracie defends this well, though, just by keeping things nice and tight, and so Yoshida seeks another path: his left arm circles Gracie's head, his left hand working its way inside his right sleeve . . . actually, I bet I wrote about this before one time, possibly in a big fat book now largely renounced several times over . . . turns out "yep":
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Ezequiel choke
A chokehold often, though not exclusively, executed from the mount, in which
the attacker wraps one arm around his opponent's neck, places the opposite
forearm across the throat, and scissors his opponent's neck between his fore-
arms. Depending on the angle of attack, the Ezequiel can act on either the
trachea or the carotid arteries. Although there are a variety of no-gi adapta-
tions, the technique is far more common in gi grappling, where one of the
attacker's hands can be inserted into or otherwise grasp the opening of the op-
posite sleeve for increased leverage. Known in judo as sode guruma jime
("sleeve wheel choke") or simply sode jime ("sleeve choke"), Brazilian Jiu-jitsu
players renamed the technique in honor of Ezequiel Paraguassu, a former
Brazilian judo international, respected in both styles for his proficiency with
his signature ne waza ("ground fighting") technique.
Because the gi plays an important role in most applications of the Ezequiel
choke, it is rarely seen in mma outside of Japan, where the traditional gi still
maintains a presence in competition. The most famous — or perhaps infa-
mous — Ezequiel choke in mixed martial arts came in Hidehiko Yoshida's much
disputed win over Royce Gracie in a special rules match at Pride's massive
Shockwave 2002 event. As Yoshida worked his way through Gracie's guard
and into mount, he slipped his left arm around Gracie's head and grabbed the
inside of his right sleeve with this left hand. Forcing his right arm across
Gracie's throat, Yoshida leaned forward, tightening the hold — and obscur-
ing the referee's view. As Gracie briefly lay motionless beneath him, Yoshida
looked up at the referee and asked, "Did he pass out?" The match was
stopped, and the livid Gracie sprang to his feet and protested immediately
that he had neither passed out nor had he tapped. In the years since, every ap-
plication of the technique calls to mind that moment in Tokyo National
Stadium where the protests of one irate Brazilian were drowned out by the cel-
ebration of tens of thousands of rapturous Japanese.
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That's about the size of it, I suppose, but I am reminded that, though I remain grateful for and appreciative of the opportunity to have done so, I sure don't miss writing for "the straight world" (of small popular-press martial arts publishing). As I remember things at the time of composition, "Did he pass out?" was a widely agreed-upon translation of what Yoshida said to the referee, but I had no Japanese at the time of that writing with which to judge anything at all, and though I posses the rudiments of that language now, I lack the Jomboy skills to tell you the actual words spoken. In searching them out just now, I have come to learn that there is a whole Wikipedia page on Yoshida vs. Gracie, and, despite relying on some of my own work as a source (never a comfortable feeling for me when I am looking something up! I am sure you can appreciate why!), it is on the whole super good: why not peruse it here? AH HA OKAY, in the opening paragraph of the 総合格闘技 sо̄gо̄kakutо̄gi section of Yoshida's Japanese Wikipedia page, they have him saying 「落ちた」ochita (he's fallen, he's dropped; 落 is a kanji we see in any number of judo waza [all of the ones that end in otoshi, in fact, and there are a bunch of those] and I am pleased and a little relieved to see it here [hello, old friend]), which I can definitely hear now (he says it a couple times); mind you, they have Gracie saying 「落ちていない」ochiteinai, like "hey hold on a minute, guys, I didn't fall or drop!" which I do not believe to be a direct quote unless Gracie has more Japanese than I had anticipated (the sentiment seems bang-on, certainly). ANYWAY, I really do recommend reading the English-language Yoshida vs. Gracie page in its entirety if you're at all interested in this match (and if you've gotten this far, I feel that your interest in this particular happening exceeds that of the general population nearly infinitely). It's really good! As was this match, which I continue to find exceedingly neat. As to the finish, I actually have less to say about that than you might expect, given how much it turns out I have had to say about everything else here (as E. M. Forster writes in a passage of Aspects of the Novel that pertains to Gide, "How can I tell what I think till I see what I say? [I quoted this just the other night in response to a question about raising our hips not just for the finish of 表三角絞 omote-sankaku-jime but for the initial catch, too; that my students are more patient than I deserve is self-evident]). If you are of a mind that the fix was in, I would disagree with you, but I would accept that I have no evidence that would likely dissuade you from that belief. If your feeling is that referee Noguchi was mistaken, I think that's perfectly reasonable, but, particularly if you have ever refereed or umpired or judged any kind of competition, I would ask you to consider the impossibility of his position, which is summed up by this passage from the Wikipeda page I keep trying to steer you towards:
"After interviewing Noguchi, examining video footage, and consulting combat sports experts, Pride rule director Yuji Shimada declared the promoters would finally keep the result as Yoshida's victory by knockout.[13] They concluded there were reasons to argue that Royce had lost consciousness for a brief time, and it was approved that Noguchi had acted out to protect Royce's life, fearing the possibility that the Gracie team could leave Royce to die on a locked chokehold.[13] Under those circumstances, victory was implicitly supported by the danger having come from a legal technique.[13] However, Pride chairman Naoto Morishita acknowledged the fiasco, and promised the promotion would ban rulesets that obstructed the referee's power to stop the match, arguing humanitary reasons.[13]"
This, to me, makes a lot of sense. I will tell you what I do not think makes a lot of sense, if this is indeed the Gracie argument (and if I am misrepresenting it, I apologize): that he made a conscious (wordplay!) and deliberate decision to go totally limp beneath the 縦四方固 tate-shiho-gatame (the most stoked call of all the stoked calls in this match is TATE-SHIHO! TATE-SHIHO! and I am with you, brother) that Yoshida had entered into right after securing 袖車絞 sode-guruma-jime. There are moments in grappling that do indeed call for what I am going to forevermore refer to as "tactical limpness" (consider the "noodle-arm shrug" escape from gyaku-ude-garami, for one), but I just don't see this as one such instance. It is entirely possible that I am mistaken in this assessment (wouldn't be the first time), and if your judgment is otherwise, I submit (further wordplay!) that we can, and indeed should, remain pals all the same.
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| tkbackpats.blogspot.com |
Finally, we are treated (in the truest sense, for what a treat it is) to truly charming documentary-style footage of 桜庭 和志 SAKURABA KUZUSHI arriving via mini-van in the afternoon, spending a few moments in the empty-stadium ring, merrily seeing about his Vader mask in a second van (seemingly unrelated to the first), spending time backstage with the almost preternaturally handsome Nobuhiko Takada, and walking the stadium halls ahead of the parade of fighters in the company of Semmy Schilt (who is so much taller) and Hidehiko Yoshida (who is not). Of all of this worthy footage, it is the Vader mask that I am most taken with at the moment, because I had kind of forgotten about it, and am reminded now that it was this particular Sakuraba ring entrance that had me carrying on at length in our very first PRIDE post, now years ago (Wednesday, September 26, 2018, if you can believe it; let us try and recall what our cares were then; let us remember the cats we had):
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HELLO MY FRIENDS AND WELCOME ONCE MORE AND PERHAPS YOU WILL RECALL that some time ago I took possession (in the limited and ephemeral sense to which we grow accustomed in this floating world of transience and sorrow) of an impressively complete set of Kakutougi Revolutionary Spirits/Dream Stage Entertainment Pride Fighting Championship shows through means of a mighty torrent that included not only the vast and sprawling numbered Pride FCs, Grand Prix, and Bushidos contested (or whatever) in fantastic domes, coliseums, and super arenas, but even the various Pride: The Best artisanal microshows from the humbler ディファ有明 Difa Ariake and 後楽園ホール Kōrakuen Hōru. It seems really great! The only shortcoming to be found with any of this (aside from the obvious and immense human cost) is that, in keeping with broader dark trends concerning materials of this weirdly-not-that-recent-anymore era, very few of the Pride shows in this torrent are Japanese pay-per-view (early) or network television (later) broadcasts, but instead the western English-language pay-per-view émissions. It was not always thus! There was a time when either was obtainable! I swear this to be true! I suppose the Japanese broadcasts could still be sought from the traders (seekers all, they are) but there is very little question that they would require payment whereas this torrent was given freely as a kindness and I accept it gratefully as such. (Also I have a great many of these shows in my basement, several of them Japanese, surely, but they are in an area of my basement that remains, at the time of this writing, suboptimally sorted [UPDATE: the basement is in such great shape these many years later, so much so that we have been able to establish a basement dōjō area with mats and everything, if you can believe it—ed.].) It might well be argued that our Japanese-broadcast-loss is more than made whole in the person of Bas Rutten, whose idiomatic (and yet not) English-language commentaries we may wish to accept as a kind of wergeld (that's not what that word means).
But as I say, a few of the files here are very much indeed the Japanese (frail) originals, including, maybe importantly, Ｄｙｎａｍｉｔｅ！ 史上最大の格闘技ワールド・カップ SUMMER NIGHT FEVER in 国立 which is to say Dynamite! Biggest Mixed Martial Arts World Cup - Summer Night Fever in the National Stadium which is to say Pride/K1 Shockwave Dynamite! before an apparently actual crowd of 91,107 [turns out not!—ed.] -- a wild scene in any tongue, for sure, but if there were any of these show you'd really extra want in the Japanese broadcast, this would be pretty high on the list, right? And it was whilst jumping around this show (I did not watch start to finish in this instance) that I happened upon Kazushi Sakuraba's entrance to face Mirko Filipović -- the Cro Cop himself, a living a rebuke to those who would unduly malign taekwondo -- and hearing the crowd's response not just to Sakuraba himself, nor yet to the smoke-blowing (well, Daijiro Matsui helped some) Vader helmet, but to the reveal of the leather or I guess probably plastic (what am I a saddler) Vader mask beneath [consider too his SAKURABA TIME t-shirt—ed.], in conjunction with being struck by just the madness of anyone ever thinking this was a thing to do, to have Sakuraba out there against Mirko Cro Cop, that I felt Everything Coming Together in a weird way that I am not prepared to defend but only to report: thinking, or perhaps more accurately feeling, how this really all is, as I have suggested several times before (a bunch of times, really, and possibly too many) that Pride really totally is part of what we have come to call The Long UWF (I am utterly convinced of this), but also how The Long UWF probably extends in time both ways, that it goes all the way back through Inoki's World Martial Arts Championship (if you were to point out that the 1984 UWF arose directly out of conflict with Inoki I would say yes of course it did this is the point entirely) to Rikidozan and Masahiko Kimura vs Hamilton's Sharpe Brothers (1936 Nazi Olympic credentials!) in 1954 and then all the way forward to to the end of Pride but really that's really probably it: the end of Pride now feels to me like the end of one surprisingly coherent thing (DREAM was an echo, RIZIN one so faint that it can scarcely be heard) that seemed epitomized as Sakuraba strolled to his doom in the 国立競技場 Kokuritsu kyōgijō National Stadium (they tore it down in 2015). I was thinking too about how the NJPW that has come back from the brink after the popular ruin (and yet weird æsthetic triumph) of the Inokiist NJPW (re)turn to professional wrestling as martial art (The Long UWF had already overtaken; Inokiism was its shadow) is NJPW in name only, really, to the extent that the commercially (and æsthetically, for sure) viable Tanahashi/Okada showman style (maybe the best iteration of that style ever, I think) that arose in the aftermath of The Long UWF's death has nothing to do with any of this at all, nothing to do with professional wrestling as either itself the strongest style or the (Saitama, Super) arena in which styles will be (fake) set against one another to determine which is in truth the strongest style, nothing to do with Inoki bringing in champions of various disciplines for the World Martial Arts matches that were presented as, and totally felt, realer than the other, also fake matches; or with the UWF breaking off and putting on matches that felt realer than the other, also fake matches (I pause to remind you that Leo Burke [may peace be upon him—ed.] got in on this); or the UWFi/Pancrase/RINGS era in which the matches felt realer still, often because they actually were (although we must never lose sight of Dave Meltzer's tale of mid-1997 RINGS, in which Dave was understandably trying to figure out which matches were shoots and which worked, which led "someone there" to say to Dave, "You're a mark," to which Dave was like "but why?" to which he was like, "Well, when you really understand the business, you'll realize it doesn't matter, because it's all the same anyway." And Dave was like "woah" as he realized how things truly were, here in The Long UWF, a term he has never used nor has Tadashi Tanaka even though pretty much all of my dumb feelings and worse ideas on this are his fault [not really, he is blameless and true]). All of this builds until Nobuhiko Takada has to become the living sacrifice for professional wrestling against Rickson Gracie in KAKUTOUGI REVOLUTIONARY SPIRITS PRIDE ONE except maybe it wasn't simple defeat so much as transcendence as although Takada lost this bout (and in time these bouts) it meant finally and truly (like for real this time) that professional wrestling became a thing not separate [分 わかれ wakare 【 分かれ 】(n) offshoot; branch; fork; see also 横分 yoko wakare side separation, a noble waza] from the martial arts but a place where actual martial arts actually happened, this time in the realest way possible (witness, if you dare, all of the face-kicking), even if this wasn't exactly the plan until it became clear that Takada was totally going to have to fight for real lest the whole deal fall apart entirely before it could come off at all. That Sakuraba, of Takada Dojo, whose Cro-Cop-gallows-walk engendered this poor reflection or perhaps these several poor reflections, turned out able to defeat if not Rickson Gracie himself (it never came up), then a thoroughly creditable array of Gracies and Gracie-proxies, and thus fulfill the rôle of Symbolic Takada, was of course enormous, but, at the same time, not everything, as it is not as though Sakuraba defeated all martial artists (here's Cro Cop just now, for instance), nor even all Brazilian martial artists (who then loomed myth-large). It was extremely nice, and super interesting, but that things were even being contested where and as they were was the weird triumph of it, that professional wrestling had become the place where all of this occurred for real now (though not always [we'll get to it]) amongst and amidst professional wrestlers even if some of the principles [this should have been "principals"!—ed.] did not identify as such (if your strange grandstanding-challenge-match martial arts family derides professional wrestling but claims Mitsuya Maeda as the source of its waza, then mister, and indeed missus, I don't even know what to tell you about the strange place you are in [nor, were I able to articulate it, should you listen]). Is it worth noting that the next (final?) Symbolic Takada (who might be a symbolic Maeda [who might be a symbolic Inoki {who might be a symbolic Rikidozan}]), Hidehiko Yoshida, makes his début at this very same Ｄｙｎａｍｉｔｅ！ 史上最大の格闘技ワールド・カップ SUMMER NIGHT FEVER? And dispatches with no real trouble (though not without controversy [if you are a dweeb {it gives me no pleasure to see that I was harsher then—ed.}]) Royce Gracie before Christ and the Buddhas and 91,107 [oops!—ed.] and a network television audience of millions? There is nothing new or arguably even interesting in any of this and it is entirely possible that what I am describing above does not even constitute an idea, however I can tell you for sure that it did constitute a feeling that I had as I encountered a moment at the intersection of physical culture and the æsthetic, a moment that is therefore literally crucial. I felt it all more heavily than I had previously, and the thing I felt most heavily of all wasn't even its continuity (though that did feel real) but the finality of it, that this is it, that when Pride is done, it's done, whatever it is we're describing (The Long UWF [obviously]). In a sense this is all about a truly realized strong style, isn't it, in that the UWF's rejection of Inoki was a rejection not of strong style but of a strong style deemed insufficiently strong (this led to conflict); and think too of how any credible claim to strong style post-Pride hinges on the stoic style forays (you are darn right I am using ファイヤープロレスリング Fire Pro Wrestling terms to deal with this) of Nakamura or Shibata, however ruinously -- but these ever-fainter echoes are not necessarily even that interesting, in this line of thought (feeling), except for the surrounding emptiness they reveal. This is all just thoroughly and irrevocably done! But that makes it all the more intriguing! Let us wander the ruins of this fallen kingdom, a little bit of Japanese and a decent amount of judo our compass and astrolabe! From time to time we will no doubt happen upon fellow travelers!
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And I think that we pretty well have!
To the match itself, then, which unfolds quite differently than I recalled, in that Sakuraba actually does kind of great against Cro Cop? Each striking exchange, to be sure, is filled with an absolute air of heinous menace, despite all the good-natured smiles and sportsmanship between these two athletes, but Saku weathers the worst of it nicely, and, though Cro Cop was, and would remain, really very tough to take down, Sakuraba manages it well enough, although he ends up a little battered in the grounded striking that follows, in particular some nasty downward elbows to the shoulder and collarbone (the collarbone shots looked just awful), and, worse yet, some deeply nasty up-kicks. When the doctor stops the fight after the second five-minute round with one of Sakuraba's eyes totally swollen shut, it's not immediately clear which blow was the culprit, but Saku's impressively thorough English-language Wikipedia page offers the answers: "Sakuraba was proposed a special ruleset of no strikes on the ground as part of the 'K-1 vs Pride theme', but he rejected the offer, not wanting any special rule for him.[68] Ironically, although he managed to take Cro Cop down through hard kicks, Sakuraba would end losing the match while exchanging strikes on Mirko's guard when an upkick from the kickboxer broke his orbital bone.[69]" Cro Cop is a sportsman in victory, and Sakuraba, even in broken-orbital defeat, is capable of a brief post-fight address that garners light chuckles from the National Stadium thousands. What a neat thing this all was! I'm so glad to have revisited it. Thank you for joining me for it.
Before we turn our attention to WHATEVER IT MAY HAVE BEEN THAT DAVE MELTZER HAD TO SAY, if you will indulge me even further (which I recognize is far more than I deserve) I wanted to take a moment to share with you the contents of two recent packages to have arrived from Japan by post (I don't know how else they would arrive, honestly), so recently in fact that their arrival (cheerfully) interrupted this very composition (I had to go outside and sign for them). Did you know that the BBM Infinity multisport Japanese baseball card sets that mostly contain baseball players (this is only natural) also sometimes have judo players in them? Well they do! And I got some! And because I am not made of stone, I also nabbed the Tanahashi and (to me, perfectly hilarious) Okada NJPW cards that were part of that same 2023 set. You will note, amongst other worthy selections, a Hidehiko Yoshida, whom we have discussed sort of a lot today. Also pictured: a Japanese copy of ファイヤープロレスリング A / Faiyā Puro Resuringu A (my very favourite one! also it's super cheap!) that I am pretty stoked about; note that they were in no way not shy about depicting totally identifiable guys right on the cover. Those rascals!
OKAY TAKE IT AWAY, CONTEMPERANOUS WRESTLING OBSERVER NEWSLETTER EXCERPTS:
September 9, 2002:
"PRIDE/K-1 DYNAMITE SHOCKWAVE
Thumbs up 127 (100.0%)
Thumbs down 0 (00.0%)
In the middle 0 (00.0%)
BEST MATCH POLL
Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira vs. Bob Sapp 127
WORST MATCH POLL
Ernesto Hoost vs. Semmy Schiltt 39
Royce Gracie vs. Hidehiko Yoshida 21
Gary Goodridge vs. Lloyd Van Dams 20
Vanderlei Silva vs. Tatsuya Iwasaki 14
ATTENDANCE AND PPV RECORDS SET, GIANTS CHANGE FACE OF FIGHTING, QUESTIONS, CONTROVERSY AND MUCH MORE AT SHOCKWAVE – In what was Japan’s answer to Wrestlemania III, and what was likely the biggest money live event in sports entertainment history took place as giants changed the future of fighting on 8/28 at Tokyo National Stadium.
The crowd was reported as 91,007 (hopefully a number that will never make these pages again. I was thinking they’d say 93,174). The real figure was estimated at about 71,000, making it the fifth largest sports entertainment crowd in recorded history and destroying all MMA records. The top four would be 4/29/95 in Pyongyang, North Korea for Inoki vs. Flair (170,000),; 4/28/95 in Pyongyang, North Korea for Hashimoto vs. Norton (150,000); 8/31/92 in Wembley Stadium in London for Bret Hart vs. Bulldog (78,927); and 3/29/87 in Pontiac Silverdome for Hogan vs. Andre (78,000).
It would have been legitimately the biggest crowd ever in Japan, as there were far more people there than on the shows where attendance was reported at 70,000 at the much smaller Tokyo Dome. It also destroyed all existing PPV records in that country with a better than 4.5 percent buy rate (more than 100,000 buys grossing more than $2 million, old record was 48,000 buys for the 2000 Pride World Grand Prix finals and Sakuraba vs. Royce). Walk-up sales were said to be awesome, which were largely the pro wrestling fans (major pro wrestling shows in Japan do huge walk-ups while martial arts shows usually do most of their sales early). It saw a show that started out disappointing with one-sided matches, created controversy and questions and was ultimately a huge success due to a classic match with 230-pound Pride world heavyweight champion Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira overcoming 375-pound Bob Sapp on a day the fighting world took notice that the day of the giants dominating may not be far in the future.
The building wasn’t totally sold out, although the spectacular overhead crowd shots looked impressive as it was close to packed, and visually came across like the famous crowd shots at Mania III. In reality, Wrestlemania the past two years sold out buildings almost as large, albeit with lower ticket prices, so this would have to be ranked as just behind the last two Manias as the biggest show in recent years.
Sapp, a physical specimen so overwhelming he barely looks human, combined with 7-foot Semmy Schiltt to show that once the freaks are trained for combat, it is no longer the domain of mere mortal heavyweights.
Sapp, with less than two minutes of combined MMA experience in destroying former pro wrestlers Norihisa Yamamoto and Kiyoshi Tamura, used his power to largely manhandle the best fighter in the world for most of the first ten minute round. He finally was victimized by exhaustion and then, an armbar in 4:03 of the second round, in what will go down as one of the classic heavyweight matches in fighting history.
On the same night, Schiltt, with limited K-1 experience consisting of exactly one match, used his ridiculous reach and an effective front kick, to dominate the most successful heavyweight kickboxer in history, Ernesto “Mr. Perfect” Hoost, earning a very controversial draw decision in a fight that most feel he had clearly won.
MMA has shown on numerous occasions that size can’t overcome superior skill, but when the monsters have guts and athletic ability and are taught that skill, it’s a different ball game. In losing, the general feeling was that once Sapp gets a little more skill, as he’s only been doing this for about a year since WCW folded, and improves his cardio (which will always be the potential weakness to exploit on a man that large), he’ll be unbeatable, if such a thing could exist in fighting. Similarly, as Schiltt improves his ability to use his reach, even a super skilled 6-5 man like Hoost is taken out of his game. Ironically, it’s that freak show element that is more of a ticket seller than two evenly matched and evenly skilled fighters.
That wasn’t the only controversy of the night. Royce Gracie, the guy who in the U.S. created the skill overcomes size doctrine in the early UFC events, had a limited striking match against 1992 Olympic judo gold medalist Hidehiko Yoshida, which ended in 7:24 with the referee stopping the match with Yoshida allegedly having a choke locked in. It turned into a crazy scene, with the Gracie side protesting, because Royce had not tapped, nor had the towel been thrown in and the rules they agreed on and demanded did not allow for a referee stoppage. According to Pride officials, the official result of the match has been declared a no contest, but this was never announced in Japan. In Japan, the news of Yoshida beating Gracie not only made the lead story in most of the sports newspapers the next day, but was covered significantly by the major newspapers that normally wouldn’t cover this kind of a sporting event. In one day, Yoshida became a major sports superstar there and reports are has been besieged with offers from major companies for sponsorships and TV commercials. Gracie, in Japan, was the major heel, for protesting and making a scene after the match. However, from watching the show, it was clear Gracie was right, in that the choke was not even fully locked in when the match was stopped. At this point, the result may be overturned and the match ruled a no contest.
While the live crowd was more into the pro wrestlers, because of the media pub, it was Gracie vs. Yoshida that ended up with the most general public interest. The show aired three days later on TBS in Japan in a Sunday afternoon time slot and did a 10.6 rating, a number that was considered excellent in that slot. The Gracie-Yoshida match drew the peak rating at 14.5, which is about 20 million viewers.
Inoki, who skydived into the stadium, got a far bigger reaction than anyone else on the show, followed by Frye and Kazushi Sakuraba, no doubt the two biggest draws on the show. They both lost and took terrible punishment in matches that neither should have ever been put in.
Frye was knocked out in just 1:30 by Jerome LeBanner, the French K-1 knockout artist who came in with about a 50-pound weight advantage. LeBanner was a replacement for defending K-1 Grand Prix champion Mark Hunt (said to have suffered a hand injury in training) just a few days ahead of time and showed up in great shape. Frye didn’t even know about the change in opponents until he got to Japan. The result would have been the same either way. With Frye as the top foreign fighter/pro wrestler in the Japanese market and never having lost a legitimate match on Japanese soil, the idea of putting him into a situation that it would take a miracle for him to survive asks a lot of questions.
Perhaps even more questions have to be asked regarding Sakuraba, who more than anyone else, has become the face of the Pride promotion and biggest draw on three of the company’s four biggest shows in history. Sakuraba was unable to answer the bell for the third round against Mirko Cro Cop. Sakuraba fought his third straight fight in which he gave up more than 20 pounds and went in at less than 100% between internal problems and fighting injuries. He suffered his third straight loss, and was fairly seriously injured for the third straight time.
In many ways, it is unfortunate that Pride is, in reality, a pro wrestling product that largely draws from pro wrestling fans (as crowd reactions clearly showed that the K-1 fans didn’t seem to support this show), except it is real. Certain fighters are ticket sellers and with so many big shows, they are overworked or put in money situations that aren’t always in the best interest long-term.
With a stadium so large to fill, Sakuraba’s best drawing opponent would be Cro Cop, because of the “pro wrestler hunter” storyline. Cro Cop handled one pro wrestler after another since August of last year. It started with then-IWGP champ Kazuyuki Fujita (a fluke win at the time on a blood stoppage, but with Cro Cop’s improvement over the past year on the ground, he’d likely be favored in a rematch) to Nobuhiko Takada (actually Takada in doing the deathly dull draw fared the best of anyone) to Ryushi Yanagisawa (under K-1 rules) to Yuji Nagata. It was Sakuraba trying to save face for Japanese wrestling that would be a ticket seller. And Sakuraba, despite giving up 25 pounds (and that’s with bulking up 12 pounds from his normal fighting weight for this match), was competitive and probably ahead at the time his eye socket was fractured and the match had to be stopped. Reports are he’ll be out of action until next spring. But even with his skill, the day has come where a natural 183-pound man shouldn’t be facing a heavyweight. They got one record gate out of Sakuraba, but the injuries are going to kill his longevity and future drawing power. Legit drawing cards in this industry are few, and when you luck into one, you can overprotect him. In the case of Sakuraba, it’s not even that, it’s more throwing him in situations that because of size, he shouldn’t be expected to overcome. The third loss in a row will also hurt the drawing power of a prospective third Sakuraba vs. Vanderlei Silva match, where Sakuraba would again be giving up weight against a younger man who has injured him twice.
The situation with Frye was worse because unlike Sakuraba, Frye had no chance going into a K-1 rules match, something he’d never done before, against a knockout artist like LeBanner, who is coming off a knockout win over Hunt. Sure, there is always the rematch possibility under Pride rules, but Frye, after the knockout, is again talking about retirement.
Hoost and Gary Goodridge both fought their second fight in 12 days, as each prevailed on a K-1 show in Las Vegas. Nogueira had just fought three weeks earlier at the Tokyo Dome. The reality of wrestling and fighting, and this draws from elements of both, is that it is hard to create a legit superstar and a draw, and if you put them in positions to look human instead of mythical, you hurt them. Overworking them when they are hot only limits their window of opportunity, and it’s a huge problem when there are constantly big shows and such a limited a number of superstars for those shows.
Another problem with the Japanese version, a necessary evil perhaps, is they booked the stadium and planned the show, basically with only one match, Sakuraba vs. Cro Cop. Most of the matches were made at the last minute, as noted, many with fighters who were run down from recent fights or not having time to properly peak. In the case of Vanderlei Silva, they were having an impossible time finding him an opponent and ended up putting him in with a karate guy who had almost no experience and with the match being made two days ahead of time, no time to train for such a dangerous man. As sports competition, despite its less flashy product, UFC is far superior because they don’t do squash matches and stupid matches, and because for the most part, shows are completed a month or two ahead of time rather than thrown together at the last minute, so you’ve got guys properly trained with a game plan as opposed to stars thrown out there, like Frye was with LeBanner, not even knowing his opponent until a few days ahead of time.
The American broadcast also featured a ton of Bill Goldberg. Goldberg was shown giving his thoughts on Pride, talking about how he got his pro wrestling character from MMA, and was shown backstage talking with several of the fighters such as Sapp, Goodridge and Frye. He joked with Frye about the odds he was facing in his fight beforehand, and when Frye asked if Goldberg was going to hit him with a chair, Goldberg asked if Frye would sell it. When Goldberg did an interview before the live crowd in English, he talked about hoping people would come to appreciate his work on Friday and Saturday (the two All Japan shows). During the English broadcast, while they played Goldberg up as a celebrity all over the show, there was almost no talk of pro wrestling or acknowledgement as to what he was taking about in his speech. Stephen Quadros gave his background as a major sports figure in the U.S. who played for the Atlanta Falcons, with no mention of pro wrestling. When Goldberg talked about his upcoming matches, there was no mention of him pro wrestling in Japan. Goldberg himself when asked about who could beat Sapp, responded distinctly that he himself was a pro wrestler, however.
Show opened with an Olympic torch lighting ceremony featuring Inoki and Helio Gracie, Royce’s father and the man who popularized Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and Vale Tudo in the 40s and 50s in Brazil. Inoki was seconded by Yuji Nagata, current IWGP pro wrestling champ, while Helio had Royce with him, to represent the two worlds merging.
It was announced that the next Pride PPV in the U.S., called Beasts from the East II, would air on 10/13, which would be a two-week tape delay from the live show on 9/29 in Nagoya. This will be considered a small show, and because there are competing events on PPV in the U.S. that weekend, they decided to go with the delayed broadcast.
On 9/2, Sapp reprised a famous pro wrestling scene from the 60s, where the Great Antonio pulled a bus to build up a match with Rikidozan. Sapp, on a national television show, pulled an 8,000 pound bus.
1. Vanderlei Silva destroyed Tatsuya Iwasaki in 1:18. The bell rang at 6:58 p.m. in Japan, and the only question was whether Silva could finish him by 7 p.m. He did. Iwasaki, who agreed to the fight with just a few days notice since they couldn’t find any worthy fighters to face Silva with no lead time, looked out of shape. A legit Kyokushin karate champ of Japan (an art that doesn’t allow blows to the head), this was a sad, overmatched squash. Silva threw a left kick to the face and pounded him with punches from the top before it was stopped. After the match, they continually talked about a Silva vs. Bas Rutten match, which they’ve now been talking about for nearly one year.
2. Jerrell Venetiaan, the K-1 Dutch champ, beat pro wrestler Daijiro Matsui, who wasn’t even asked to fight until two days beforehand. The first two rounds, said to be boring, were edited out. Third round saw Matsui badly miss a dropkick, which is kind of understood he’s always going to try as a pro wrestler. Venetiaan opened up Matsui’s left eye with a soccer kick. Venetiaan did far more damage, and won a split decision.
3. Gary Goodridge destroyed Lloyd Van Dams in 3:39. Goodridge was funny in his pre-match interview, as they brought up his huge upset win over Mike Bernardo in Las Vegas. Goodridge said that Bernardo told everyone he was 100% sure he was going to destroy him, and Goodridge said until the day of the fight, he was also 100% sure Bernardo was going to destroy him. Van Dams is a 260-pound mid-level K-1 fighter from Holland who was lost once Goodridge took him down with a belly-to-belly suplex. Goodridge pounded on his face, busted up his nose, then opened up his forehead. He got a mount and was throwing in the blows before the ref stopped it. A total one-sided fight.
4. Ernesto Hoost drew Semmy Schiltt over five rounds. This was a good tactical K-1 match as Schiltt used his reach to keep Hoost away. However, to the Pride audience, it was out of context (kind of like watching Brawl for All in the middle of a Raw show). Hoost got a few good punches in, but Schiltt was dictating the pace and the aggressor. All three judges ruled it a draw (and not only that, two of the three judges ruled every single round even). This was very strange since everyone watching thought Schiltt clearly won several of the rounds and the fight. Decision was booed. Kazuyoshi Ishii, the K-1 promoter, on commentary, admitted that a draw for Hoost considering who he is and Schiltt’s lack of K-1 experience, is really a loss for Hoost.
5. Jerome LeBanner destroyed Don Frye in 1:30. Legendary pro wrestling announcer Ichiro Furutachi (New Japan’s announcer during the Inoki/Hogan/Andre/Tiger Mask glory days; sort of a Japanese Gordon Solie if Solie had left wrestling and gone on to be a big media personality) did this fight for Japan TV. LeBanner pounded him, and Frye had to take a standing eight count. LeBanner kicked his face and nailed him with some hard shots. Crowd went crazy for Frye as he came out and loved the match because it was all action, and in Japan, nobody had ever seen Frye handled like this so from a Japan standard the match was considered a huge success.
They did a long presentation and intermission. First, they honored Helio Gracie in a long ceremony. Ishii said that if it wasn’t for Gracie, then this sport wouldn’t even exist. Then Goldberg came out. Goldberg didn’t get a loud pop, but everyone in the building was standing in awe of him. He plugged his pro wrestling matches. Then Inoki’s music played. He got triple the reaction of anyone else on the show as he skydived from a plane from two miles up to the building, landing on the ramp as a camera followed him down. After such a fiasco three weeks ago, he not only redeemed himself again, but literally stole the show.
6. Nogueira beat Sapp in 4:03 of the second round (first round was 10:00, so it was 14:03 total). Nogueira immediately went for a double leg, but Sapp blocked him and gave him a ganso bomb. Nogueira was very lucky to have survived that one. Sapp overpowered him early but Nogueira was never out of it. Nogueira got a side mount and busted Sapp open over the right eye. Sapp reversed him and pounded him badly. Nogueira went for his triangle from the bottom, but every time, Sapp would power bomb him hard to break it up. Nogueira’s face was a total mess from the punishment as he took brutal shots on the ground. Both men’s cuts were checked by the doctor at different times. Nogueira seemed more effective standing, but kept trying to take it down. He was quicker and more skillful standing, but he’d land hard punches to Sapp’s face, and Sapp wouldn’t even react to them. Sapp would shove Nogueira standing and he’d go flying and want to take it down, figuring at least on the bottom he could try submissions. Nogueira would go for a takedown, but Sapp wound wind up on top with all that weight on him. Sapp clearly won the first round. When the round was over, Sapp looked totally gassed and Nogueira’s face looked like hell. They traded early in the second round. It wound up on the ground. Goldberg noted that there wasn’t enough air on the planet to fill up Sapp’s lungs at that point. Sapp was totally gassed and Nogueira grabbed this 25-inch arm and armbarred him, and got the tap. Place went ballistic for the finish. Quadros said that this finish turned Nogueira into a living legend of the sport. This didn’t air on the U.S. PPV, but after the match, Josh Barnett, who trained Sapp for the fight, issued a challenge to Nogueira for the belt. Unfortunately, that match won’t be able to take place until next spring at the earliest because of Barnett’s suspension.
7. Yoshida no contest Gracie in 7:24. This was mainly submissions. Striking to the body was legal, but neither guy tried any, and both wore gi’s. It was more like a combination judo and jiu jitsu style of a match. Both tried leglocks, which aren’t really a specialty of either. At one point Yoshida went for a “Kimura” (entangled armlock) which was the move pro wrestler Masahiko Kimura used on Helio Gracie in 1951 in what was the biggest MMA match in history up to that point in time in a soccer stadium in Brazil. Yoshida had pro wrestlers Michiyoshi Ohara (who disappeared off the face of the Earth after his loss to Renzo Gracie in Pride) and Tsuyoshi Kosaka in his corner. Yoshida was calm all the way. He tried a shoulderlock and necklock before going for the clock choke (trying to choke Royce with his gi for a judo finisher) when the ref stopped it. All hell broke loose at that point because it was a very premature stoppage. The choke wasn’t even fully applied. Still, the uncharismatic Yoshida was made into a superstar with the win. Quadros didn’t shill for the finish, as when they went to the replay, he said the choke wasn’t locked on and it was a bad stoppage. He also said that Schiltt should have won the decision over Hoost.
8. Cro Cop beat Sakuraba via doctor stoppage after two five minute rounds. Sakuraba came out as Big Van Vader, with the old Vader headpiece from his New Japan days, a Vader string mask underneath, and a shirt that read “Sakuraba time.” Neither Rutten nor Quadros knew the significance, and thought Sakuraba’s outfit was either out of the movie “Road Warrior” or “Pulp Fiction.” Goldberg only announced the Sapp and Frye matches so if he could have figured it (and of course, every fan in the building understood it), he wasn’t there for the save. Cro Cop is now a superstar babyface on K-1 shows, but is heavily booed on Pride shows (he even turned “superheel” Silva huge babyface in their match) as the “outsider.” Since he was heavily booed here, it told what audience did and didn’t come. Seeing how well this plays out boggles my mind when in pro wrestling, these angles come around and the promotion has the advantage of being able to manipulate them for maximum gate appeal, and these gates do better with results without having that long-term edge. Cro Cop had excellent defense against Sakuraba’s takedowns. He’s improved so much in the past few months. Cro Cop clocked him with a punch and got a lot of strong leg kicks in. Things were looking bad for Sakuraba, but finally he connected with a strong punch and at 3:15 he got a takedown. Cro Cop actually escaped with something resembling a monkey flip. Second round saw Cro Cop connect with more low kicks and a hard body kick. Sakuraba took him down and dominated him for much of the second round throwing punches from the top. Cro Cop threw a hard punch from his back which broke the eye socket on Sakuraba’s right eye. Sakuraba seemed to be winning the fight when the bell rang to end the second round, but as he got off, he eye was swelling shut badly and you could see he wasn’t going to be able to continue. The doctor looked at him and stopped it. This would have been the best match of the night on most Pride shows.
The show ended live (this didn’t air) with Ishii talking about doing a Gracie-Yoshida rematch after more complaining from the Gracie camp."
and
"Pride is planning a November Tokyo Dome show based around yet another Nobuhiko Takada retirement match, this time for Takada to pass the torch to Hidehiko Yoshida. Inoki made that announcement, and apparently Takada was pissed, because he never agreed to any such thing. For the 9/29 Pride show, besides the Ryan Gracie vs. Shungo Oyama and Andrei Kopylov vs. Mario Sperry, the only match talked about we know of is Heath Herring vs. Fedor Emelianenko (a good match for the hardcores but of zero box office value and not really an on paper exciting fight as Fedor’s match with Semmy Schiltt was boring, tho Herring is a much better wrestler than Schiltt). Also scheduled according to various sources, none official, are Ricardo Arona, Anderson Silva, Vanderlei Silva, Igor Vovchanchyn, Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira and the Pride debut of Kevin Randleman. Sapp vs. Cyril Abidi (winner will then face Jerome LeBanner) under K-1 rules and Bernardo vs. Tom Erikson (who has never done a kickboxing match in his life) under K-1 rules are official for 9/22. Ishii is doing a pro wrestling stipulation stating that if Erikson can beat Bernardo, that Bernardo then has to retire, and the winner of that match will later face Mark Hunt. Ishii was shocked and embarrassed by Bernardo being knocked out in Vegas by Goodridge."
September 16, 2002:
"It is just about official that the Pride/K-1 Dynamite! show on 8/28 at Tokyo National Stadium was the biggest grossing live pro wrestling event in history.
The final number is not confirmed, but we’re told it did exceed the record $7 million live gate set on April 4, 1998 at the Tokyo Dome for the Antonio Inoki retirement match against Don Frye. The all-time non-Japanese record is barely half that, set by the Hogan vs. Rock match at Toronto Skydome for Wrestlemania this year. The merchandise figures from the show of $400,000 didn’t come anywhere close to the top figures on previous major shows for either WWF or some of the bigger previous Japanese Tokyo Dome events. The all-time merchandise record is $2.6 million also set at the Inoki retirement show. Guess they didn’t have any skydiving bobble heads.
A correction from last week’s issue. The PPV did top 100,000 buys out of 2.2 million PPV homes in Japan and it did easily break the Japanese all-time record. However, the record listed of 48,000 for the Royce Gracie vs. Kazushi Sakuraba match was incorrect. The previous record was set November 3, 2001 of 70,000 buys for Sakuraba vs. Vanderlei Silva. Sakuraba has now headlined the three largest PPV shows in the history of Japan and Pride now has seven of the ten biggest in the history of the country."
and
"Just to show how enormous mainstream the Dynamite show was, in the 8/30 Tokyo Sports, the entire first five pages and most of page six was nothing but show coverage. The front had a huge photo with a story about Hidehiko Yoshida beating Royce Gracie (regarding acknowledgement in Japan that the result has been changed to a no contest, the reports in Japan are that DSE will make an announcement in another week). Page 2 had nothing but coverage of the show, featuring four more sidebars on the show, all mainly about Yoshida’s win. Page 3 was also nothing but the show, mainly focusing on Sakuraba’s loss and the next three pages covered the rest of the show before baseball (the most popular sport in Japan) coverage started on page 7. I can’t ever recall any similar event getting that degree of coverage. They’ve started pushing a Yoshida vs. Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira match as, with Yoshida watching, Nogueira did a promo on the Deep show saying he was 100% sure he’d win that match."
and
"Doctors told Sakuraba that he couldn’t start training again until the end of November, so that officially nixes any chance of him participating in a proposed November Tokyo Dome show. The hoped for plan would be if Sakuraba beat Cro Cop, that the Dome would be headlined by Sakuraba-Silva III. At this point, with Sakuraba’s injuries and Silva’s added size, it would be a bad match to make even though on paper with the possible exception of a Rickson-Ogawa match, it’s the best possible drawing match they could put together. Really it’s time for Sakuraba to do worked shoot style pro wrestling because he’s getting seriously injured too often. Same really goes for Frye, as he’s taken a lot of physical punishment this year, particularly his knees and ankles in the Shamrock fight and his head from the LeBanner bombs. Sapp actually weighed 352.0 pounds for his match with Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira (who weighed in at 230.8). Sapp dropped down from the 387 he weighed for his previous fight with Kiyoshi Tamura, obviously feeling he’d need more cardio as he was very nervous going into the match, and rightfully so. Sakuraba weighed 191.4, which was the heaviest I can ever recall him going into the ring at, while Cro Cop trimmed to 215.6. Jerome LeBanner was 268.4 to Don Frye’s 220.7. Royce was 193.6 to Yoshida’s 225.7. If Pride were to promote in the U.S., most of these matches wouldn’t be allowed to take place because of the weight differential."
and
"The next Pride show on 9/29 in Nagoya (10/13 air date in U.S.) has officially announced besides Ryan Gracie vs. Shungo Oyama (Ryan goes for revenge after Renzo lost to Oyama), Andrei Kopylov vs. Mario Sperry (Russian vs. Brazil submission but Kopylov is out of his league striking and is old and out of shape but way bigger than Sperry), Norihisa Yamamoto vs. Guy Mezger and Alexander Otsuka vs. Anderson Silva. It’s a classic 'B' level show because anything good will be saved for the Tokyo Dome."
September 23, 2002:
"On the Bob Sapp front, Sapp is under contract to Ishii for K-1, and Ishii books him out to Pride. Both All Japan and New Japan are also vying for his pro wrestling rights."
and
"In something of an about face, Naoto Morishita of Pride announced that they were upholding the referees decision and that it will be considered a win by Hidehiko Yoshida over Royce Gracie. Largely the ref refused to reverse his decision and Yoshida said that he could feel Gracie going out with the choke when it was called. The Gracie side, which had been told it was to be regarded as a no contest when the decision was apparently going to be that way (we were also originally informed it was being ruled a no contest before being told that decision had changed) were said to be very upset. They probably should do a rematch, but there is no point in Pride doing so because in a submission rules match with a 20:00 time limit, like the first fight, and no judges, the odds are it’s going to be a draw which only hurts Yoshida, who they are hopeful has been created as a star, and even if he beats Gracie again, he doesn’t gain nearly as much as he’s risking since in the Japanese fans’ eyes, he’s already beaten him clean."
and
"The complete 9/29 Pride show (10/13 U.S. PPV date) in Nagoya was announced on 9/18. Besides the matches listed last week (Alexander Otsuka vs. Anderson Silva, Norihisa Yamamoto vs. Guy Mezger, Shungo Oyama vs. Ryan Gracie and Mario Sperry vs. Andrei Kopylov), they’ve added Heath Herring vs. Iouri Kotchkine, Kevin Randleman vs. Michiyoshi Ohara (former New Japan Pro Wrestler who disappeared off the face of the Earth when he looked so poor against Renzo Gracie in a Pride match), Igor Vovchanchyn vs. Quinton Jackson and Akira Shoji vs. Paulo Filho. It’s a show without any kind of a marquee main event, so we’ll see just how hot the name Pride is if they can do a good house with this. This is really a bunch of matches that make no storyline sense or don’t lead to anything, like a UFC show of a few years ago. Kotchkine is a former RINGS guy who Herring should destroy. Randleman should destroy Ohara in his Pride debut. Vovchanchyn vs. Jackson is a good match on paper. Vovchanchyn should be the favorite and it’ll probably be a good slugfest, but you don’t know how much Vovchanchyn, who has had more fights than almost anyone in Pride, has lost from all his matches even at 29. Filho, a strong Brazilian ranked No. 4 in the FCF ratings at 185 pounds, should beat Shoji, although when giving up weight you never know. Otsuka, a pro wrestler, should have a size edge on Silva but not an ability edge. Yamamoto is a lot bigger than Mezger, but Yamamoto hasn’t looked good in a long time. Oyama had a boring fight with Renzo Gracie, but he won, so I guess Ryan coming for revenge is a storyline, but the idea of building up Oyama (everyone expects him to win) as the new Gracie beater is a joke because Oyama isn’t that good."
and
"The Pride Tokyo Dome show was announced for 11/24. At this point that’ll be a difficult one because there is no Kazushi Sakuraba vs. Vanderlei Silva marquee main event that can pack that building. Sakuraba has said that he would be willing to fight, even though doctors have said no way. The promotion is still hoping to put together Yoshida vs. Nobuhiko Takada as Takada’s retirement match, but that’s far from a done deal. Takada did say he’s agreed to do a Pride retirement match at the Dome show, but that he wanted to return to traditional pro wrestling in 2003."
and (from the Pancrase section):
"The strong ratings of the recent Pride in a similar time slot has made the networks more interested. From a TV perspective in Japan, several have noted that the feeling is that pro wrestling is yesterday’s news and MMA is the future of pro wrestling in Japan. Problem is that MMA is not as exciting on television and can’t perpetuate itself as well, both because it can’t work storylines as efficiently and also because a top wrestling star can appear every week on TV and draw for ten years, while a big MMA draw only has a few fights a year and maybe a three year window. Like with Sakuraba, by the time he’s over enough as a legend to be such an incredible draw, he’s only on the downside because of injuries."
An interesting note to end on, I think! Please allow me to thank you once again for your attention to these matters. I acknowledge that this one got a little out of hand in terms of sheer, unremitting volume (over twelve-thousand words before we made our way to the Observer excerpts), but I suppose that could just as easily be said of our overall project as well. To the extent that the part and the whole might stand for one another in this way, have we been lightly synecdochic? Almost certainly not. And yet one cannot help but wonder, and to try to remember what little Kenneth Burke one may have once read and known, or at least heard about. We will almost certainly figure it out when next we convene at 名古屋市総合体育館 Nagoya-shi Sōgō Taiikukan, formerly Nagoya Rainbow Hall, currently Nippon Gaishi Hall (to reflect the sponsorship of 日本碍子株式会社, Nihon gaishi kabushikigaisha / NGK Insulators, Ltd., a trusted name in ceramics). Until then, please take care.
That Wikipedia page you linked cites this very blog, which I think is kinda incredible
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