DREAM 18 wasn’t the only Japanese MMA event on New Year’s Eve. Inoki Bom-Ba-Ye 2012 – a hybrid MMA/Pro-wrestling card – also provided the MMA community with some freak show goodness. We’ve been putting off coverage of this event until videos surfaced because frankly, when the main event features a post-prime Cro Cop vs. a disgraced sumo wrestler turned professional wrestler, well, yeah, this event can wait a few days.
The main event, Cro Cop vs. Suzukawa, proved that no matter how far past his prime he is, Cro Cop can still submit a clueless jabroni making his MMA debut. In other words, it was a decent freak show fight that played out exactly as it should have. It just wouldn’t be New Year’s Eve without a freak show fight, now would it?
DREAM 18 wasn’t the only Japanese MMA event on New Year’s Eve. Inoki Bom-Ba-Ye 2012 – a hybrid MMA/Pro-wrestling card – also provided the MMA community with some freak show goodness. We’ve been putting off coverage of this event until videos surfaced because frankly, when the main event features a post-prime Cro Cop vs. a disgraced sumo wrestler turned professional wrestler, well, yeah, this event can wait a few days.
The main event, Cro Cop vs. Suzukawa, proved that no matter how far past his prime he is, Cro Cop can still submit a clueless jabroni making his MMA debut. In other words, it was a decent freak show fight that played out exactly as it should have. It just wouldn’t be New Year’s Eve without a freak show fight, now would it?
My favorite moment from this one comes around the 1:40 mark, when Ishii pushes Sylvia across the ring attempting a takedown. No one is here to say that judo doesn’t work against larger opponents, but Ishii found that it’s certainly much more difficult to implement when your opponent is a 300+ pounds of fat, ribs and lousy tattoos. Probably the best instance of a fighter being confused by his freaky opponent’s fatness since Minowaman vs. Butterbean.
Speaking of Minowaman, he fought on New Year’s Eve, as is tradition. His opponent was middleweight “Playbor” Bor Bratovz. Okay, so it wasn’t a freak show fight, but Minowa managed to defeat someone his own size, which is almost as impressive. He picks up a heel-hook in the first round of this one.
Rolles Gracie also defeated Yusuke Kawaguchi two minutes into the first round of their fight by arm-triangle choke. You’re on your own for a video of that one, though. Enjoy the freak shows.
Sorry, Alistair, it looks like you’ll just have to wait your turn.
In an interview with MMAFighting’s Ariel Helwani that followed the UFC 150 post-fight press conference, Dana White was asked to answer a series of questions with simple “yes” or “no” answers. And although it seemed implausible that The Baldfather could ever go more than thirty seconds without uttering a certain curse word, he kindly obliged Helwani and spilled the beans in regards to several big questions currently circulating in the MMA world. Simply put, bullshit was cut through in record time.
And among the questions present in the back of Ariel’s (and everyone’s) mind was that of heavyweight champion Junior Dos Santos and who would be the next man to get viciously mauled to death bravely sacrifice himself for the good of The Colony “challenge” him for the title. To put it in the words of DW: Overeem – No, Velasquez – Yes. Although an event has yet to be named, White said in a seperate interview that the pair would likely collide on the annually stacked New Year’s Eve card, also known as the card that Overeem will totally be fighting on.
Sorry, Alistair, it looks like you’ll just have to wait your turn.
In an interview with MMAFighting’s Ariel Helwani that followed the UFC 150 post-fight press conference, Dana White was asked to answer a series of questions with simple “yes” or “no” answers. And although it seemed implausible that The Baldfather could ever go more than thirty seconds without uttering a certain curse word, he kindly obliged Helwani and spilled the beans in regards to several big questions currently circulating in the MMA world. Simply put, bullshit was cut through in record time.
And among the questions present in the back of Ariel’s (and everyone’s) mind was that of heavyweight champion Junior Dos Santos and who would be the next man to get viciously mauled to death bravely sacrifice himself for the good of The Colony ”challenge” him for the title. To put it in the words of DW: Overeem – No, Velasquez – Yes. Although an event has yet to be named, White said in a separate interview that the pair would likely collide on the annually stacked New Year’s Eve card, also known as the card that Overeem will totally be fighting on.
It’s hard to see why Ariel wins more MMA journalism awards than Uwe Boll does Razzies, as he managed to extract more information out of White in ten seconds than our intern Frederick has done in two years (we told him that if he resolved our situation with Dana, we’d hire him, and we haven’t seen him since). Here’s a brief rundown:
– BJ Penn vs. Rory MacDonald is still happening, likely as a co-main event on UFC on FOX 5.
– Dana “is cool” with Jason Miller, even though Mayhem refused to call him during their awkward Twitter exchange. Turns out, Dana was only joking when he told Miller to retire, furthering my belief that sarcastic font really needs to become a thing in 2013.
And although booking Velasquez over Overeem was the right thing to do given the circumstances, it also looks like the UFC is walking into the same potential trap that they placed themselves in with UFC 150. What trap are we referring to? Well, aside from DirecTV shitting the bed Saturday night, the live gate for UFC 150 was apparently “the worst gate for a pay-per-view since 2007″ according to White, who told the following in the UFC 150 media presser just moments before.
White attributed part of the low attendance to the recent string of Colorado-based tragedies that has swept over the state, and he undoubtedly has a point here. But on the other hand, the paltry 650k gate can also be attributed to that of the main event. Not many of us thought Edgar had earned an immediate rematch based on his performance alone at UFC 150, to which White’s response was that Edgar received one simply because it was owed to him. And while the latter is true, it doesn’t exactly generate a lot of excitement, or at least enough to fill an arena in any case.
Yet here we are again, witnessing another rematch. Only this time, the first fight didn’t end in a controversial decision, but in a first round knockout. Sure, Velasquez was coming off a long layoff and got caught, and sure, he will definitely do better the second time around (as did Edgar), but when even Dos Santos is admitting that he doesn’t want this fight, it’s kind of hard to get excited for it from a fan’s perspective, something the gate numbers might reflect down the line.
Then again, the end of the year cards are normally stacked enough to draw even the most reluctant MMA fan out of hiding, so the UFC will more than likely prosper to close things out unless a *knock on wood* injury curse rears its ugly head again. It should be known that I also scored Henderson/Edgar II in favor of Edgar (48-47), so what the hell do I know?
How about you, Potato Nation? Are you excited to see these two throw down once again? One thing’s for sure, the winner wont be decided by the judges, and that should be reason enough to get excited.
“Listen, I know we’ve had our moments, but before you make your list just hear me out…” (Photo: Gossiboocrew.com)
We’re only a few hours into the new year, but unless your head hit the pillow just as the ball dropped, you’ve probably already carried some of your bad habits with you into 2012. We are creatures of habit, and change doesn’t come naturally to us. If it did, we wouldn’t make such a big production out of our ‘New Year’s Resolutions’. The sport of mixed martial arts and its fans are no different. Here’s a quick look at some of the bad habits we’ve picked up and poor decisions we’ve made over the past 12-months. Let’s hope we can leave them behind in yesteryear.
“Listen, I know we’ve had our moments, but before you make your list just hear me out…” (Photo: Gossiboocrew.com)
We’re only a few hours into the new year, but unless your head hit the pillow just as the ball dropped, you’ve probably already carried some of your bad habits with you into 2012. We are creatures of habit, and change doesn’t come naturally to us. If it did, we wouldn’t make such a big production out of our ‘New Year’s Resolutions’. The sport of mixed martial arts and its fans are no different. Here’s a quick look at some of the bad habits we’ve picked up and poor decisions we’ve made over the past 12-months. Let’s hope we can leave them behind in yesteryear.
“Faggot”, “Cunty”, Rape Jokes, Etc.
“That’s why pencils have erasers.” (Pic: MMAMania.com)
If I cared about people’s feelings I probably wouldn’t read this site and I certainly would write half of what I do, so don’t look to me to carry the torch for easily offended. And while I also think that it’s certainly not in the best interest of any public figure to use divisive, hateful language, it’s their right to speak their mind and live or die by their words. Lastly, although these incidents have been used by our enemies to suppress our mainstream progress, I don’t think anything short of an in-Octagon death can stop us now.
So why am I opposed to this controversial language? Simple: I don’t want a poor choice of words coming between me and great fights. We’ve already seen one fighter cut, albeit briefly, for an off-color joke, and I don’t want it to happen again. Had the UFC pulled the plug on the Brock experiment after his UFC 100 tirade, we would have missed out on many of the highs and lows of his polarizing career. And just imagine how less interesting the welterweight division would be right now if Diaz’s many past crimes were held against him. If we continue down this road, a major star is going to cross the line and we’ll all be deprived of great fights. That’s why it’s time to draw a line in the sand.
("Want a Baby Ruth?")
MMAJunkie is reporting that a heavyweight tilt between K-1 star Jerome LeBanner and DREAM light heavyweight champion Gegard Mousasi could be added to the K-1 Dynamite New Year’s Eve show December 31 at the Saitama Super…
("Want a Baby Ruth?")
MMAJunkie is reporting that a heavyweight tilt between K-1 star Jerome LeBanner and DREAM light heavyweight champion Gegard Mousasi could be added to the K-1 Dynamite New Year’s Eve show December 31 at the Saitama Super Arena in Saitama, Japan.
Mousasi says he has verbally agreed to the bout and is awaiting a contract to make the fight official.
"I don’t know if I’m fighting him yet," Mousasi said of Le Banner. "They haven’t confirmed. They asked me, and I said yes, so now if he said yes, the fight is on."
Although some question whether or not at 3-1 (1 NC) in MMA if LeBanner is experienced enough to pose a challenge for Mousasi, "The Dream Catcher" says he feels he will, especially standing.
"If I fight Jerome LeBanner in the U.S., [he] wouldn’t be considered a good MMA fighter," Mousasi said. "But in Europe because he’s a popular K-1 fighter, it’s fighting a big fight. It doesn’t matter if it’s MMA or K-1, so it’s good for me (and) my name in Europe if I could beat him. And he’s big and strong, so it’s a challenge for me to get him down. I know that once I can get him down, I can win. But that’s the challenge."
The fight will be only Mousasi’s second as a heavyweight. He defeated aging MMA veteran Gary Goodridge at last year’s year-end Dynamite! show.
He is currently walking around at 223 pounds and says he likely won’t go into the fight with his 260-pound opponent much bigger than he is now.
"It’s too short a time to put a lot of weight on, so maybe two or three kilos more, but that’s it," said Mousasi, who heard Satoshi Ishii also could be a potential opponent for the year-end DREAM event. "But I don’t consider weight to be that big of a deal. As long as my technique is better, it will make up for his strength."
As far as his next Strikeforce opponent, Mousasi revealed that Mike Kyle may be on tap for him in the New Year.
Check out some Lebanner and Mousasi highlights after the jump.
