Japanese New Year’s Eve events have always followed a motto. Puroresu father figure Antonio Inoki started it all nine years ago with his “Inoki Bom-Ba-Ye” series, which started as professional wrestling only shows, developed a professional wrestling vs. K-1 theme and in 2001 and morphed into K-1 vs. Pride Fighting Championships in 2002. What followed were the glory days of Japanese mixed martial arts, during which the Pride and K-1 parent organizations tried to outdo one another with huge fights between judo champions, sumo wrestlers and television announcers.
Inter-promotional feuds have always worked well in the history of sports entertainment, not just in Japan, which is why K-1 mastermind Kazuyoshi Ishii has come up with the Dream vs. Sengoku Raiden Championship slogan for this year’s show. SRC was supposed to hold a NYE event of its own but reconsidered those plans after commercial failure was in sight. Now, many of its champions and marquee fighters --
Kazuo Misaki,
Akihiro Gono and
Kazuyuki Fujita -- will share the stage with Dream aces Norifumi “Kid” Yamamoto,
Shinya Aoki and
Alistair Overeem.
Olympic gold medal-winning judokas
Hidehiko Yoshida, 40, and
Satoshi Ishii, 23, will tangle in the main event.
Ishii has emerged as the Golden Boy of Japanese MMA. Never before has one young man carried the hopes and dreams of an entire nation or shouldered so much pressure to succeed. With the fascination for MMA decreasing among the general public -- last year’s “Dynamite” event only drew a little more than 25,000 spectators -- many hope the 2008 Olympic gold medalist can rekindle interest in the sport.
Most expect Yoshida -- 17 years his elder and winner of Olympic gold in Barcelona, Spain, in 1992 -- to hold the stirrups for young Ishii, as he passes the torch from one generation to the next. With no notable wins in MMA in the last five years, the 2003 Pride middleweight grand prix finalist no longer seems like a genuine threat to the younger, bigger challenger. However, with 16 fights under his belt, he owns a significant experience advantage over the rookie. In addition, Yoshida holds a 4-1 mark against Japanese opposition, his only defeat coming by split decision against
Sanae Kikuta a year ago.
The difference makers should be Ishii’s power and physicality. Both men are essentially heavyweights trapped in middleweight frames, but Ishii should enjoy a solid 20-pound advantage. Keenly versed in judo himself, he will not be concerned with getting thrown or choked. It will be interesting to see if either fighter shows up wearing a gi, as it could become an X-factor in the fight. After a couple of weeks of training at both American Top Team and Xtreme Couture Mixed Martial Arts, one can expect Ishii to have picked up at least a basic understanding of the wrestling and Brazilian jiu-jitsu games in MMA.
Throughout his seven-year MMA career, Yoshida has proven notoriously difficult to finish. Pitted against some of the best strikers and submission specialists of his era, only
Josh Barnett managed to stop him cleanly, using a heel hook in March 2008. Mirko “Cro Cop” Filipovic finished him with leg kicks, and he accepted his failed match against
James Thompson on short notice. Even so, Ishii showed killer instinct during his run to the Olympic gold medal, finishing all but one of his opponents by Ippon. Expect him to do the same to Yoshida a couple of minutes into their match.
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