Liddell is lucky that he is a tough guy with power or else he would have lost that match. Overeem was definitely a lot more technical in the stand up and it showed. Liddell had the grappling advantage but he prefers to stand and strike. Looked like it almost cost him.
Saku - but you picked Tamura over the gi’ed wonder! well, with Yoshida’s “knee injury” I’m sure he’ll pull out to save face (literally).
Ricco got robbed. good ol Pride politics.
yeah the fights were great.
Fedor & Crocop looks like the best heavy bout ever made. Those two make the rest of em look like chumps.
I was in a room full of 20 fighters with beer, making bets on each fight and going ballistic - now whats more fun than that!
Kuri said, " but you picked Tamura over the gi’ed wonder! well, with Yoshida’s “knee injury” I’m sure he’ll pull out to save face."
I had changed my pick to Yoshida in one of my later posts. It’s still there to read and admire! haha 
I want someone - anyone - to kick Yoshida’s butt all the way from here to Hokkaido. Fuck, take that gi off him and what do you have? Nothing.
I’m waiting to see Rampage v. Silva. I think that Silva will win with no real problem, but I’m sure that Rampage will take a hell of a beating before he goes down. And just like everyone else thinks, Fedor v. Crocop should be awesome.
The Yoshida vs Tamura fight was definitely a stiff work. The fight went exactly as predicted. Tamura would come out and look like he was going to win, Yoshida would get the sub but be too injured to continue with the GP. Many people on other forums said exactly how the fight was going to go before the fight even happened. Funny thing is that is exactly how the fight went. Yoshida will drop out before the second round. I wonder who his replacement will be? Some people think it is going to be a Gracie.
Count me in this Yoshida-hater club.
Char - while living in Jpn I got SO sick of the bullshit hype around Yoshida in the media, always talking as if hes a shoe-in for the title. The next “nipponjin no hero”
all about the nationalism
Can’t blame 'em though since every other Jpn fighter gets KTFO’d and they need to get asses in seats.
Yep, many predicted the “victory” (how does Tamura with yrs of experience not even attempt to defend that basic choke? Shit, guys with 1 week of jiu-jitsu can defend that) and subsequent “injury”.
Oh how I wish he does step up to battle Silva. That would be the KO highlight of the year.
Along with Crocop planting his shin on Igor’s face too of course.
The more I train the more amazed I am at these guys.
Who are you accusing of a work?
Certainly not Pride I hope, because that would be the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard.
If Pride were that type of organisation I guarantee you that Sakuraba, being a Pride and Japanese fan favorite would not have lost 3 times to Silva, cro-cop and especially not to that peg, Schembri.
Conspiracy theories belong on the UG.
Sakuraba: You are being sarcastic right? You do know that Pride has done works before? You do know that everyone Yoshida has fought is known for doing stiff works (except for Royce who got screwed)? Was that your first MMA event? The fight went exactly as people predicted because they have seen how stiff works usually go. Mark my words, Yoshida will drop out before the second round with some bogus injury. Sakuraba has lost to Silva and Cro cop because those guys will not do works while Tamura, Don Frye etc will and have done works.
“Was that your first MMA event?”
Good to see you could have a conversation with someone of opposing view without having to belittle them. Now THAT was sarcasm!
Fine, I’m open minded to other’s opinions. Show me proof that Yoshida was a work. And dont even try to get out of it by saying that everyone knows it was a fix, and by be not accepting some conspiracy theory that I must be a newbie to the sport. Like I said, show me proof and I’ll consider it.
You still havent addressed Saku’s recent loses. Simply saying Cro-cop and Silva cant be bought off isnt an argument. Again, whats your proof they cant be bought off? If Pride absolutely wanted them to lose they could have told them that if they didnt go down, their career in Pride was over. Unfortunately you’ve taken on a Catch-22 argument. Basically you’re saying that if Yoshida wins it was a fix, and that if he loses it is because the opposing fighter could not be bought off. Hmmmmm. Those are some serious accusations that require some serious proof.
BTW if Yoshida doesnt fight in next pride, that still doesnt prove it was a fix. If anything, it just proves that he knows Silva will destroy him.
And finally, I dont understand the nationalism point of view. Whats the point fixing a fight between two Japanese fighters? Obviously one of the two will make it to the next round! But instead you’ll have me believe that they went through the trouble of pairing 2 Japanese fighters to ensure a Japanese representation in the second round, and for some odd reason they decided to fix the fight and to top it all off, they then planned on letting that fighter (that they supposedly chose) not fight in the second round?
It doesnt even make sense.
Like I said, show me proof. And by proof I mean something concrete, not 10 UG trolls opinions.
According to SPORTSNAVI Yoshida will not be in the second round due to a “knee injury”. Just as predicted.
Sakuraba: You need to open your eyes. Stop nut-hugging Yoshida. All of his fights have looked suspicious; all of his fights (except Royce who got screwed) have been against known workers. Also after the fight Yoshida suddenly collapsed and held on to his knee. The trainers couldn’t even touch his knee with ice without Yoshida screaming in pain. Then suddenly he stands up and walks out of the ring like his knee is fine. Now he can’t continue because of a “major knee injury”. I would love for Yoshida to fight someone like Silva or Crocop. Then we would know for sure if he was legit. Right now Yoshida is still a question mark. Also Pride could not threaten Cro cop’s or Silva’s career because they could just leave and go to the UFC, K-1 or some other event.
Just an fyi…
I also have a Sakuraba screen name (without these things ~~). Other Sak registered before me but didn’t post, so I didn’t know. I guess I’ll change mine.
PS: Other reports stated Yoshida will be fine by Nov. Hopefully he doesn’t just throw in the towel after two seconds like Fujita at the last GP.
I hope Yosheada fights in the next round. Fighting a legit guy like Silva, Jackson or Lidell is what Yosheada needs. Suspicious looking fights against known workers and pro wrestlers have just lowered Yosheada’s credibility. Yosheada’s success against legit fighters would just further prove the effectiveness of pure judo/bjj. Of course he would never be a Champion without proper cross training but it would show that if you are good enough at judo/bjj you could still do a lot.
By no means do I consider Yoshida an actual contender. He may have been a great judo player, but mma isnt a judo tournament.
Yoshida will quickly get dealt as soon as he faces a solid opponent, but up until now, he hasnt really. That is the real reason why he’s been winning, not because of some alleged fix. Silva and cro-cop would destroy Yoshida, not because they cannot be bought, but because they are superior fighters.
The obvious answer is usually the correct one.
But Yosheada is not injured. He is faking it. You don’t collapse, scream in pain when someone just touches your knee and then a minute later get up and walk out of the ring smiling and without a limp, you get taken out on a stretcher. Also the fight looked extremely suspicious (just like his other fights). People predicted how the fight would go BEFORE the fight and they were 100% correct. I hope you are not just a judo troll from the UG that will blindly follow any fighter that has trained in Judo. Hopefully Pride forces Yosheada to fight in the next round. Many questions will be answered.
~Sakuraba~: I already addressed your points but you don’t want to listen.
You guys should battle it out over on Sherdog forums.
Who knows if Tamura threw the fight (he did tell Pride he wanted no more real fights) or not, but Yoshida did do a fine bit of acting there with the knee.
Look for Renzo or kin to be the replacement (he didn’t appear at the press conference for no reason)
As for the nationism issue- of course Jpn want to see Jpn win, but they also appreciate seeing their fighters give their best even when out matched (called “kokoro” or “yamato damashii” and its very important in sports & Jpn culture in general).
Judging from previous events Pride has no qualms about throwing helpless Jpn pro-wrestlers to the lions to get the PPV buys.
You think the average Kenji would buy the PPV if its all unknown-to-him foreign fighters?
Now throw in some known Japanese wrestlers (or Judoka) and pitch it as the nihon vs. world - now see the profits sail.
Saku was great but Pride feeding him to larger fighters wrecked his career.
If you’re going to accuse someone of throwing a fight, I think that it’d be better to offer some proof. Just saying “The guy’s known for throwing fights” doesn’t cut it.
In the ten years I’ve been here in Japan, with all of the sports I’ve watched here, there has only been one time that I’ve seen a match that I thought was fixed. And that time it wasn’t for money. It was between two brothers who were both high-ranking sumo wrestlers, who met in a play-off. The younger brother, who was larger and a better wrestler, basically just laid down for his older brother (who had yet to win a tournament).
So that was basically to salvage his older brother’s pride, and was obviously a very unusual situation. Other than that, I’ve never seen anything that even remotely looked like a fix over here. The Japanese have too much invested in their personal pride for that.
If you want further proof, look at Tamura’s match a few Pride’s ago against his teacher (I forget the name) who was retiring. If ever there were a chance for a throw, that was it. But he knocked the sensei out. He felt bad about it, but he did it. And there were no hard feelings afterwards.
Personally, I have a very hard time believing that Don Frye would throw a match as well. Maybe some pro-wrestling stunt or something, but not a Pride match. If you have proof that he accepted money or whatever to throw a match, then by all means offer it up. If not, then you shouldn’t be saying that he did.
Char, there have been works in some of the earlier Pride shows (Coleman vs Takada for one).
Forgot where but in an interview after “losing” to Yoshida, Frye had to be reminded he has lost in Pride, to which he smiled (apparently).
Well, it looked like a work. Frye not throwing a single hard punch? C’mon!
And you gotta admit that the lines between puro-resu & MMA (both called “kakutougi” as you know) are blurred, and that a majority of Pride fans come from pro wrestling.
I’ve personally witnessed shouting matches between fans at events there, basically MMA fans vs. puro resu fans.
the puro resu fans were cheering on their boy, who had no business being in a legit match, and the few MMA fans shouting back(other fighter was Brazilian).
Pretty damn funny but it illustrates the point.
Well, at least the top fighters can still make a career there without having to throw fights - a much better career than they can have in the UFC.