ProphetFighting

The UFC + Ishii: A doomed relationship?

Up at The Savage Science:

Lyman Hoyt examines the strange and dysfunctional relationship between Japan’s gold medal winning Olympic judoka and the UFC:

Ishii + the UFC: A doomed relationship @ THE SAVAGE SCIENCE

K-1 Capitulation–new article about the Badr Hari mess just posted

Just posted–a new article about the Badr Hari situation. Badr Hari won’t be suspended after all, and K-1 President Sadaharu Tanikawa has come up with a whopper to explain why he *has* to let him keep fighting. His spin puts anything James Carville or Karl Rove has ever done to shame…

K-1 Capitulation @ THE SAVAGE SCIENCE

Badr Hari to be stripped of K-1 heavyweight title, suspended indefinitely…

K-1 said that they were going to swing like a hammer and they’ve done just that. Our Far East expert Lyman Hoyt is reporting that several Japanese media outlets have run stories indicating that Badr Hari will be stripped of his K-1 heavyweight title and suspended indefinitely.

Badr Hari stripped of K-1 heavyweight title, suspended indefinitely @ THE SAVAGE SCIENCE

Remy Bonjasky wins K-1 World Cup GP

Up now, a recap of the exciting night of action and bizarre finish of the K-1 2008 World Cup GP which we covered live from Yokohama, Japan:

Wild finish gives Remy Bojansky K-1 World GP Championship @ THE SAVAGE SCIENCE

K-1 101: The basics of Japan’s top standup fighting promotion

Just added an article explaining the basics of K-1, along with a preview of Saturday’s K-1 World GP Final 2008. THE SAVAGE SCIENCE will have live coverage of the event from Yokohama, Japan starting at 12 midnight Pacific/3 AM Eastern on Saturday December 6th.

K-1 101: Understanding the basics of Japan’s top standup fighting promotion @ THE SAVAGE SCIENCE

JZ Calvan vs. Joachim Hansen at Fields Dynamite!

New article by Lyman Hoyt previewing the great New Years’ Eve matchup between Gesias “JZ Calvan” Calvancante and Joachim “Hellboy” Hansen.

JZ Calvan vs. Joachim Hansen set for New Years Eve in Tokyo @ THE SAVAGE SCIENCE

Cro Cop’s opponent in DREAM debut to be Mighty Mo?

Word on the streets of Zagreb is that Cro Cop’s most likely opponent at his DREAM debut is now K-1 kickboxer Siala Siliga aka “Mighty Mo”. He’s had a credible career as a kickboxer despite losing his L4 fights though has limited experience in MMA style bouts (though he is 3-0 in them against middling opposition). Probably a perfect opponent for Cro Cop in this spot–he’s not a joke by any means but he’s also a good measuring stick: if Mirko can’t get past Mighty Mo its hard to see him returning to top form.

Mighty Mo’s career profile @ K-1

Article about Mighty Mo from the Croatian news website Javno.com (in English)

[tags]Mirko Cro Cop, K-1, MMA, DREAMS, Mighty Mo[/tags]

DREAM press conference photo

Photo from the DREAM press conference:

UPDATE: For those of you fluent in Japanese here’s some links to the press conference video. At the very least forward to the 9:00 minute mark of the first linked video and check out the awesome promo video by the guy that used to do all of the PRIDE videos, Daisuke Sato. I’ll try to track down a YouTube “click and play” version of the promo video…

http://yarennoka.com/streaming/080213_a.asx
http://yarennoka.com/streaming/080213_b.asx
http://yarennoka.com/streaming/080213_c.asx

DREAM lives: FEG/DSE announces new fight promotion

Could PRIDE be back from the dead like Jason Voorhees in the Friday the 13th movies? Could Dana White be just another horny, pimply teenager who smugly walks off turning his back to the pond only to have Jason rise from the murk brandishing his sword?

Regardless of the applicability of a slasher movie metaphor the MMA world just got a whole lot more interesting with the debut of DREAM. The promotion is a partnership between K-1 parent corporation Fighting and Entertainment Group (FEG) and a little outfit known as Dreamstage Entertainment. Pretty subtle name too…I guess “Dana White sucks” didn’t work in kanji.

We reported earlier tonight that Mirko Cro Cop was leaving the UFC for the new group, and the Croatian media is quoting a March 15th date for DREAM’s debut event at PRIDE’s old stomping ground, the Saitama Super Arena outside of Tokyo. Cro Cop was at the presser and is scheduled to fight on the 3/15 show against Randy Couture…just kidding….against an opponent to be named later.

Here’s what Edo aka “our man on the Cro Cop beat” sent just a few minutes ago:

FED / DSE press conference in Tokyo introduced a new MMA promotion – DREAM. Mirko was a special guest at the press conference where it was announced that Mirko will continue his career under the roof of a new promotion.
The first even is going to be held in Saitama on March 15 and Mirko will appear on this card, while his opponent is yet to be announced.
More information will follow upon Mirko’s arrival to Zagreb tomorrow, so stay tuned on MMA-ID!

Give Edo some props by visiting his excellent new sports betting website BetWWX.com. I’ll be contributing a nice underdog play in this weekend’s Elite XC card later today…

Also, over at Yarrenoka.com there’s already a lot of DREAM stuff posted including a logo and a schedule of events. Also at the 3/15 event will be the start of a lightweight Grand Prix tournament with a whole slew of top notch participants:

Shinya Aoki
J.Z. Calvan
Andre Dida
Mitsuhiro Ishida
Tatsuya Kawajiri
Caol Uno
Joachim Hansen
Gilbert Melendez
Luiz Azeredo
Bu-Kyung Jung
Koutetsu Boku
Luiz Firmino

April 29th will see DREAM.2 with the start of a middleweight GP. Expect more developments tomorrow…

DREAM press release at Yarennoka.com

UPDATE: Sherdog has an article up on the DREAM press conference with a bunch of spiffy pictures, though none as spiffy as the bad ass picture of Jason below….

UPDATE 2: Still no official response from Zuffa/UFC on either the Cro Cop departure or the new promotion. As of 2:15 PM PST Cro Cop’s bio was still up on the UFC website. Then again, so is Randy Couture’s and Royce Gracie’s so that might not mean anything.

UPDATE 3: Word is that the Cro Cop/UFC split was amicable and by mutual agreement. Cro Cop still has designs on the UFC heavyweight belt, but wants some “tune up” fights in Japan. Since he won’t be signing the checks for those fights, Dana White had no problem with it. The way he likely sees it is that if Cro Cop gets his game back in shape oversees he’ll be a better drawing card in the future. If not, its no skin off of Dana’s f’ing nose.

[tags]FEG, DSE, Dreamstage Entertainment, Mirko Cro Cop, PRIDE, DREAM, MMA, mixed martial arts, Japan, Saitama Super Arena[/tags]

New Tuesday Tapout up at Epic Carnival

New Tuesday Tapout up over at the Epic Carnival….this week we talk a little bit about MMA and a lot about my struggle to find a welcome mat that creates the proper aura of fear in my neighbors:

Since I am the “future of fightsport journalism” (TM) and all of that I really don’t have time to search around on the Internet all day looking for a bad ass welcome mat. On the other hand, most of you Carnies do. Since all you’ll be doing on a day-to-day basis is waiting for the unemployment check to come and watching cartoons take some time to help me out. I haven’t decided what the prize will be yet but the reader who finds me the best welcome mat and either posts it in the comments or emails it to me at savagescience@gmail.com will get a prize of some sort. You don’t have to *buy* the welcome mat for me, but if you insist I won’t discourage it.

Here’s a few rules–I make the final determination of bad ass-edness. No sports team logos, NASCAR mats, etc. They’re just not bad ass enough. The only one I’ve seen that is sort of cool is a mat with the message “Come back when you have a warrant”. That’s in the right ballpark, but my concern here is that it would encourage the local busybodies to snoop around all up in my business. I don’t want any of that–I simply want to create a sufficient aura of fear and mystery that they leave me alone.

You got to go there to read the whole thing, but you’ll be so glad you did….

The Prophet’s Tuesday Tapout: Bad Ass Welcome Mat Edition @ Epic Carnival

[tags]MMA, mixed martial arts, Tuesday Tapout, Epic Carnival, The Prophet, housewares, welcome mats, Kimbo Slice, Mirko Cro Cop, UFC, PRIDE, Dana White, Japan[/tags]