I dont think its necessary to be a douchebag and call me “son” to try and belittle me and my point. I’m not attacking you…

Secondly, I’m not “PRIDE” so Misaki is not “my WW contender” – my point was that all these idiots were trumpeting around mma math and being very disrespectful to fighters. Silva at 30 is FAR from being finished just b/c he’s got two losses. Chuck Liddell lost to Cotoure, was getting tooled against Overeem until he landed the bomb and then got dominated by Rampage. Look where he is now….some fighters just hit a rough patch but its not like we need to be doing post mortem’s quite yet.

My points were that these guys they were fighting are no joke and yes they were brought in to be beaten, but thats usually what they do in mma – Rampage is being brought in to be beaten by Chuck, Sylvia is being set up to lose to Cotoure or Cro Cop – funny thing in the fight game is that these fighters do their damndest to screw that up!!

There’s a chance that people in the US audience will have seen these fights and maybe Henderson will have become a very marketable commodity…time will tell, promoters sometime have to try to make lemonade with the lemons they get.

LOL amazing quote.

Sorry Gaijin. Even if everyone did drop it, it’ll still be there. It’s part of the Japanese landscape if you haven’t noticed by now. And it’s not going to go away. Yes, there were exciting fights, but how is that going to keep Pride’s home base afloat? Two of your top Japanese stars got humbled by guys who shouldn’t be there in the first place. They were expendible son. Fodder to show how great Japanese talent are supposed to be. instead, it bit them in the ass. The only guy who won out of the bunch is the guy japanese call “croatchety old man”.

How are they supposed to sell themselves now to their hometown, gaijin? Say unified rules hindered the true ability of Misaki? Gomi had a bad bout of lag before his fight? Bullshit! That’s what the Japanese will say. You’ve got a guy wearing a belt in PRIDE who got owned TWICE, I repeat, TWICE to pretty much medioche talent. Would you respect that here in the US? Hell no! You’d be wondering who’s dick this guy sucked just to keep the medal around his waist. You’ve got your WW #1 contender who can be pretty good if he wants to, getting blanketed and almost owned by the guy who’s job is the equivelent of the Spanish announcers table. Think about that. Your top Welterweight contender just got beat…by a spanish speaking commentator. You think the japanese people are still going to see Misaki as the WW contender after that? I wouldn’t.

Stop acting like your namesake. Just because the flames are warm doesn’t mean you need to stay in the burning building.

I understand what you are saying, but having champions fighting and losing non-title fights, losing fights in other weight classes, etc., makes Pride seem chaotic and strange. While Pride’s chances for success in America are low to begin with, I think that if Pride doesn’t establish champions and the value of the belt, they are going to come across as disorganized and bush league compared to the UFC in the eyes of American fans.

When the best fighter in the division isn’t the champion, the organization looks fishy. Say what you will about the UFC, but Chuck is clearly their best 205er, Silva is clearly their best 185er, St Pierre is their best welterweight, etc etc. When a UFC champion loses, there is a new champion, and the fans respect that. When in Pride a champion loses and there are no repercussions, it comes across as perplexing to Americans.

Hendo winning the belt solves the problem PRIDE has had for a while now: The MW champion not being able to face the true #1 contender, and in the meantime getting beaten in HW-fights. With Hendo as champ, we have Arona, Shogun and Silva all as 100% realistic opponents, with RogNog not far behind. Hallelujah, we can finally get back to the business that has been completely halted since the MW-GP. This is GOOD for PRIDE, both stateside and in Japan.

Gomi’s loss was a disaster for sure. He has been exposed again. A fantastic fight for a fan, but DSE can’t be happy from a business-standpoint.

I wouldn’t be surprised to hear that half the crowd was papered, but as long as actual sales doesn’t drop down to 50% of what they had last time, it’ll still be a positive. And at least the crowd was very into the action and it came across great on TV. Less money spent on fireworks and spectacularism this time too.

I creamed my pants when I heard Lon’s voice. FINALLY a good decision on the commentary front. Barnett was great, and Trigg, obviously, is a lot better alongside two relaxed co-announcers. I’m ready to give Trigg + Lon a chance.

Sakurai was fantastic. That second round looked like perfectly booked pro-wrestling psychology. It was absoulutely beautiful to watch.

Best MMA-show of the year so far.

While I realize the fights didnt produce the expected or desired results for DSE, thats the nature of the business – this isn’t pro wrestling! People writing of Wanderlei Silva b/c he’s lost two fights in a row to two of the more elite p4p fighters in the world?? Pretty blatantly biased attitudes from what I’m assuming are very strong pro-UFC fans. Mirko Cro Cop has proved to be outside of Fedor, the best fighter on the planet and Henderson has always been a dangerous fighter (admittedly I didnt give him much of a chance last nite) at any weight. Are we forgetting Silva is only 30 years old and its not like he’s getting blown away – he’s lost to top fighters in excellent fights – heck when you look at it he’s lost to Arona, CC and Hendo (and a very controversial loss to Hunt – which on subsequent viewings looks to be a bad decision). Fighters often go through phases where they need to have a fresh game plan and re-tool their approach and it looks like he’s just reached that point – apparently he spent Friday night in the hospital – and Randy Cotoure was lost twice in a row before going on his big run again. People are acting like this was the first time a fighter lost in the history of fighting – newsflash, when you fight for years against quality competition losses will happen. I think these eulogies are a bit premature.

As for the other fights – I cannot believe people are pulling out all these MMAth games – it can easily be used both ways and used to make ANYONE look bad….so grow up – Zach I expected a lot more from you!! Why are people acting as if this is *PROOF* UFC > PRIDE – you could equally argue that when Rampage and CC come into UFC and win PRIDE >> UFC….its retarded logic – fighters don’t represent organizations they represent themselves and to another extent their respective teams they train with.

Diaz moved down to fight Gomi did he not?? People are shocked and elated for UFC that a “mid-carder” moved down 10lbs and was able to pull of a wild submission win??
Trigg was a really hot prospect in the UFC for some time and then hit a rough patch, but of course him winning last nite –> UFC > PRIDE??

Arguments can be made for either side – if the UFC is constantly poaching PRIDE fighters maybe thats a sign Zuffa realizes that theres worldwide talent and that PRIDE is the place to find some of them. Both organizations have awesome top-tier fighters – if anything this shows how deep the talent pool can be in MMA.

PRIDE has some fighters that are now even more appealing to the US audience – is this that horrible of a thing? I’m sure they’re gonna have to retool some of their plans for the future but that’s life in a sport where outcomes cannot be scripted!

People need to stop this pro wrestling “promotion wars” attitude and stop acting like they have any active role in one promotion being better than another – you’re an mma fan, have some more respect for the fighters that bust their asses day in day out so that we can enjoy these amazing fights.

As for the comment by David, Henderson said in an interview that he would keep the MW title if he won it for at least a year and then give it back. By that time maybe Soukoudjou can fight Shogun for it.