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Tim Sylvia vs. Josh Barnett…
By Zach Arnold | September 12, 2010
… has been booked as a super fight for Antonio Inoki’s IGF show on 9/25 at JCB Hall in Tokyo. It’s being marketed as Sylvia’s pro-wrestling debut and a clash of former UFC Heavyweight champions.
Also scheduled to make his pro-wrestling debut on the IGF card is Wakakirin, the disgraced former Sumo wrestler who got busted for marijuana last year. He’ll face Mark Coleman on the 25th.
Don Frye
20 quotes from the man on Saturday night. IGF also said that he and Tank Abbott might also be at their JCB Hall show, too.
Mid-major Outsider MMA show coming up
Akira Maeda’s promotion has a big show coming up on 10/11 at Yokohama Bunka Gym. The top half of the card will feature an interpromotional war theme of “The Outsider vs. ZST” and an interpromotional war theme of “The Outsider vs. US Armed Forces” in tribute to the 50th anniversary of the US-Japan accord. Also on the card are the semi-finals and finals of their 70-75kg tournament (Teppei Hori vs. Hiroyuki Tani & Takeshi Goda vs. Hisato Izawa) and a few other amateur fights as well.
The Outsider vs. ZST card
- 70 kg: Keinosuke “Tattoo Man” Yoshinaga (Outsider) vs. Masayuki Okude (ZST)
- 60 kg: Yuki Takei (Outsider) vs. Toshihiro Shimizu (ZST)
- 70 kg: Takayuki Urano (Outsider) vs. Yuki Yamamoto (ZST)
- 68 kg: Apache Kojiro (Outsider) vs. Yutaka Shimamura (ZST)
- 75 kg: Tetsuya Sano (Outsider) vs. Masayuki Hamagishi (ZST)
The Outsider vs. US Armed Forces card
- 70 kg: Ryuma Asano (Outsider) vs. Devon Edwards
- 65 kg: Takahiro Kuroishi (Outsider) vs. Samuel Aguilar
- 75 kg: Fumihiro Yamada vs. Jimmy Canals
- 72 kg: Yoshihiro Saegusa (Outsider) vs. Alex Ghana
- 100 kg: Yoshitaka Ideta (Outsider) vs. Lamont Kirkland
Two new Japanese books coming out
The first is a new book by former Weekly Gong writer/editor and New Japan TV personality Katsuhiko Kanazawa called “Jinsei no ring” and it largely talks about past wrestlers, what happened in and out of the ring, and what they’re up to now. A top focus of the book is Akira Katayama, a wrestler who was paralyzed after a diving move at a Korakuen Hall show in Tokyo. I bring this up because a couple of weeks ago, Dave Meltzer posted an old Observer from the early ’90s on his web site that focused on the Japanese wrestling styles becoming more ‘extreme’ and pushing the envelope. It was around this time that Pancrase and the MMA pioneers were starting to build their promotions. I remember vividly at the time (and still have all the old Weekly Gong & Weekly Pro-Wrestling magazines) that the weekly magazine publications that the fight organizations relied on so heavily for PR used to cover MMA as “other” and often had photos from the events in the back of the magazines.
Anyhow, Kanazawa’s new book takes a look back at some of the things that happened in the early 90s and the last decade.
The second book, which I said was coming out, is in fact coming out. Kodansha will officially release the final book of Mr. Toshiro Igari this Friday. Appropriately, it’s a black book. A lot of people will be paying attention to this book, moreso now because of Igari’s death than they would have if he was still alive. Our eyes will be open on this one…
Topics: Japan, Media, MMA, Pro-Wrestling, Zach Arnold | 3 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
Josh Barnett is going to have to do all the work here to carry Sylvia!! I think this could be sloppy.
Barnett signed with Strikeforce. Pathetic that any organization would sign a 3 time offender. He should be banned from the sport…. But this is what happens when organizations could care less about the sport and it’s credibility.
Random question Zach(or anybody else): How much do these guys get paid for this stuff? Sylvia, Coleman, Barnett, other semi high profile mma guys…??