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« | Home | »

Sengoku demands punishment for Aoki

By Zach Arnold | January 7, 2010

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A formal letter was sent out to determine what punishment K-1/DREAM would impose on Shin’ya Aoki for his taunting after breaking the humerus bone of Mizuto Hirota. The letter said that they want a punishment so severe that a similar type incident won’t occur in the future.

Regarding the future of Sengoku, the promotion plans to have 6 or 7 events in the Kanto (Tokyo) area in 2010. The first big show will happen on 3/7 in Tokyo at Ryogoku Kokugikan. According to the promotion, there isn’t a strong tie currently with the Yoshida dojo (Yoshida, Nakamura, etc.) but that they are open to negotiations. This should be no surprise given that Kokuho, the boss of J-ROCK (who managed Yoshida’s career in PRIDE), left Sengoku as the company’s top boss.

Satoshi Ishii reportedly wants to have his second MMA fight soon.

Topics: Japan, Media, MMA, Sengoku, Zach Arnold | 17 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |

17 Responses to “Sengoku demands punishment for Aoki”

  1. Alan Conceicao says:

    He should be. I think its disgusting that the commissions in the US do nothing about unnecessary late blows (Hendo/Bisping and Rashad/Salmon come to mind) and in the case of Japan, there is no commission, putting everything on the promoters. In this case, they should do something.

  2. Ultimo Santa says:

    “Severe” punishment…for flipping the bird?

    And this is on par with punching an unconscious opponent somehow? What world are you living in, Alan?

    Your two examples are a little odd as well – I don’t think those two stick out in the mind of many people.

    What about Rampage Jackson raining down punches on Wanderlei’s jawline while he was out cold…while the ref had his arms around his waist trying to pull him off?

    And Rogan’s reaction “Oh well, Rampage was just amped up!”

    Huh? THAT was no big deal, but Aoki’s middle finger requires some sort of epic punishment?

  3. Alan Conceicao says:

    “Severe” punishment…for flipping the bird?

    For taunting a guy you just injured? Yeah, I’m not a big fan. Fine him.

    Save me the comparisons to NFL cracking down on end zone celebrations too.

    As for the rest: No one remembers Henderson/Bisping? Oh, well, I guess you have to argue that, right? I just pulled out the two most glaring examples, but if you want to mention that fight too, go ahead. Point is that unsportsmanlike conduct of any sort during MMA fights isn’t being curtailed, either in the form of taunting after bouts are over or in the form of late hits. I don’t see either as good.

  4. 45 Huddle says:

    Brutal? Yes. A penalty needed? Probably not.

    So Sengoku is planning on 6 or 7 cards. Strikeforce is planning on 20. Bellator is planning on 24. Why do I get the feeling that we won’t be seeing a total of 50 card from these 3 organizations in 2010?

  5. Alan Conceicao says:

    A penalty would help decrease these in the future. What Aoki does is make MMA look enormously ugly to those on the fence about it, which is unwise. Maybe a 10% purse reduction fine for things like that would be OK by me. Late hits are a worse offense: Someone is going to get hurt by those one day, and the sport could end up dead as a result. 25% or more reductions should be in place, particularly when in the case of Rampage or Henderson, it was clearly premeditated.

  6. Black Dog says:

    My feeling is that Aoki should be fined for showing up an opponent he had not only defeated, but injured.

    Sticking the middle finger in the face of a downed and injured fighter shows utter disrespect and is not good for the fight game, no matter where it is.

    There are some good points above–MMA is not doing a very good job of policing the behavior of some of these guys.

    I understand emotion in heat of the moment, and I understand elation at winning a big fight. It crosses the line when you strike an opponent after the fight is over (are you reading this, Rampage?), possibly injuring him permanently.

    That said, wankers like Rogan don’t help either when they make lame excuses. It’s just more ammo for the anti-MMA crowd.

  7. No Tears says:

    What everyone is forgetting is this business is about combat. No matter how poised and experienced of a fighter these guys are, adrenalin and endorphins kick in and by rule you fight until the referee stops you. The Henderson example is a little ridiculous to me. He cracked Bisping and immediately followed up with the shot to the ground. MMA is a VIOLENT sport, with strong personalities. So Aoki showed poor judgment and a lack of class in his win celebration, big f’n deal. Any sport in any country has several of these type of athletes. Get off the tree hugging people, this isn’t shuffle board…

  8. Zack says:

    Somewhere in a Fertitta owned Casino, Armando Garcia agrees.

  9. klown says:

    Aoki should definitely be publicly penalized financially for disrespecting an injured opponent. (Lesnar too for getting up in Mir’s battered face).

    By the same token, late hits should also be severely punished, enough to deter this behavior in the future.

  10. jj says:

    “What Aoki does is make MMA look enormously ugly to those on the fence about it, which is unwise.”

    That’s a bit of a stretch. No one that is on the fence about MMA was watching that event, aware of what Aoki did after the fight, aware of K1/Dream/Sengoku, or even who Aoki is. Anyone watching that event or aware of his disrespectful action is a hardcore mma fan and in no way looks down upon the entire sport due to what Shinya did. If it was a UFC PPV or UFN (ar Maybe a Strikeforce event) then maybe it would come to the attention of anyone “on the fence about MMA”.

  11. Alan Conceicao says:

    Plenty of people are aware of K-1 and DREAM. They just aren’t Americans.

    As for it being a violent sport, that’s irrelevant. The idea is that its a sport, not a spectacle. If you want to watch for unconscious dudes being beaten on, you’re a neanderthal.

  12. IceMuncher says:

    We should only make it a late hit if the guy continues hitting after the ref steps in. It’s too arbitrary any other way. It’s easy for us to see when a guy is out (sometimes), but we’ve got a nice relaxed outside view of the action. We don’t know what it’s like for the fighters.

    The ref is there specifically to look for when a fighter is out, so it makes sense that a fighter should be allowed, at the very least, the amount of time it takes the ref to see the KO and react. Even then, you’ve probably got to give a little extra leeway to the fighter for reaction times.

    So Sokoudjou and possibly Rampage (I don’t remember the end very well) would get in trouble, but Hendo is in the clear. I think it was an intentional late hit, but in the interest of uniformity, you couldn’t punish him. It’s like a hit just before the whistle in football. It’s a cheapshot, but still legal.

  13. Brad Wharton says:

    Slightly related Dynamite news;

    Gary Goodridge has been denied a licence for his proposed fight in the US due to his recent fight on the Dynamite card.

    Seems fair, but there was an interesting comment from the promoter in the piece on MMAWeekly.

    “Gary Goodridge took a secret fight that his manager didn’t even know about over in Japan, a week ago. Everybody knows about that. He goes and he lays down for this fight, gets TKO’d in the first round. Now even though there’s no jurisdiction for any commissioning body over what happens in Japan, since (the Indiana commission) knew about it, they told me they were still cancelling the fight.”

    Is he suggesting that Goodridge took a dive, or that he went over there to fight with no expectation of winning.

    Either way, it’s a low move from Gary – he’s been around long enough to know that a commission wont licence you if you’ve lost a fight just days previously.

  14. Alexander says:

    Lets face it, Goodridge was going to be paid more for his fight in japan then some rinky dink Indiana promotion. Probably Hoosier MMA company. Anyways, he took the fight in Japan due to greed, there was no moral fiber in this decision. He knows he can shake off that Indiana promoter and get another payday elsewhere.

  15. Dave2 says:

    It’s not about greed, it’s about survival for Gary Goodridge. Yeah of course Gary Goodridge is going to accept the better paying gig in Japan. Gary Goodridge badly needs the money. The dude is going to keep fighting until his brain is totally fried because he knows that he can’t make a living doing something else. He went through a divorce, has to pay alimony, has a house to pay for. Goodridge apparently hasn’t worked in a “real job” (jobs outside fight sports) in a long time so his job prospects outside fight sports are probably quite poor. He probably wouldn’t make enough off his gym to support himself.

    It’s sad but he’s another broken-down fighter who is going to fight until he has to drink food out of a straw and wear diapers because he can’t afford to quit the fighting game before he compromises his health severely.

  16. Alexander says:

    But do we really know Goodridge is paying for a house and so forth? Do we know he has saved money? Goodridge could be fighting because he wants to relive his early glory days of actually winning fights and looking legit. He just doesnt get that he will never return to those days.

  17. Alan Conceicao says:

    But do we really know Goodridge is paying for a house and so forth?

    http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2010/writers/ben_fowlkes/01/07/goodridge/index.html?eref=writers

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