Could the Nagoya Sumo tournament get derailed for good?
By Zach Arnold | June 26, 2010
As noted before on the site, Sumo is getting hit repeatedly with scandal after scandal and a lot of it has to deal with the yakuza. Amidst reports that NHK is considering not airing Sumo events on television, there’s now discussion that next month’s tournament may not happen.
Japan Sumo Association not to release rankings for Nagoya tournament on Monday
Gambling, of course, has been a major problem for those in the Sumo world and you’d see it all the time when the sumo wrestlers crossed over into pro-wrestling. They would end up with massive gambling debts (think: Tadao Yasuda) and big trouble would come.
A person arrested on suspicion of extortion of a Sumo wrestler claims that he got paid because it was reward money for being a middleman to bookmakers. Adding another twist to this story — Yomiuri reports that the Sumo wrestler’s hairdresser gave the middleman the money.
Former yakuza member gives Mainich inside look at baseball gambling rocking sumo world
The problem for police is that they don’t have the same kind of laws on the books like in the States to go after the gangs. The problem impacting Sumo is the same one in other sectors of the Japanese fight game. However, everything is on the line now because sponsor support has completely collapsed.
The only thing that could top this story off would be a cameo appearance by Rod Blagojevich.
On a side note, this scandal flared up in part due to a weekly magazine report. You just can’t trust those weekly magazines now, can you? Ask Mr. Sakakibara about that.
Topics: Japan, Media, Zach Arnold | 1 Comment » | Permalink | Trackback |
The happiest man in the world because of Fedor losing is…
By Zach Arnold | June 26, 2010
Miro Mijatovic.
I’m about to give you a unique history lesson that you probably won’t read elsewhere. In many ways, Fedor losing tonight historically means a lot to me because it’s kind of a closing on a chapter of history that never really got a proper end to it (the end of PRIDE).
If you don’t recognize the name Miro Mijatovic (and I’m sure most of you don’t or forgot), he was the super agent in Japan who had the two mega power gaijin aces under contract: Fedor and Mirko. This was in 2003. Miro did work as a lawyer in Japan and came from very deep Australian credentials. He ended up doing some service work for swimmer Ian Thorpe in Japan.
Miro came into the MMA world and became one of the “big three” agents during the PRIDE era. You have Motoko Uchida, Akira Maeda’s former secretary in RINGS, managing BTT (Brazilian Top Team). You have Koichi Kawasaki, who represented Chute Boxe Academy. You had Miro who was representing Fedor and Cro Cop.
Miro had managed the careers of both men pretty damn well and dealt with all the politics that you’ve seen played out in public; only he had to deal with it in private and make sure everything went smoothly. He did his job.
Then came the New Year’s Eve wars of 2003. Antonio Inoki got into the game. Seiya Kawamata, admitted yakuza fixer, got involved with the Inoki Bom-Ba-Ye show for Nippon TV. PRIDE had their deal with Fuji TV. K-1 had their deal with Tokyo Broadcasting System. Fedor would end up fighting on the NYE event and Cro Cop bailed on Miro to go to Ken Imai, who was closely aligned with PRIDE boss Nobuyuki Sakakibara. If you recall, Mirko was supposed to fight Yoshihiro Takayama on the Inoki show but backed out due to back injury claims. We know what happened next.
Eventually, the strings got pulled in PRIDE and political backstabbing was the norm. Miro watched as Cro Cop and Fedor, his two big fighters, fought each other. In the end, Miro became one of the key components to the implosion of PRIDE because of how he was threatened by certain individuals and how the yakuza scandal unraveled. He faced a lot of hardship privately from the scandal and it essentially drove him out of the fight business.
While I do not take joy in watching Fedor lose, I do understand why his detractors are celebrating tonight. It is a sense of closure on the PRIDE era. However, for those who lived during the PRIDE era and got burned by it, tonight’s loss has an extra-sweet taste to it.
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The internet MMA universe is exploding
By Zach Arnold | June 26, 2010
I think the happiest man tonight with Fabricio Werdum beating Fedor is not Werdum himself but Mirko Cro Cop. Mirko brought in Werdum to his camp several years ago to help work with him on the ground game (this was during the PRIDE days). And if anyone remembers at all the build-up for that Fedor/Mirko match, it was incredible and one of the most surreal moments I’ve ever seen in my life. (Including the video package of Mirko before the fight, the controversial one — you’ll know what I’m referring to if you saw it.)
My gut feeling about Fedor losing is that he lost to a guy he should have beat, but he lost to a guy who while uncoordinated standing up is pretty good on the ground. Not exactly the result I expected. He made a mistake. He put the guy on the ground and he fell into the trap. The hyperventilating needs to stop already and people need to put it all into perspective.
I don’t really feel too bad for Fedor losing and I’m not sure he feels bad himself. Disappointed, yes, but not crushed. His management team sure as hell panicking, though. As for Mr. Werdum, congratulations, you earned your lottery ticket and I hope for nothing but the best for you financially and athletically in the business. You really pulled off a big accomplishment. Thumbs up.
As for Dana White laughing like a mad man for a week heading up to UFC 116, fine. He can be the bully. Let him say what he’s going to say. At this point, he’s become predictable in his rhetoric. He just better hope that Shane Carwin, “the boring guy,” doesn’t pick apart Brock Lesnar and win the UFC Heavyweight Title. I’d hate for there to be chaos in the Heavyweight division, wouldn’t you?
Quotes and thoughts
“The Shank Tark.” My favorite line ever. Awesome.
Jordan Breen on Frank Shamrock retiring:
Narrating your own retirement tribute video? Really? Couldn’t get someone else to do these voiceovers? Hell.
Love how many people are outraged by this Shamrock homage. Strikeforce has exhausted all good will and fans are ready to snap at anything.
Congrats Frank Shamrock on a great career. Does he get into the UFC Hall of Fame? How do they determine that again?
Miguel Torres on Fedor losing:
Everyone is human. Fedor is still the man, but now he feels the cold chill of his humanity. If it bleeds… we can kill it.
Every Brazilian I know is calling me yelling into the phone. I know, believe in your jiu-jitsu.
I have a weird feeling Alexander just got murdered in a basement of a bar in Russia. The kgb don’t play no games.
Franky Shams comparing himself to Fedor is like me comparing myself to Studs Terkel. Does not compute.
So was it God’s will for Fedor to get tapped out in 69 seconds? Because if so, it clearly means God is on the MMA media’s side.
Topics: Media, MMA, StrikeForce, Zach Arnold | 59 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
Dave Meltzer: Fedor’s appeal is that he’s the anti-Brock Lesnar
By Zach Arnold | June 26, 2010
A passage from Friday night’s Observer radio show that has several topics that people argue online about all rolled into one.
I’ll focus on one part of the passage that stuck out the most to me and it has nothing to do with Fedor individually but rather about Strikeforce as a promotion. When Scott Coker did his interview earlier in the week with Josh Gross for SI radio, Coker said that the reason he had the Fedor/Werdum fight in San Jose is because he wanted to reward the fans that had supported the promotion for so long as its home base with a big-level fight. Juxtapose this with what Scott Coker keeps saying in interview after interview, where he says the organization is no longer a regional promotion but rather a national promotion.
Keep that in mind when you read what Dave has to say about how ticket sales are going for the event at HP Pavilion. He says the building will be packed but that a large portion of the audience will be out-of-towners as opposed to locals. I’ve heard Dave say the same thing about Strikeforce in the area since they “went national,” that the locals aren’t showing up in big numbers and that the locals view the product now more or less as a national deal as opposed to something they have an attachment to.
A couple of points playing off of that…
- Cung Le gets booked because Cung Le is supposed to draw the locals. If he’s not drawing a big amount of local fans any more, that’s a warning sign. Cung was one of Scott’s big draws in the past for San shou fights.
- I’m going to use a pro-wrestling analogy here, so bear with me or else skip this point and go to full-page mode. Listening to Dave describe how the Bay Area market has changed since Strikeforce went ‘national,’ it reminds me so much of what was said in the Carolinas in the 80s when Jim Crockett Promotions decided to get into a war with Vince McMahon. They started running shows in different towns and didn’t have the infrastructure to do it. In one of the craziest moves ever, they ran a show at the Nassau Coliseum in Uniondale, New York and drew about 5,000 in McMahon’s backyard. The promotion ended up bleeding cash and they got out in time for Ted Turner to do the NWA/WCW alignment. Crockett saw the locals start to fade away because the locals viewed the promotion as leaving them behind. That’s the danger that Strikeforce faces here if they fail on a national level — it’s going to be hard to ever bring back those local fans that had supported the company in the first place.
There’s the set-up for Friday’s radio passage:
Continue reading this article here…
Topics: Media, MMA, StrikeForce, UFC, Zach Arnold | 45 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
Addressing the criticism about our article on Matt Hamill fighting last weekend in UFC
By Zach Arnold | June 26, 2010
There is so much to respond to in this video. I would encourage you to watch the video and read the transcript.
First, we have yet another example of the bizarre phobia to mention my name specifically when talking about something I’ve written. This is another high-profile example of this phobia — this week alone. It’s not a coincidence, but it is strange — if you think someone’s off base or they suck, you usually call them out. If you mention their work but are afraid to say the author’s name, then that’s political.
Second, take note that none of the major core issues in terms of details (small and big) are addressed in the video. No one critical of the commission argued that the doctors, in their respective fields, aren’t qualified. As Dr. Margaret Goodman pointed out, the issue is that the doctors who looked at Matt Hamill’s mark on his back in Nevada weren’t dermatologists or specialists. There’s a difference.
This is why I put up the label on our article on Wednesday that you needed to spend some time to read everything in it and to understand the context of what was being discussed along with all sides being presented. I made that label because I knew one of three things would happen:
- a) Those critical of us wouldn’t read the article
- b) Those critical of us would only skim the article and not see what was researched or reported on fully
- c) Those critical of us did read the article but had their own slant in their mind anyways and were going to spin hard one way or the other
And yet, there are plenty of statements made in this video that need to be responded to.
Continue reading this article here…
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UFC throws a fit and removes Kendall Grove fight from Spike TV portion of UFC 116 card; Update: BJ Penn’s web site claims Tapout backs away from Fedor
By Zach Arnold | June 25, 2010
Read the story for full context. The timing of the comments made by Kendall Grove about The Ultimate Fighter and the forum in which they were made was pretty dumb.
However, on the other hand, why is this development so petty? Because it’s basically Spike TV and UFC giving Kendall Grove the proverbial middle finger and saying, OK, you want to talk about the network that way, fine, you won’t appear on television and any sponsor money you were going to make by appearing on television is out the window. In the process, they screwed over Goran Reljic as well.
From a development perspective, UFC will argue that getting Ricardo Romero some air time against The Smoothie King will be better than Kendall Grove who could be labeled by the organization as a guy who’s not going to climb much further up the ladder. However, the irony of UFC putting The Smoothie King on television and rewarding a guy that Dana White was complaining (justifiably so) two years ago for stand-up gate is just amazing. Booking The Smoothie King reminds me of when UFC booked Sean Gannon and I’m not necessarily talking about skill set, either.
Update (6/26): Fedor now with Dan Henderson’s Clinch Gear? America and Russia holding hands…
Topics: Media, MMA, UFC, Zach Arnold | 13 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
Talk Radio: Why is the media paying so much attention to Strikeforce negotiating with Batista when it’s as big of a joke as James Toney in the UFC?
By Zach Arnold | June 25, 2010
Now that’s a leading headline for you. This passage comes from Sherdog radio last Wednesday.
The first point being made is how much of the media covering MMA now comes from the pro-wrestling world. Of course, as Alan Conceicao has pointed out before, “everything is pro-wrestling.” The addendum point to point #1 is how much Scott Coker and Showtime believe that grabbing former WWE guys is somehow going to help their bottom line.
The second point being made is trying to put the potential signing of Batista in context to UFC signing James Toney. At least with Brock Lesnar in UFC and Bobby Lashley in Strikeforce, you had pro-wrestlers with amateur wrestling experience. With Batista, you have someone who went down in wrestling folk legend for allegedly getting beat up by Booker T.
Continue reading this article here…
Topics: Media, MMA, StrikeForce, Zach Arnold | 28 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
Advice from New Jersey State Athletic Control Board on dealing with staph
By Zach Arnold | June 25, 2010
When I wrote a detailed article about the doctors who cleared Matt Hamill to fight with the mark on his back last Saturday, it was a revealing article in many ways. Some good things and some bad things.
The good is that for those of you who read it, I got great feedback from you about the topic.
The problem is that people largely weren’t interested in reading the article or discussing it. I learned a long ago time as a writer that in order to gain traction with a story, you need to have the following three factors:
- Feed the beast. (A new story or taking a known story and giving it life with new information.)
- Media interest in talking about your story.
- Reader interest in your story.
In the case of the examination we did about the medical background of doctors who cleared Matt to fight, we did feed the beast but the media largely ignored it (outside of a couple of outlets like MMA Torch) and the readership interest wasn’t there. I found the latter to be highly ironic because at times on both this site and on other MMA sites or message boards, you often hear the criticisms that there isn’t good writing or good journalism going on in the online MMA world. However, once something does meet their standards, suddenly they don’t want to read or comment on it and instead choose to surface on another topic that they deem to be of lower standards. Amusing.
When I addressed the issue of staph in MMA, it’s obviously a topic that I think everyone should take very seriously because we don’t need the fighters having nasty diseases and fighting in unsafe environments. Which brings me to a couple of articles I recently received about what Dr. Sherry Wulkan of the NJSACB wrote on the topic and what fighters, trainers, and others can do to prevent outbreaks of staph and what to do if you do get some sort of infection.
Continue reading this article here…
Topics: Media, MMA, Zach Arnold | 8 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
Strikeforce 6/26 HP Pavilion (San Jose Arena)
By Zach Arnold | June 25, 2010
This card will air live on Showtime East but on a three-hour delay on Showtime West. A $25 coupon is being offered if you order Showtime to watch this show.
Main card
- Lightweights: Josh Thomson vs. Pat Healy
- 145-pound women’s title: Cris Cyborg vs. Jan Finney
- Middleweights (Loser out of 8-man future tournament): Scott Smith vs. Cung Le
- Heavyweights: Fedor Emelianenko vs. Fabricio Werdum
Topics: Media, MMA, StrikeForce, Zach Arnold | 20 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
Everyone in the business treats each other like a mark and the fans get the same treatment as well
By Zach Arnold | June 25, 2010
I could have been describing professional wrestling based on the title of this post. In a sense, I think that’s why you see such endearment from wrestling fans towards MMA in terms of feeling as if they can relate to what happens in the business.
I’ve used the term astroturfing on the site before (click on the word to search the archives).
Cage Side Seats says the information leak is related to a lawsuit.
fyi — in light of the fact that the goal is to make it looked ‘hijacked’ we won’t blur the round number on the clock.
This just adds a whole new element to what Jordan Breen said about all the higher-ups involved in the MMA industry being obsessed with MMA web sites/message boards and acting like, well… “bitches in a beauty salon.”
The second part of that Middle Easy article refers to allegedly having a marketing firm use employees as fake fans on message boards. Note to Zuffa and Spike — you don’t need to hire UFC fans on message boards. There are plenty of defenders already online. There were plenty of UFC defenders online in 2006, especially with all the insane UFC vs. PRIDE threads that dominated every message board at the time.
Speaking of everyone working each other over, that seems to be the only storyline in the media for tomorrow’s fight between Fedor and Fabricio Werdum in regards to when is Fedor going to the UFC.
Continue reading this article here…
Topics: Media, MMA, StrikeForce, UFC, Zach Arnold | 12 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
Steve Cofield on ESPN’s MMA Live broadcast
By Zach Arnold | June 24, 2010
He’s their “ESPN MMA Insider” and did an interview spot this week from Las Vegas. There’s a lot of people who like to bag on Steve, but his presence on this show is a much-needed boost in terms of addressing issues that the ESPN show normally isn’t comfortable with discussing. Let Steve bring the edge and handle the “dirty issues” and suddenly you have a show that could perhaps find its own voice as opposed to being simply an infomercial for Zuffa.
Speaking of MMA Live guests, Jake Rossen has a new article (CLICK HERE) about the history of PRIDE’s GP tournament. Read it.
I also think Pat Miletich is a plus on the show and hope he can make more appearances.
I was surprised at how aggressive Kenny Florian was in coming out against Fedor on this week’s show as far as Fedor not fighting the top guys. Florian said that Werdum’s one shot is to get Fedor in the clinch and get on top on the ground and “take away his hips.”
Final Bellator show of season two
It happened on Thursday night in Louisville, Kentucky and clearly while the quality of fighters in this promotion is not on the same level as UFC or even Strikeforce, the truth is that this group has a constantly entertaining product with a good mix of young prospects and veterans from minor promotions.
One of the interesting positives in favor of Bellator is just the unpredictability of this group. Zoila Frausto, who watched her sister Stephanie lose last week in Kansas City to Lisa Ward, went out and pulled off a huge upset over Rosi Sexton. It was an amazing result and one that I don’t even think the promotion expected it.
Bjorn Rebney was doing his best to hype up the fact that Joe Warren fought with an illness and could barely make the fight date, but that largely doesn’t excuse his performance against Patricio Pitbull. Pitbull played it perfectly in round one. In round two, Warren went to what he knew best — take a guy down and hold him down for the round. Much of the same in round three. Pitbull didn’t show much skill from off his back and it was the perfect situation for Warren. Smother a guy, but show little-to-no offense at all, and he was getting cheered by the Louisville crowd all night for doing this. They were chanting “USA! USA! USA” throughout the fight.
I was way more impressed with what Alexander Shlemenko did to Bryan Baker. He really tagged Baker with some shots standing and that was a real good display of striking power.
Now, a look at what the results for season two mean for upcoming title fights:
- Featherweights – Joe Warren vs. Joe Soto
- Lightweights – Pat Curran vs. Eddie Alvarez
- Welterweights – Ben Askren vs. Lyman Good
- Middleweights – Alexander Shlemenko vs. Hector Lombard
Topics: Bellator, Media, MMA, StrikeForce, Zach Arnold | 7 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
The rise of top Featherweight Marlon Sandro
By Zach Arnold | June 24, 2010
This is the passage from Jordan Breen’s radio show last Tuesday that I really wanted to talk about.
“He started his career looking like really another Nova Uniao position-based grappler and has turned into having smoking punching skills. In his last four victories, Marlon Sandro has knocked out: Nick Denis, Yuji Hoshino, Tomonari Kanomata, and now Masanori Kanehara. Those four wins have taken him a combined 3 minutes and 38 seconds. 2 minutes and 33 seconds of that were the Yuji Hoshino win. And not only is he knocking these guys out, these guys are all ending up on spine boards and stretchers and needing to be scraped off the canvas. It’s a freaky level of natural electricity coming out of this man’s fists. And so it does seem a bit weird to think that a guy who had a big string of decisions would be able to be you know capable of that kind of thing. The things I would single out are first of all, the level of striking he had at the time, his boxing still isn’t super great but he’s really nice at setting up his right uppercut and that’s the punch that’s really hammering home these guys. That’s really the straw that stirs the drink for his nasty and brutal knockouts. So, when you get a little bit more boxing acumen you’re really able to choose the shots that fit you well and you can land with accuracy and with potency and that’s a bit what he has here. On top of that, his ground game, which is what he was more comfortable with in his earlier career being a Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu black belt, being a Nova Uniao guy, he’s more concerned with passing than pounding first. He prefers to get position before he does anything. And really, even if you look at a more recent fight where he fought a bit on the ground… the m.o. was to pass guard first. He wasn’t really that interested in pounding. So a lot of his fights where he racked up decisions, he was positionally taking out these guys. I don’t know if that will change now, I don’t know if he kind of realizes the gift that he’s been given and will get takedowns and just pounce on a guy’s head. But there are a few times even in the Shooto Brazil days where he opened up a bit on the ground and was able to seriously hurt guys, clobbering them on the floor. But more often than not, he preferred to get to a dominant position and look to grapple, didn’t really have a good mix of the pound and pass. So, I would say that’s the biggest distinction. As he good as he got a bit of stand-up technique, he was more willing to use it and was able to set up bigger power punches and on the ground he just doesn’t prefer punching. He prefers to pass and go for submissions that way. But it will be interesting to see if he goes back to the ground game in subsequent fights if we will get a ground ‘n pound performance, I imagine he would still show off some serious, scary-type Howitzer power should be opt to do that.”
Topics: Japan, Media, MMA, StrikeForce, Zach Arnold | 6 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
Jordan Breen: Showtime has angrily called me before after reading transcribed quotes from my radio show
By Zach Arnold | June 24, 2010
A funny passage from his Tuesday radio show. Keep in mind that Jordan had no knowledge of what Scott Coker said during his interview with Josh Gross on the SI show.
By the way, who’s this mystery transcriber? You know who it is. I may be persona non grata as far as being safe to name drop in most of the MMA media circles (this is hilariously a true fact), but if you ever doubted over the countless years of writing that people in Zuffa’s office, the Japanese offices, etc. read what I write, consider those doubts removed. Who would ever be afraid of moi? Amusing as hell.
Here’s the set up for this passage: A caller asks Jordan what he thinks about his influence on the MMA industry. Jordan tries to play it cool but brings up the fact that Showtime has called him up in a fit after reading a transcription of what he said on his radio show previously. If you want to know what got Showtime pissed, it’s this passage from Jordan that I transcribed which related to Showtime calling the shots for Strikeforce and how Rich Chou has little matchmaking power. Take note that Scott Coker was not a happy camper during that Josh Gross interview when he was responding to whether or not Showtime was calling the shots for Strikeforce.
After Jordan answers the caller’s question, I’ll throw a passage about you from Jordan’s show about 10 minutes before the caller’s question. Jordan is talking about the negotiations between Dave Batista and Strikeforce.
Continue reading this article here…
Topics: Media, MMA, StrikeForce, Zach Arnold | 26 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |