Did early Pancrase get any exposure alongside the UFC or nobody knew about it outside of Japan?

[agibmxmma]

Question for old fans in here, did you know about Funaki, Bas Rutten and the rest of those guys? The internet was new and Ultimate Fighting was underground

Could you see Pancrase fights live via satellite? Im guessing not. Even the most die hard fan probably never got to see these guys or am I wrong?

Satellite, black boxes and VHS tapes were how we saw it back then. But I'd say those of us who were Martial Artists who focused on Combat Arts (Muay Thai, Sambo, Boxing, etc..) during the 70s, 80s and 90s, knew of Pancrase and other events similar, before the UFC came around in the early 90s. If anything, Pancrase and it's competitors were looked at as more "realistic" fighting and fighters, whereas the UFC events were looked at as a "circus" in sense initially with guys in one boxing glove, sumo wrestlers, etc..

 

[Killer Kadoogan]

couldn't find a way to obtain access, but knew it existed. i recall seeing advertisements before UFC PPVs. knew it was some crazy league with palm strikes. shit was hard to find though. video rental stores eventually got UFC VHS but i dont remember seeing much else past that.

 

[JohnMandick]

Jason DeLucia?

I think he put a curse on Bas at some point.

Yes, that's right I think. lol They had a back and forth on sherdog.

 

[Fedorgasm]

I remember UFC was first to be on ppv, but then others tried to do something similar.

There was one called Future fights I think, which ended up being completely fake. They even had a guy I recognized as a WWE wrestler in it.

There were some that were real and they copied the UFC, I don't recall the name but they had guys like Mario Sperry, Igor zinoviev, etc.

Then there was shoot wrestling, which is how they branded Takada's org. It was great. I thought it was real but it wasn't.

Then after that, I think they did a pay per view with Pancrase. I remember enjoying it because it had a similar ruleset to shoot wrestling. I still remember the pay per view commercial slogan "Throw down... With Pancrase"

 

[GSP_37]

I don't think it was live or recent but cable TV used to have a channel called Imagineasian(?) Channel and they used to show like a UFC Unleashed type Pancrase show featuring matches of Bas, Frank Shamrock, Funaki, the other Japanese guy, Ken Shamrock, etc. This was maybe around 2007.

 

[colorles]

couldn't find a way to obtain access, but knew it existed. i recall seeing advertisements before UFC PPVs. knew it was some crazy league with palm strikes. shit was hard to find though. video rental stores eventually got UFC VHS but i dont remember seeing much else past that.

MMA was just weird back then. Most of society didn't know or care anything about it. Boxing gyms never talked about it. But in wrestling circles and even random social circles like at parties or whatever, etc, there would usually be "that guy", that had a certain look to him - read, shady and possible involved with illicit activities - that was into mma and has tapes, maybe he did some TKD or something or maybe he talked about killing people with pressure points and was involved with the mob, or he literally reeked of cheep cocaine and steroids. Just all around shady types and/or weird dudes like in Napolean Dynamite:

 

[Jyodog]

bootleg vhs tapes

 

[don't ask]

In the late nineties, I had managed to get my hands on some Pancrase tapes. There were quite a few NHB orgs going in America that were relatively easy to find, but Pancrase was a real treat when I finally saw some of their matches.

I took a Larry Hartsell seminar and he was assisted by one of his students, a guy named Justin something (Clay? Williams? I don't remember) who was a Pancrase champion of some sort. I always wish I could see some of his matches. All I remember is that he had amazing kicking flexibility. He could stand in uppercut range and hit you with a headkick.

I just realized I remembered this incorrectly. He was a Shooto champion, not Pancrase.