- Joined
- Aug 4, 2016
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*Editors Note: Mike Lorefice's comments will be preceded by his initials*
Welcome to the beginning of the richest of combat sports traditions, as we have now arrived to the first of many MEGA-BATTLE events that FIGHTING NETWORK RINGS will put forth, and no sooner do we arrive, when we are welcomed by a montage featuring freezing fog, a full moon, and an eerie 2-note synth bassline that will forever be etched into our collective psyche. The date is 1-25-92, and now it is Maeda’s turn to kick off the new year, with what will hopefully be another powerful statement. When we last saw this outfit, we were able to behold the debut of perhaps the greatest fake fighter of them all in Volk Han, and while he is set to be mysteriously absent from tonight’s proceedings, hopefully this will be made up by an appearance from foot-fighting master Rob Kaman. This outfit will have its work cut out for them, as the UWF-I launched the new year with an amazing performance from Kiyoshi Tamura and Yuko Miyato that the PWFG was unable to find an adequate response to, so now we turn our eyes to Maeda to see if he can rise to the challenge.
After the moon visuals that wouldn’t be out of place on a Scandinavian metal album fade away, we are taken to the sparse settings within the Tokyo NK hall, where they are conducting a weigh-in of all the fighters, despite there not being any weight classes in effect. After this, we are greeted to the fighters coming out one-by-one to the Hip-Hop version of the Rings theme, rife with an unbridled lyricism that would have A Tribe Called Quest in a state of envy. Seriously, check out this gem: “I am the champion! I rule all the rings! I am high…. the king of the universe! I am I who conquers all. If you mess with me, hey It’s you who’s gonna get slayed. Because I’m the king of all kings, I mean what I mean. Hey, lemme tell ya, let’s step into the ring!” Poetry. In. Motion.
Our first match of the evening will be an EARTH BOUT featuring Herman Renting vs Shtorm Koba. As of press time, I’ve been unable to find out any meaningful information about Koba, and this appears to be his only appearance in any kind of pro wrestling/MMA setting, but he does appear to be a possible harbinger of esoteric levels of Judo/Sambo knowledge, so we are hopeful. When we last saw Renting he was in a quasi-shoot with sediokaikan master Nobuaki Kakuda (in that they were basically having a legit sparring contest, but not fully utilizing all the rules/techniques at their disposal). The fight starts with some deliciously stiff kicks from Renting, before being taken down by an excellent ouchi-gari (major inner-reap) which seems to confirm my suspicions about his judo acumen. After the takedown they immediately go for dueling foot-locks but are quickly stood back up by the ref for getting under the ropes.
Once they are back on their feet, they continue to lay into each other with neither man seeming to pull their strikes (but wisely keeping them all to the body to avoid injury) and this is already much better than I could have anticipated. The action continued at a brisk pace until Renting botched a throw, and wound up accidently headbutting Koba, causing a nasty cut over his eye. The doctors eventually cleaned the cut up, and authorized the fight to continue, which prompted Koba to display how a proper throw is to be executed with a tasty yoko-otoshi (lateral drop). Things eventually go sour for Koba as he falls prey to a reverse achilles-lock and must take a rope-escape. Renting eventually wins via an ankle submission at the 13:40 mark. This was a good match that had a nice blend of realism and entertainment, that is hard to accomplish. It could have used some more striking sequences, and there were times that Koba’s newness was apparent, but overall this was a great way to start things off, and it’s a shame that this will be the last we will see of Koba, as he genuinely seems to have loads of potential in this format, with his obvious judo skills.
ML: Renting remains one of the better talents Maeda is renting. He was clearly the better athlete, and could have picked apart Koba with his standup. However, Renting did a good job carrying this as a judo inspired match, which allowed Koba to follow pretty well, and show a lot of potential. Koba really stepped up the intensity after he was busted open hard way when a suplex went awry, and the matwork became pretty interesting due to the urgency. The match seemed to peak in this early to mid portion though. 14 minutes was too long for a debuting wrestler, especially if this was basically just going to be a grappling match. Still, this was pretty good, and it's a shame Koba never returned.
Now it’s time for an AQUA BOUT (which will be our first shoot of the evening) between Mitsuya Nagai and Koichiro Kimura. Kimura impressed me last time with both good footwork, and a solid judo repertoire, but was unfortunately hampered by an overly long match with another rookie, which negated his ability to properly shine. Here he will be facing Nagai, who was on the receiving end of a one way drubbing at the hands of Gerard Gordeau last month, in what was this promotions first proper shoot.
The match is underway, and Kimura immediately takes two nasty thigh kicks before blasting Nagai down with a double-leg takedown, but when doing so it placed Nagai too close to the ropes and thus prompted a quick restart. Kimura continued to take some more leg punishment before getting the fight to the ground again, but he quickly found himself at a loss while inside Nagai’s open guard, and his only answer was to try a rudimentary ankle-lock, which not only failed, but prompted Nagai to secure a heel hook which led to our first rope-escape. The next several mins saw a continuing pattern of Kimura getting lit-up by Nagai on the feet, before securing a favorable position via takedown, but finding himself unable or unsure of what to do once he had the superior position. After a string of mat failures, Kimura eventually just opted to soccer kick Nagai after his takedowns, at least until the ref could intervene and stand Nagai back up. The last few mins saw Nagai ratcheting up the intensity of his striking, until he unleased a never-ending torrent of palm strikes, which eventually prompted the ref to call for a knockdown. Kimura was able to get up for two more servings of this, before being eliminated for good. Despite Kimura’s only weapon being his takedown skills, this was an exciting match due to the intensity on display, especially from Nagai, and it was good to see him back in form after his humiliating loss to Gordeau last month. I’m not sure if apprehensiveness to striking his grounded opponent is what held Kimura back, or his grappling skills aren’t as good as I originally esteemed them to be, but the only thing he really showed here today was a solid wrestling base, and I’m confident that he is capable of a lot more. Still, I feel like we are off to a great start with 2 good matches.
ML: This was a shoot, but, for the most part, they didn't really manage to get any big shots in until the final minutes. The fight was very intense though, and the transitions, scrambles, and takedowns were very fast and urgent. It was Shootboxing vs. SAW, and while Caesar's skills are clearly more interesting than Tobin Bell's, Kimura should have owned this match once he was able to get Nagai down, which he regularly was. Kimura had some pretty neat takedowns where he kept twisting Nagai until he spun him down, but didn't have much of an arsenal of submission arts once he succeeded. In the days largely before striking created the opening for the submission, Kimura found himself doing too much waiting for the opening. In his defense, Nagai was a dangerous striker even off his back. The problem with this match is they just kept seeming to negate each other. Nagai couldn't really kick because Kimura would just catch it and up end him. Whether Kimura got a takedown off a body lock or off catching Nagai's kick, he really didn't have any method of opening up a submission, and the match just stalled out. Nagai had much better luck using his hands, but without gloves it was difficult for him to do a big damage. He swelled Kimura's eye, but probably could have scored a late knockout if he could have used closed fists. Kimura nonetheless seemed about ready to just quit, hunching over, and still wasn't ready to restart after the Ref gave him an eight count, but finally threw some fierce palms of his own. Still, Kimura was just out of gas, and eventually wilted to Nagai's superior cardio. While this had more than its share of downtime, Nagai's comeback finish was exciting, and I think this was a good shoot given the time period. Good match.
The Pangs of Defeat…
Welcome to the beginning of the richest of combat sports traditions, as we have now arrived to the first of many MEGA-BATTLE events that FIGHTING NETWORK RINGS will put forth, and no sooner do we arrive, when we are welcomed by a montage featuring freezing fog, a full moon, and an eerie 2-note synth bassline that will forever be etched into our collective psyche. The date is 1-25-92, and now it is Maeda’s turn to kick off the new year, with what will hopefully be another powerful statement. When we last saw this outfit, we were able to behold the debut of perhaps the greatest fake fighter of them all in Volk Han, and while he is set to be mysteriously absent from tonight’s proceedings, hopefully this will be made up by an appearance from foot-fighting master Rob Kaman. This outfit will have its work cut out for them, as the UWF-I launched the new year with an amazing performance from Kiyoshi Tamura and Yuko Miyato that the PWFG was unable to find an adequate response to, so now we turn our eyes to Maeda to see if he can rise to the challenge.
After the moon visuals that wouldn’t be out of place on a Scandinavian metal album fade away, we are taken to the sparse settings within the Tokyo NK hall, where they are conducting a weigh-in of all the fighters, despite there not being any weight classes in effect. After this, we are greeted to the fighters coming out one-by-one to the Hip-Hop version of the Rings theme, rife with an unbridled lyricism that would have A Tribe Called Quest in a state of envy. Seriously, check out this gem: “I am the champion! I rule all the rings! I am high…. the king of the universe! I am I who conquers all. If you mess with me, hey It’s you who’s gonna get slayed. Because I’m the king of all kings, I mean what I mean. Hey, lemme tell ya, let’s step into the ring!” Poetry. In. Motion.
Our first match of the evening will be an EARTH BOUT featuring Herman Renting vs Shtorm Koba. As of press time, I’ve been unable to find out any meaningful information about Koba, and this appears to be his only appearance in any kind of pro wrestling/MMA setting, but he does appear to be a possible harbinger of esoteric levels of Judo/Sambo knowledge, so we are hopeful. When we last saw Renting he was in a quasi-shoot with sediokaikan master Nobuaki Kakuda (in that they were basically having a legit sparring contest, but not fully utilizing all the rules/techniques at their disposal). The fight starts with some deliciously stiff kicks from Renting, before being taken down by an excellent ouchi-gari (major inner-reap) which seems to confirm my suspicions about his judo acumen. After the takedown they immediately go for dueling foot-locks but are quickly stood back up by the ref for getting under the ropes.
Once they are back on their feet, they continue to lay into each other with neither man seeming to pull their strikes (but wisely keeping them all to the body to avoid injury) and this is already much better than I could have anticipated. The action continued at a brisk pace until Renting botched a throw, and wound up accidently headbutting Koba, causing a nasty cut over his eye. The doctors eventually cleaned the cut up, and authorized the fight to continue, which prompted Koba to display how a proper throw is to be executed with a tasty yoko-otoshi (lateral drop). Things eventually go sour for Koba as he falls prey to a reverse achilles-lock and must take a rope-escape. Renting eventually wins via an ankle submission at the 13:40 mark. This was a good match that had a nice blend of realism and entertainment, that is hard to accomplish. It could have used some more striking sequences, and there were times that Koba’s newness was apparent, but overall this was a great way to start things off, and it’s a shame that this will be the last we will see of Koba, as he genuinely seems to have loads of potential in this format, with his obvious judo skills.
ML: Renting remains one of the better talents Maeda is renting. He was clearly the better athlete, and could have picked apart Koba with his standup. However, Renting did a good job carrying this as a judo inspired match, which allowed Koba to follow pretty well, and show a lot of potential. Koba really stepped up the intensity after he was busted open hard way when a suplex went awry, and the matwork became pretty interesting due to the urgency. The match seemed to peak in this early to mid portion though. 14 minutes was too long for a debuting wrestler, especially if this was basically just going to be a grappling match. Still, this was pretty good, and it's a shame Koba never returned.
Now it’s time for an AQUA BOUT (which will be our first shoot of the evening) between Mitsuya Nagai and Koichiro Kimura. Kimura impressed me last time with both good footwork, and a solid judo repertoire, but was unfortunately hampered by an overly long match with another rookie, which negated his ability to properly shine. Here he will be facing Nagai, who was on the receiving end of a one way drubbing at the hands of Gerard Gordeau last month, in what was this promotions first proper shoot.
The match is underway, and Kimura immediately takes two nasty thigh kicks before blasting Nagai down with a double-leg takedown, but when doing so it placed Nagai too close to the ropes and thus prompted a quick restart. Kimura continued to take some more leg punishment before getting the fight to the ground again, but he quickly found himself at a loss while inside Nagai’s open guard, and his only answer was to try a rudimentary ankle-lock, which not only failed, but prompted Nagai to secure a heel hook which led to our first rope-escape. The next several mins saw a continuing pattern of Kimura getting lit-up by Nagai on the feet, before securing a favorable position via takedown, but finding himself unable or unsure of what to do once he had the superior position. After a string of mat failures, Kimura eventually just opted to soccer kick Nagai after his takedowns, at least until the ref could intervene and stand Nagai back up. The last few mins saw Nagai ratcheting up the intensity of his striking, until he unleased a never-ending torrent of palm strikes, which eventually prompted the ref to call for a knockdown. Kimura was able to get up for two more servings of this, before being eliminated for good. Despite Kimura’s only weapon being his takedown skills, this was an exciting match due to the intensity on display, especially from Nagai, and it was good to see him back in form after his humiliating loss to Gordeau last month. I’m not sure if apprehensiveness to striking his grounded opponent is what held Kimura back, or his grappling skills aren’t as good as I originally esteemed them to be, but the only thing he really showed here today was a solid wrestling base, and I’m confident that he is capable of a lot more. Still, I feel like we are off to a great start with 2 good matches.
ML: This was a shoot, but, for the most part, they didn't really manage to get any big shots in until the final minutes. The fight was very intense though, and the transitions, scrambles, and takedowns were very fast and urgent. It was Shootboxing vs. SAW, and while Caesar's skills are clearly more interesting than Tobin Bell's, Kimura should have owned this match once he was able to get Nagai down, which he regularly was. Kimura had some pretty neat takedowns where he kept twisting Nagai until he spun him down, but didn't have much of an arsenal of submission arts once he succeeded. In the days largely before striking created the opening for the submission, Kimura found himself doing too much waiting for the opening. In his defense, Nagai was a dangerous striker even off his back. The problem with this match is they just kept seeming to negate each other. Nagai couldn't really kick because Kimura would just catch it and up end him. Whether Kimura got a takedown off a body lock or off catching Nagai's kick, he really didn't have any method of opening up a submission, and the match just stalled out. Nagai had much better luck using his hands, but without gloves it was difficult for him to do a big damage. He swelled Kimura's eye, but probably could have scored a late knockout if he could have used closed fists. Kimura nonetheless seemed about ready to just quit, hunching over, and still wasn't ready to restart after the Ref gave him an eight count, but finally threw some fierce palms of his own. Still, Kimura was just out of gas, and eventually wilted to Nagai's superior cardio. While this had more than its share of downtime, Nagai's comeback finish was exciting, and I think this was a good shoot given the time period. Good match.
The Pangs of Defeat…