Thought I'd try and tap the Sherdog fountain of MMA knowledge... I'm looking for advice/opinion/knowledge from anyone who followed WMMA back in the day. I've been working through the early history of women's 115lb MMA, and obviously Megumi Fujii is the most accomplished female fighter the sport has yet seen at that weight (and probably the most successful female MMA fighter pound-for-pound) - no disrespect to my girl Joanna Champion. But I've been struggling to find much about Yuka Tsuji that's in English. It's difficult to find much footage of her too (unlike Fujii). However I gather that she is often considered the second-most successful 115lbs fighter, after Megumi. Is this accurate? She was clearly a highly dangerous submission artist, at least judging from her record. How did she compare with Megumi? If anyone has any information/insight/context on Yuka Tsuiji and her place in WMMA history, I'd be grateful.
She's definitely up there as an all time great. She came from a wrestling background (placed in one of the Asian Championships for freestyle) and was predominantly a submission grappler. Fujii is definitely the Japanese female GOAT (and overall WMMA GOAT imo), after her it would probably be between Tsuji, Miku Matsumoto, and Ayaka Hamasaki. I'm not sure how much of her is uploaded onto YouTube and the like but I think I have at least half of her Smackgirl fights. She also rocked pretty cool masks
Yuka Tsuji vs Megumi Fujii was the superfight that everyone wanted but it never happened. They both fought in the same organizations. And both were the biggest stars in Smackgirl and JEWELS. I think the organizations didn't want Fujii or Tsuji to lose. So they didn't make that fight. Yuka Tsuji lost the first time to Anne Tavares, but Tsuji came into that fight with a heavily bandaged shoulder. Megumi then fought Tavares and won. Another common opponent was Erica Montoya. Yuka Tsuji submitted Erica (btw, that was a good fight). Fujii won by decision. I would say Fujii is #1 and Yuka was #2. MIKU was way overrated and never on the same level as Tsuji or Fujii. I could only find the first round of Yuka Tsuji's fight with Erica Montoya. Like Fujii, most of Tsuji's matches very fairly short because they were so good at submissions. Here is the first round of Erica Montoya vs Yuka Tsuji. This fight was in 2004. So this is well before WMMA even hit the US. It is one of the few fights that was actually very competitive. I think Erica was only 19 years at the time. A few months after losing to Tsuji, Erica fought Megumi Fujii, lost that fight, and then she stopped fighting MMA. If she was somehow still in fitting shape, Erica would probably submit a lot of today's WMMA fighters.
Idk that I would say Miku was way overrated. She came into the sport with no previous martial arts background but by the end of her career she was racking up big wins (Hisae, Hamderlei, Lisa Ellis, Carina Damm, avenged her losses to Takimoto twice). She avenged all of her losses by the end of her career. She will always be a bit of a what if though since she retired possibly before she even peaked as a fighter (retired at 28, on a 12 fight win streak, and was still clearly improving). Her accolades stack up to Tsuji's. It's too bad Miku, Megumi, and Tsuji never fought each other (Miku and Megumi did at least have that exhibition for Miku's retirement).
I remember a highlight video back in the day of a Japanese chick that use to do flying and rolling ankle locks and broke multiple ankles as a result. I forgot her name, but she was like the Palhares of tiny Japanese women.
Funny enough, that was the exact fight I was visualizing, but wrong fighter. In my mind I clearly mixed two fighters into one persona. But the fighter who I was actually thinking of was Satoko Shinashi 32-2-2, who is as it turns out more noted for her arm bars, but does have a few good heel hooks and leg bars. She also holds some Subs too long like Palhares.: She stopped fighting in 2008, but made a comeback in 2014 and has gone 5-0 since.
I've never even heard of Shinashi. Just Googled her. Very impressive record. How does she compare as an atomweight with Ayaka Hamasaki and Miku Matsumoto? EDIT: I just discovered she walks around at 92lbs! So a shitload smaller than even the atomweight division, even though that's where she competed. Wow.
0 clue. I'm no expert on JWMMA. I know one name. Megumi Fujii: I just remember years back someone posted a highlight video of this chick and I forgot her name until I rediscovered the highlight video today. But, I remember watching it and thinking "Damn....she is legit." Then she retired and came back so I thought, "Too legit to quit."
Shinashi Satoko is actually much lighter than 105 lbs. In fact, she's closer to 95 or 100 pounds. She was the best fighter at her weight class. Her only major loses were to Hisae Watanabe and Mai Ichii (who is much bigger and stronger than Shinashi). The problem with Shinashi is that she is so light that it is often difficult to find opponents for her. So that's why she had to fight at 105 many times. Megumi Fujii is Ayaka Hamasaki's mentor, trainer, and coach. Ayaka is Megumi's best student. Shinashi Satoko, Megumi Fujii, Ayaka Hamasaki, and Yuka Tsuji were all better than Miku Matsumoto. To be honest, all of them were ahead of there time in WMMA. By the time, WMMA arrived in America, they were mostly past their prime.
That's great man, thanks very much. I appreciate you taking the time. Just out of interest, why did you think Matsumoto was overrated relative to those other ladies?
Honest question: Is she really that good? I was looking through her record and saw that some of her wins were against girls that either hadn't debuted yet, only had 1 fight at the time or had a negative/.500 record. All of her wins since coming back have been against girls with those type of records too. Then again I'm no groundhog WMMA expert, especially not on the japanese scene, so I really want to know what's up with that.
Don't forget to figure in the place of hard-striking atomweight K.O. queen Hisae Watanabe. BTW, although an "old-timer" her most recent fight was less than two months ago.
I noticed that too (thanks to the Fight Finder). On the other hand, I suppose the talent pool was tiny and consisted of part-timers and amateurs.
Idk why you are so convinced that Miku is overrated, she has better wins than Shinashi. Shinashi is great but due to her size she didn't fight the best competition for the majority of her career and was strictly a grappler, I would favor Miku had they fought. She was only about 94lbs, she dominated the 99lbs division. She did well when she moved up to Atomweight as well. Mai Ichii, who she lost to, weighed 120lbs in their fight, almost 30 pounds heavier than Shinashi. Unfortunately she doesn't seem to have any plans of fighting anyone remotely relevant in her comeback but she's in that weird spot where there is no one known in her weight class and she is tiny at 105.
