Some light reading when you desire to :
Do you miss Japan’s boom? Miss Genki Sudo’s long, elaborate dance sequences and freak show fights? There are people at our forum who agree with you. Go figure.
I think after the past few weeks we’ve had some questions answered when it comes to the future of the sport of MMA. If anything, to some it might have been a cold, hard reality check, while to others it was the expected result. MMA in Japan was the standard for years. While the UFC was being shunned by the mainstream in the mid-90s we had PRIDE selling out big arenas and Inoki beginning to scheme up ideas to break into the market. That was then and this is now, and right now things have changed drastically. Two events in particular over the past few weeks; World Victory Road’s Senkogu and most recently DREAM.1 have proven that the Japanese style of MMA still has its place in the world of MMA, but not like it used to.
Fighting in Japan is known for being a spectacle, for being something the public can get behind and enjoy, regardless of the quality of the match-making or how elite the fighters are. It just turned out for years that lots of top competition were fighting in Japan due to the better pay, exposure and the brighter future. Last week, Kendall posted a pretty positive piece on the debut of the DREAM project and the possibilities of it finally replacing the void left from PRIDE’s departure last year.
Much in the standard PRIDE and, well, any fight promotion in Japan fashion, we had inexperienced fighters facing off against very popular top competitors in Minowaman (sigh) and Cro Cop, and in suit, getting destroyed. Then, in something else that more or less ends up being unique to Japan due to persistence, we had the beginnings of tournaments with actual competition. The quality of the fights are immaterial to my argument, but most of the fights were actually pretty good. Sure, Aoki/JZ ended disappointingly, and really, Aoki seemed to not want to be there, but it was still a fair night of fights. Things looked good, the DREAM.1 show seemed to have a decent sized crowd, the fights were good, the whole event showed a level of promise that we haven’t really seen in a while. WVR was a good show, but its unclear if they’d actually run more shows or if it was just another one-shot deal with an empty promise for further shows.
Then we saw the ratings for DREAM.1. Ouch. When you think back to PRIDE, you think that a rating of double that was seen as a disappointment it just gives you the idea of where MMA stands in Japan right now. This wouldn’t be the first time something in Japan skyrocketed in popularity and then came crashing down after the fad had passed, but this time it is really hitting home. The fight market in Japan is dwindling, and as Marc already pointed out, there is quite an influx, and it won’t be surprising if this trend continues, as well as European and Russian fighters who seem to end up in Japan begin filtering into the US.
The only thing that will keep Japan alive at this point seems to be the unique presentation they offer as opposed to the US. The showmanship and over-to-top presentation is something that in the US promoters have been trying to shy away from, to distance themselves from pro-wrestling. Akihiro Gono in UFC walking out in a disco suit and an afro wig is something that almost didn’t make sense when it happened, it got some uncomfortable laughter from the announcers, but it was quite out of the ordinary in the US; walk out covered in sponsored gear with your whole team, also sporting the gear. The US wants to emulate boxing, while Japan wants to provide an experience, like Genki Sudo’s over the top dance routines. Really, one can only hope that the fight scene in Japan pulls through, instead of slowly dying off and leaving us, the fight fan, without any variety.