I’m a huge fan of fight sports. I grew up watching boxing and the occasional street fight. In the past few years I have become, like so many others, a big fan of mixed martial arts. The UFC has recently taken over, they pulled a classic business move and bought their biggest competitor, PRIDE from Japan. I was a big PRIDE fan, but now it’s over. The UFC is the top dog.
PRIDE was based out of Japan and had different rules than the UFC. Kicks and knees to the head when on the ground were allowed, yet no elbows, they fought in a ring instead of a cage, and the judging was different. The rules of the fight dictate a lot, but that’s another blog entry.
Anyway, if you are a fan of fight sports or are interested in the UFC and mixed martial arts, you owe it to yourself to see some PRIDE fights.
Check out the fights from 2001 and up. Watch the rise of Fedor Emelianenko, Wanderlaei Silva, Quinton Jackson, Mauricio Rua, and so many others. Tremendously entertaining, highly recommended.
Available on netflix.com.
Fedor is the Champ! Watch all his fights, he is one of the greatest ever.
His first appearance is in PRIDE demolition. Start there.
There are so many great fights, it’s too many to name. Anderson Silva vs Ryo Chonan. Amazing.
It’s worth it to watch them all in order, to see the rise and fall of the winners and losers. Trust.
Posted on January 02, 2008 at 11:35 PM | Previous Entry | Next Entry | Entry List | Email Entry | Digg
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There are 8 total comments about this entry. The most recent comment was posted 4 months, 4 weeks ago...
If you ask me pride was a much better organization and the buyout by the UFC ruined a great organization,whereas UFC has a mix of (mostly)lowlevel fighters and som highlevel,Pride was mostly highlevel!!Ithink the move for a lot of the fighters like crocop and silva fucked them up not that the people they were fighting were better fighters.In the end money ruins everything as usual!!
Since the acquisition, it would be good if UFC incorporated the use of PRIDE’s Yellow Card penalties. Some of those chumps would fight harder if they knew risked losing 10% to 30% of their purse, and a possible DQ.
Sakuraba in Pride was amazing! Totally unorthodox action and reaction. I agree with you about the rules preference in Pride over the UFC. After seeing UFC 1, 2, and 3 I was hooked.
I am still pissed that Dana White negotiated the purchase of PRIDE. PRIDE Owns the UFC, always had tougher fights. Bushido rules above all....Japan should never have sold it over.
Pride is gone but they came out with a new production called DREAM that has a lot of ex-Pride staff. So far they have had only one event (recently), but the whole MMA world was buzzing about it. One of the most interesting things is that EVERY event is a Grand Prix, where the fighters have to take part in tournament style competition. And don’t forget, the rules are exactly the same as pride and they fight in a white ring, just like the good ol’ days! My only concern is that so far they only concentrate on their lightweight and welterweight grand prix’s: no MW, LHW, or HW so far. Although, I think that is because there is such an untapped talent pool in LW and WW from Pride’s dispersal. All the good MW and up fighters from Pride went straight to the UFC it seems.
The white ring was the shit! PRIDE had great style and was a much classier organization.
Watching the UFC now it’s such a different fight with no kicks, knees, and stomps while on the ground. Fighters end up having to fall into an opponents guard or letting the other guy stand up. Such a crucial element to the fight is the ability to attack the opponent on the ground and/or attack while they are attempting to stand up. Mauricio Rua used to stomp the shit out of people as they attempted to stand or hold them down and use knees.
Totally, Wanderlei stomped shit too. It was brutal when he kicked Sakuraba right in the face in one of their fights. Shit I thought his head would come off. But yeah, Dream is where I’m headed now, Joachim Hellboy Hansen is a beast.
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good stuff,great entertainment ....