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Saw this on UG forums just now

Rumored fights:
The second round of the Strikeforce heavyweight tournament is:
Alistair Overeem vs. Fabricio Werdum
Josh Barnett vs. Brett Rogers

Article: http://www.mma-japan.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=366:strikeforce-japan&catid=54:other&Itemid=98

Bringing back the Pride-esque buzz in Japan. I love the idea. Strikeforce really uping there game if they can aggressively attack Japanese market unlike the UFC

they're gonna beat the UFC to the punch. i wonder how Dana feels about this.

you could say this move may be partially due to drug testing with barnett and overeem, but overeem did pass his test in st louis. i think it has more to do with other reasons.

This card will do well, Overeem and Barnett are still big stars over in Japan. That said, Japan just isn't a viable market for either the UFC or Strikeforce anymore.

And I wouldn't rag on UFC too much about this. They've been working on getting the UFC Brazil card put together, which is much more monumental than a return to Japan IMO.

UFC should be heading to Korea instead of Japan.

Barnett and Overeem, the two juicers??? Sketchy, real sketchy. I wonder if SF will demand stringent testing, as the UFC does in England. Their intentions basically comes down to that.

Granted, Overeem and Barnett are also the two 'biggest in Japan'. Overeem with Pride and K-1, Barnett with Pride and pro wrestling.

If SF can pack Saitama, this is a massive deal. A huge undertaking. Nice.

singh_shady wrote:And I wouldn't rag on UFC too much about this. They've been working on getting the UFC Brazil card put together, which is much more monumental than a return to Japan IMO.

The Japanese organizations are floundering bad. That market could be a huge coup.

SF needs a Japanese T.V. deal, and with that they really could be beating UFC to the punch.

singh_shady wrote:And I wouldn't rag on UFC too much about this. They've been working on getting the UFC Brazil card put together, which is much more monumental than a return to Japan IMO.

Symbolically, maybe. But not financially.

singh_shady wrote:And I wouldn't rag on UFC too much about this. They've been working on getting the UFC Brazil card put together, which is much more monumental than a return to Japan IMO.

I only mentioned it because Zuffa has been talking about a Japan event in late '11 over the past couple months. If they could revive the mma market there that would be huge. That being said, the UFC is nothing like Pride or Dream and the culture of JMMA so i have my doubts.

cowboyronnie wrote:

singh_shady wrote:And I wouldn't rag on UFC too much about this. They've been working on getting the UFC Brazil card put together, which is much more monumental than a return to Japan IMO.

The Japanese organizations are floundering bad. That market could be a huge coup.

SF needs a Japanese T.V. deal, and with that they really could be beating UFC to the punch.

A big Japanese card wouldn't hurt, but in the grand scheme of things it won't matter. Also, a TV deal probably won't happen.

Listen to Scott Coker himself echo the same sentiments (Listen from 11:30 to 13:15)

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7q-5zlhBOSU[/youtube]

This is a win-win situation for Strikeforce. Not only does it give them a chance to pounce on a big MMA market in Japan, but it also let's them roll out their roiders without fear of being caught. Overeem and Barnett save a bunch of money now that they don't have to find a way to hide the roids in their systems and Strikeforce skirts the possible embarrasment of their guys getting busted for doping.

I think Overeem should be viewed as innocent until proven guilty.

Barnett, I agree. That guy is ridiculous.

REDDzone wrote:I think Overeem should be viewed as innocent until proven guilty.

C'mon.

Cammo, what big Japanese market are you talking about? This isn't 2003, the Japanese MMA culture is dying. I've read stuff from MMA fans living in Japan who say the mass popularity of MMA in Japan in the early 2000's was almost fad like and that the fad has now passed.

I mean 100,000 people went to see Bob f*cking Sapp fight Nogueira. Yea some of them were hardcore fans (and some of them still remain) but a vast majority of those people went to go see a spectacle. Big names (and I'm talking big JAPANESE names, Barnett and even Overeem don't count), big guys (the Japanese have always had a weird obsession with large muscular men like Bob Sapp, who was a bonafide superstar there. Might be a Godzilla thing) and the occasional freak show fight (again, huge in Japan). The grandiose production, the pyro, the extravagant entrances were absolutely a huge part of it. Anyone who thinks SF can recapture the imagination of the Japanese public is flat out wrong, and SF knows this. The CEO himself says this himself in the video I posted..

Coker has said anything more than 1 event in Japan every few years is not viable. Not only that but he goes one step further by saying that if there's a big fight, it should be in the US and not over in Japan. How is 1 event annually that may or may not have a huge fight going to reinvigorate the Japanese market? Also, any event in Japan would have to take place in the afternoon so it could be aired live in the States. Add in the fact that a TV deal is highly unlikely (due to differing agendas between Japanese and American media) and I fail to see how this would be a profitable long term venture for SF.

Anyways, this card is rumoured to be OFF now anyways:

http://www.mixedmartialarts.com/news/29 ... -then-off/

EDIT: It's still happening, I meant that it's off for Japan and will be held in the US. It's been going back and forth though

Interesting (first) post, Singh. ^

I didn't know about the fad characertistic.

Overeem is a Bob Sapp w/ actual effectiveness.

singh_shady wrote: Big names (and I'm talking big JAPANESE names, Barnett and even Overeem don't count), big guys (the Japanese have always had a weird obsession with large muscular men like Bob Sapp, who was a bonafide superstar there. Might be a Godzilla thing) and the occasional freak show fight (again, huge in Japan).

LOL

There is a racial element. They've got big black dudes running around in loin cloths beating their chests screaming ooga booga in their pro wrestling promotions. Sapp totally pandered to that. They're monsters of a sort in the Japanese imagination, I think.

cowboyronnie wrote:

REDDzone wrote:I think Overeem should be viewed as innocent until proven guilty.

C'mon.

Come on.

Frank Mir added more weight in a much shorter period of time. Where are his steroid accusations?

Overeem has never tested positive, and pissed clean in 2010 in the U.S.

edit: typo.

Mir added it during a long lay-off and did not maintain it.

There's no physical way that you can maintain that kind of muscle mass and train to fight 5-6 times a year without steroids. Your body can't recover from all that trainign without synthetic testosterone. It's biology.

cowboyronnie wrote:Interesting (first) post, Singh. ^

I didn't know about the fad characertistic.

I think because everyone absolutely loved Pride (myself included) they seem to forget that it had a relatively short peak. It was always moderately popular throughout it's existence event but really, mass popularity amongst the general public peaked from around Shockwave '02 to Shockwave '05. That's only 3 years. It was probably the greatest 3 year stretch in MMA history but it was a short one nonetheless. As names like Saku, and Gracie faded (another huge cultural thing that helped Pride establish it self, it was Japan vs Brazil) and as Sapp really started to suck, the public began to lose interest.

Overeem is a Bob Sapp w/ actual effectiveness.

Yea that's why K1 has been trying to plaster his face onto everything. While I love Overeem, he's not an over the top character like Sapp was though.

cowboyronnie wrote:There is a racial element. They've got big black dudes running around in loin cloths beating their chests screaming ooga booga in their pro wrestling promotions. Sapp totally pandered to that. They're monsters of a sort in the Japanese imagination, I think.

Yea totally

Mir added ~30 pounds across 4-5 months and maintained it until he chose to slim back down.

How much did Overeem even put on? He weight what right now? 250 ish pounds (which is crazy considering he looks like a freakin' statue)? He was always a GIGANTIC LHW. I wonder what he used to cut from? 220 at least, probably more. And how many years did it take him to put on those 30-35 pounds?

I'm not even an Overeem fan. The only guys who I wouldn't root for to beat him in the SF tourney are Barnett and Rogers.

I still don't think he should be called a roider though if we don't know for sure.