My last post about Mirko "Cro Cop" Filipovic got me thinking about how much I loved the Pride Fighting Championship. I then decided that it would be really good to show my love in a blog post about its history and great moments in the organization.
Pride Fighting Championship, also known as Pride FC or simply Pride, was a Mixed Martial Arts promotion based out of Japan. It was started in 1997 as a one time event to pit popular Japanese pro-wrestler, Nobuhiko Takada, against Rickson Gracie. The immense success of the event, which drew 47,000 to the Tokyo Dome, allowed the company to hold regular MMA events. Pride wasn't broadcast anywhere in the United States until the Final Round of the 2000 Grand Prix.
The 2000 Grand Prix was an open-weight tournament to be held over the course of two nights. The Opening Round was held in January of 2000 with a field of 16 fighters. The Final Round was held in May of 2000. The final 8 fighters would have to win 3 fights in one night to win the tournament. Mark Coleman would go on to win the tournament by beating Igor Vovchanchyn in the final bout. Coleman, a two time UFC tournament champion and the first ever UFC Heavyweight champion, was so overcome with joy after the win that he attempted to jump over the Pride ring ropes and hilariously bounced off them back into the ring.
After this night, Pride became a huge hit not only in Japan but in the United States. American fans had to learn a new set of rules from the Unified Rules that were now in place in the states. In Pride the first round lasted 10 minutes while the final two rounds were 5 minutes long. The 10 minute first round was to give ground fighters the time necessary to work for a submission. The fight wasn't judged round by round but as a fight entirely. Pride fights were staged in a 5 rope square boxing style ring. Pride did not allow elbow strikes to a grounded opponent but they did allow knees and soccer kicks to a grounded opponent. Stomps to the head were also a staple of a Pride fight, usually by Wanderlei Silva and Mauricio Rua.
Pride was known for their elaborate event openings and the famous "fighter parade." The Pride event openings were filled with the sounds of a full orchestra, pyrotechnics and the ravings of Lenne Hardt, also known as the "Crazy Pride Lady." These elaborate introductions were in stark contrast to the basic openings of events such as the UFC who had begun to discontinue fighter introductions and pyrotechnics during their shows. When a Pride event was starting the excitement was palpable.
Pride wasn't just all flash and no substance. They put on some of the most entertaining and technically superb fights of all-time. Many of the magical moments Pride gave the MMA world were a direct cause of their Grand Prix tournaments. The Mark Coleman celebration and Kazushi Sakuraba's epic 90 minute fight with Royce Gracie at the 2000 Grand Prix, Mauricio "Shogun" Rua's destruction of the competition at the 2005 Middleweight Grand Prix, and Wanderlei Silva's war with Quinton Jackson at the 2003 Pride Middleweight Grand Prix are all moments that will live forever thanks to the Pride tournaments.
For years, Pride enjoyed success that rivaled the UFC in America. Around the 10th Anniversary of Pride the organization would be dealt a serious blow. The organization was dogged for years concerning allegations that they had ties to the Yakuza or Japanese mob. The Japanese tabloid, Shukan Gendai, published that Pride was a Yakuza front. With these allegations running wild, Fuji Network terminated their television deal with Pride. The Fuji television deal was extremely lucrative for Pride and they were left with just the pay-per-view carrier, SKY PerfecTV, as their lone outlet to Japanese television. 10 months later, Pride was sold to Lorenzo Fertitta and the UFC.
The Fertittas and Dana White promised they would keep the Pride name going and hold events in Japan at the press conference to announce the purchase of Pride but it never panned out. The UFC could never find a way to work in Japan. Even when they loaned Chuck Liddell to Pride to enter the 2003 Middleweight Grand Prix they could never get Pride to send one of their fighters over to the UFC to fight. The Japanese are a very nationalistic people and the thought of an American company running the Pride organization was almost sacrilegious to them. The Pride Worldwide offices closed October 4, 2007.
There will never be another Pride Fighting Championship. The UFC may put on fights that are just as good and sometimes better than past Pride fights, but they will never have the same feel and atmosphere that accompanied Pride. There was nothing like the deathly silence of 50,000 Japanese fans the moment before they erupted in cheering when their fighter won.
This video says all that needs to be said about Pride that I couldn't capture in my writing.
No comments:
Post a Comment