As many of the hardcore, dedicated MMA supporters know, K1-Dreams held their inagural event yesterday. Dreams is regarded as the new ‘Pride FC’, the legendary Japanese organization where a multitude of MMA superstars reigned supreme. Names like Fedor, Nogueira, Cro Cop, Vanderlai, Rampage, Henderson, Gomi…the list was simply incredible.
During its Apex, Pride FC was the number one MMA organization on the planet; the UFC a distant second. Pride events jammed some of Japan’s biggest stadiums, ranging from 30,000 to over 65,000 fans to watch their New Year’s Eve shows. Now do the math for a second…the UFC gets ~14,000 in Vegas, ~18,000 in Columbus, ~19,000 in California. Their upcoming UFC 83 show in Montreal is a sellout of 22,000 seats, a new UFC record. Again, Pride would get from 30,000 + to any one of their regular events.
While it is my belief the UFC will one day pack stadiums of 40,000 plus, there is no denying the power the former Pride FC brand had in Japan, as well as the global MMA landscape. Today, that brand has been fused into the newly launched K1-Dream.
Prior to this amalgamation, K1 and Pride were fierce competitors, but after the UFC purchased Pride FC, there was a huge void in the Japanese MMA scene. Imagine removing the NHL from the hockey landscape in Canada; that is similar to what happened in Japan. What was left in Japan was various MMA leagues, all high quality, specifically K1, but it was just missing the lustre of the Pride FC gemstone.
When the UFC purchased Pride FC, they effectively released many of the Pride FC executives and production staff. These staff members were eventually picked up by Pride’s former competition, K1, which then created K1-Dreams. On Saturday, Dreams had their first event, packing in over 19,000 fans into the arena, while showcasing a bevy of international talent the UFC were unable to sign.
Many eyes were paying close attention to this card as it marked not only the return of Mirko Cro Cop, but also the mouth watering 16-man lightweight grand-prix tournament. You have heard me mention many of these lightweights before ( listed below) as potential candidates for the UFC to scoop up, sign, and send shockwaves into their existing lightweight division.
The UFC’s strongest division is their lightweight division, yet you can make an arguement that most of the participants in K1-Dreams’ lightweight tournament would bump many of the UFC’s Lightweight top ten, down the rankings. On paper, only two, maybe three of the UFC’s fighters would crack most analysts top ten world rankings, with Dream’s roster easily has six to seven in the Top Ten.
If you are an MMA fan, one with a respect for all fighters and their organizations, I implore you to take the time to watch not only the K1-Dreams Grand Prix tournament, but also do some research on many of the fighters. Believe me, if the barrier of promotional politics was not a factor, the lightweight division would have a main event (or at least a co-main event) on every MMA card the UFC / K1-Dreams would promote. The talent pool is as rich as it is deep.
To see what I mean, here are the fights from this weekends inagurual K1-Dreams event:
Lightweight Grand-Prix
Non-Tournament Bout
This is the first step of the MMA landscape changing in 2008, as K1-Dreams has already announced the participants in their upcoming Middleweight Grand Prix. If this contiues, Dreams will most likely have a light-heavyweight and heavyweight Grand Prix as well. Add this to the UFC’s promotional maching and you can see why the future of MMA is bright one in 2008.
