I think the issue with MT and kickboxing in the US is that it isn’t broadcasted here because it isn’t popular and it isn’t popular here because it isn’t broadcasted. Maybe I’m wrong here and people have given them a shot on Nat’l TV, but they aren’t the easiest sets of sports to watch even when they are being presented to the US audience.
UFC FightPass used to show Muay Thai fights live from Lumpinee and used to have the rights to GLORY as well, but those contracts ran out and weren’t renewed. And I guess you’d have to wonder why they weren’t renewed, but it more than likely wasn’t worth the UFC’s while.
Karate Combat has seen much more success than MT and KB in the US and that success can be credited to their excellent/engaging production, their marketing and their fights on YT that get millions views.
I think the biggest issue with MT/ KB relative to the UFC, and what ultimately made the UFC so popular, is that the UFC was an all encompassing fighting league where wrestlers, boxers, submission specialists, Karate, TKD, Kickboxing and MT practitioners could all converge and compete.
Leagues before this often only served to pit kickboxers or karate fighters or BJJ players soley against other kickboxers, karate fighters or BJJ players and something like what the UFC was (and is) multiplied the pool of both fans and competitiors exponentially. Instead of only having TKD fighters (and fans) to chose from, the UFC had them all so long as one of their fighters was competing.
One FC is having MT and KB bouts with mma gloves with world class guys in both incl Thais and Japanese as well as grappling only events - both in the mma cage.
It covers every MMA promotion that’s worth watching imo.
But the Tapology homepage does a decent enough job letting you know what the biggest upcoming cards of the week/day are. They seem to miss the Rizin cards pretty often though.
UFC FightPass has a shit ton of regional stuff as well, with my more recent favorite being LUX out of Mexico. They have their own little Bruce Buffer who would totally be getting sued by him if Mexico were a legitimate country with a real court system.
That is true and I definitely enjoy watching those in between the mma bouts they have. I’m a sucker for a surprise striking battle whether it be in an actual mma bout or one of the full on MT/KB fights they put on in between. Even the BJJ matches they put on are fun.
Of course One FC is tailored more for the Asian audience but all events are availble online immediately after too…so hardocores like us can catch it all.
Hoping Rodtang and Tenshin can have a rematch in One.
Bro I literally stay up to watch those with my buddy who’s in the UK. Feels like a neo-resurgence of what it would have felt like to watch those PRIDE events live while they were going down in Japan. I do the same for RIZIN. They got an event coming up Sunday night that starts at 9PM pacific tho so that’s great.
I will say I wish there were more Americans (north and south) on the billings to really give it that old school PRIDE feel.
Cut divisions down to 3: heavyweight/middleweight/lightweight
Get rid of the 10 point must system
Judging criteria should take the totality of the fight into consideration.
Upkicks to the face, 12-6 elbows, and soccer kicks should be permitted. Assuming the ref is competent
Champions must defend the belt every 90 days or have it relinquished.
Judges must be throughly vetted and shown to be highly experienced in various aspects of mma.
A fighter should be able to win a decision from the bottom assuming his agression is significantly greater and/or he demonstrated dominance with multiple close submission attempts/control.
Wearing a gi should be optional.
Fighters should be promoted/given bonus for adopting a gonzo constant go-for-broke style.
$300,000 KO bonus if the fight ends in the first round by strikes or submission
$100,000 KO bonus if the fight ends in the second round by strikes or submission
-$100,000 if the fight goes the distance.
Man, I can’t watch most RIZIN shows these days. Their WMMA GP coming up is 108 lb women and thats most of their WMM offering. On the mens side its Japanese FLW’s and BW’s primarily just competing with each other and then they might have a LW and lower level HW fight on the card and thats the show.
Its just nothing like what Pancrase, RINGS, PRIDE, DREAM and K1 Heroes was.
Have not had a desire to watch RIZIN since Horiguchi won the BW tourny and because it just feels like a national level show for SW to BW men and women now and thats never what big show JMMA really was in the past.
Rizin has been a slow progression in my opinion. I checked in on it years ago when I first heard about it and wasn’t impressed.
I watched another show earlier this year that was on after one of the Apex cards and me and my buddies were having a ball watching it and comparing it to the weakness of the earlier card.
We were thoroughly convinced that Rizin was the superior promotion and, I mean, on that night, it was.
Say what you will about ‘em, but they regularly have cards like these:
There a lot of good reasons outlined above why people dont watch the UFC like they used to. Im hesitant to make an entire night with my friends a UFC night for several reasons. I dont know who a lot of the fighters are… even the fighters i know that are incredible annoy me sometimes like when Holly Holms yells Keeeeahh! after every punch and the last fights i can remember of hers she went 5 rounds…i dont understand how some of the new techniques work because they came out after i quit fighting like calf kicks (Ed Herman tapped me with a wrist lock recently)… but the business model the UFC has built definitely works for them… i dont know, there are very few Vanderlei Silvas in todays UFC…
How long have you been watching JMMA? I’m glad you enjoy RIZIN, I was enjoying it until things changed a lot with the type of cards they were doing.
I’ve been watching JMMA since 96 and this RIZIN card was one of the worst NYE shows ever when ranked vs what has been produced since 2003 when they started.
Yachi is not a top 100 ranked LW and he was in the co-main. Nobody cared about 2022 Gomi vs Tenshin. Oh wow, another Rena fight…great. Ougikubo is a solid fighter but he happens to be ranked #76 in the world at BW right now and has to be the least known/popular fighter to ever headline a big JMMA NYE show in the history of JMMA NYE.
This is what DREAM and GLORY did for the last DREAM NYE card, I hope you see the difference in quality between something like this and that shit RIZIN just served up.
