The Chronological History of MMA
Chapter 8: UWF-I Grand Opening #4 Moving On 4th 7/30/91 Fukuoka Hakata Starlanes
By Michael Betz & Mike Lorefice 3/9/20

Welcome back, one and all, to the next chapter in our ever shifting journey, as we progress through layers of intrigue, rappel into the depths of mystery, and seek to find the true core, or rei of MMA, by peering back into the hourglass of history. Takada and Co. have left the cozy confines of everyone's favorite venue, Korakuen Hall, in an effort to strive for greater exposure, in this case booking a bowling alley located in the Fukuoka Prefecture. We are greeted straightaway to the posh settings of the Hakata Starlanes, whose décor stylings somewhat resemble a bunch of chairs thrown into a tradeshow hall and given copious amounts of florescent office lighting for good measure.

Our first bout of the evening will be between Makoto Ohe and Juan Arellano (who totally looks like he could be a bass player for an obscure late '80s L.A. thrash metal band.) This scribe is excited, because even if this match is only half as good as Ohe's all-out war against Rudy Lovato from 6-6-91, we are in for a treat. The first thing we notice is while Arellano has loads of athleticism and some ability to throw flashy kicks, he seems to lack any real boxing experience, and is taking a lot of unnecessary shots to the face from his opponent as a result. His explosive athleticism is allowing him to surprise Ohe with some blows here and there, but you can tell he doesn't really have any fundamental kickboxing training. As of press time, I have been unable to find any further information on Arellano, so I'm venturing a guess that he may have been involved in Tae Kwon Do, or another martial art focused on kicking, and simply hasn't had any experience in a professional fight setting. Arellano was able to survive round 1, but his luck ran out in the middle of round 2. Even though he was able to start the round with some sneaky thigh kicks against his opponent, he kept leaving the upper half of his body wide open, and Ohe kicked him into next week for his folly. It does appear that Arellano has the physical attributes to make a good fighter if he can put the time in and work on the basics, so hopefully he comes back in more seasoned shape, but only time will tell.

ML: Arellano had the reach and athleticism, but I agree he seemed to lack fundamentals to the point one has to question how much actual kickboxing training he had. Taekwondo was what I was thinking to when I saw his ability to throw some flashy movie kicks, but his poor overall technique, particularly in the boxing aspects. It just felt like Arellano was trying to figure this sport out on the fly. The more Ohe saw of him, the easier he was able to pick him apart. Arellano was blocking the left middle kick with his right arm in the 1st round, but perhaps because it hurt his arm, he got the brilliant idea to instead try to duck it, which turned it into a high kick knockdown. Ohe was quickly able to counter a sloppy left hook with an intended high kick for the KO. The match wasn't lacking in action, but the primary negative was that Arellano simply wasn't good enough to pull the greatness out of Ohe.

Tatsuyo Nakano vs Yuko Miyato gets off to a bit of a slow start as Miyato is content to fight from the outside, keeping enough distance to avoid a clinch and pepper Nakano with leg kicks. Eventually, Nakano takes the fight to the ground, but once there, he can't seem to figure out anything worthwhile to do down there. This pattern repeats itself for a while, until they start cutting loose and volley palm strikes and kicks at the 6 minute mark. They had an exciting see-saw battle for a couple of minutes until we were treated to the uber-lame ending of Nakano putting Miyato in the chinlock of doom, which secured his victory, but necessitated our sorrow. This wasn't a bad match by any means, as both performers are seasoned workhorses and are always going to be professional enough to put out the requisite amount of intensity, but the problem here is that both fighters (especially Nakano) are simply too tethered to the old NJPW/UWF way of working a match and aren't evolving. They can get away with it for now, but I fear that if they don't progress soon this style, and shoot-movement, will pass them by.

ML: These guys did a 30:00 draw on 6/11/88, and three of their other four UWF matches were about 20 minutes. Tonight's match developed slowly as if it were going to be another marathon, but while their intention seemed to be to build the match around escalating the violence, they were too mundane & durdly early on then just shifted to the explosive striking and suplexes, going back & forth for a lengthy finishing sequence until Nakano won with a lame rear naked facelock. The striking, mostly from Miyato, was good, with little Hashimoto Nakano getting his requisite bloody nose. Nakano got Miyato with his German suplex, but when he tried Maeda's captured, Miyato was able to defend enough that both spilled over the top to the floor. These two are hard working bread & butter types who did enough to make it worthwhile. This was even the best we've seen so far in UWF-I from Nakano, but with neither fighter really developing their style or moving forward as martial artists, it mostly just felt like a lesser version of their previous wars.

Kazuo Yamazaki vs. Billy Scott will be the debut match for Scott, a westerner that wound up sticking with UWF-I throughout its duration, and even into the promotion's spiritual successor: Kingdom. To this day he is very active in the MMA/Catch Wrestling community, with his own academy in the Bowling Green area of Kentucky, as well as holding various seminars throughout the country. Here, he must face the ultimate trial by fire against the seasoned Yamazaki. Hopefully the promoters installed a more rigorous vetting process this time around, and will spare Yamazaki from another round of embarrassment, a la JT Southern. After the referee conducts a diligent search for foreign objects, the match is underway, and we can see that Scott is the best Gaijin that the promotion has seen so far, as he actually moves like someone with a solid wrestling pedigree, but unlike Tom Burton, he has the speed and fluidity to go with it. The first couple of minutes have them feeling each other out, with Scott faking some shooting attempts, and Yamazaki gauging his opponents' distance with some fast kicks. Scott succeeds with a takedown, but his training in submissions must have been limited to the school of "crank on something, and hope for the best," which doesn't phase Yamazaki in the slightest. The match followed a pattern of Scott being the takedown artist, but not being able to pin Yamazaki down for long, or to lock in an intelligible submission. Yamazaki would keep finding crafty ways to transition out of his predicament and turn in it into a leg/ankle attack. Eventually, Yamazaki got the win when his Scott came rushing at him with his head down, and he was able to slap on some kind of version of a standing arm-triangle choke. What was great about this match was that each wrestler went into it with a mind set of having to feint, set up attacks, and actually work for a takedown or submission attempt against their opponent, as opposed to just handing everything to each other. Unlike much of the overtly choreographed wrestling of the past, it seems that this style can allow its practitioners the ability to shoot for good portions of the match (at least in terms of positioning) and sprinkle in cooperation in others. In any event, Yamazaki was a master of ring psychology, and to his credit, Billy Scott showed a lot of poise for a rookie, and had good patience and movement. His submission acumen needs work, but that can surely improve in time. It's very likely that the UWF-I has secured a great talent in Scott, and I hope to see him improve in the days to come.

ML: Yamazaki hasn't exactly had a great opportunity to shine yet. After frustratingly getting strapped with the Southern man, who clearly couldn't keep his head, he now found himself involved in the trial of Billy Jack. Luckily though, Scott, who wound up being my favorite American fighter in the promotion (other than monster for hire Vader, who almost doesn't count given his matches were almost purely powerbomb driven pro wrestling beatdowns), shows a good deal of ability even in his debut. What set this match apart was their ability to tantalize the audience through a display of defense. This wasn't a match where they'd lock the submission, and then 45 seconds later the opponent magically grabbed the ropes, it's a match where they always seemed close to something on the mat, but rarely got it. Early on, they keep testing each other, kind of for the fun of it, with the fighter who defended the move trying his hand at it, and failing as well. They really had the answers for each other in standup, with Yamazaki being ready for Scott's single leg takedown, which seemed to be Billy's biggest weapon from his amateur wrestling days, and Scott avoiding taking too many of Yamazaki's kicks, answering aggressively to at least take away Yamazaki's space so he had to grapple with Scott instead. Yamazaki was a massive favorite here as he's the #2 fighter in the promotion going against some new guy from Tennessee, a place where wrestlers seemingly only know how to throw punches, yet still have no actual technique. Yamazaki is somewhat subdued early, just testing Scott out & seeing what he has to offer, while Scott is much more excitable, which is his personality anyway, but the difference especially makes sense here given he's the new guy trying to make a strong impression against a top dog who sees this more as a tune-up/sparring kind of walkover. Yamazaki tends to be a step ahead for the first 10 minutes. Though he's not running away with the contest by any means, you can see his brilliance in the story of the match where he sets up Scott turning the tide & actually becoming a threat to win when Scott finally catches Yamazaki's kick & counters with a back suplex into a 1/2 crab for the matches big near submission. The fans were instantly ignited, chanting "Yama-zaki" because in the context of the bout they've been viewing, someone actually being trapped in a submission, especially mid ring, is a real threat. Yamazaki does a great job of putting the submission over by not going over the top, taking a down after a rope escape trying to recover, & then still just stalling fixing his kneepads to try to steal Scott's momentum. Yamazaki then coming back with high kicks somewhat defeated the purpose though. This was really the time for Scott to have a minute or two with Yamazaki in danger to show what he could do before Yamazaki turned the tide back and perhaps won, and while that's mostly what happened with Scott coming right back with a belly to belly suplex & working for an STF, the transition to the finishing segment was a bit abrupt & the segment itself felt rushed, as was the case with Miyato/Nakano. Both matches felt like the workers may have been finding their way to a pre scripted finishing sequence, but these two did a better job of having a match before that & finding a way to stay true to it rather than just biding time until the usual UWF-I flashiness. As a whole, Yamazaki/Scott worked quite well because they kept active enough that the fans cared about them coming close but not quite getting there, and the drama kept increasing. In the end, not a lot happened by the usual UWF-I pro wrestling standards, but much of what made it good is they were successful in teasing the audience that things almost happened. This was certainly more credible than the usual no resistance exchanges, and to me, much more exciting and dramatic because of that. ***1/4

Nobuhiko Takada & Kiyoshi Tamura vs. Yoji Anjo & Jim Boss. The last time we saw a tag match from this outfit was during the debut show, and that was quite entertaining in a pro wrestling sense, but did absolutely nothing in terms of establishing any sort of true-fighting credibility. I expect more of the same here, but the x-factor this time is Kiyoshi Tamura, who I think would get a great match out of the corpse from Weekend at Bernie's, so I'm hopeful. We start off with a pre-match interview with Jim Boss, in which he states that he has the winning advantages going into this fight due to his alliance with Yoji Anjo, who he oddly states is one of the most respected Japanese wrestlers in America, and from the power of his Tom Selleck mustache. The match starts with Tamura and Anjo, and we are having flashbacks of their match from earlier in the month, with neither person wasting any time jumping right into lighting fast grappling exchanges, which saw a nice counter from Tamura as he warded off a failed O-Goshi throw attempt from Anjo with his own rear naked choke entry. Shortly afterwards both men opt to tag in their partners and now we have Takada and Boss. Despite having a somewhat stiff and awkward side-stance, Boss is throwing better kicks than I expected him to, though he can't really compare with the more varied lines of attack that Takada is bringing to him. The match went on for a little over thirty minutes, with Yoji Anjo securing a victory via a straight/Fujiwara armbar. While the match was long, it never really felt plodding due to the high-octane tempo that everyone kept. Most of the contest was striking exchanges on the feet, and the times it did go to the ground, it was usually someone quickly going for a submission, so it never really dragged. While this was quite entertaining from a Pro Wrestling standpoint, it still did absolutely nothing to add any real-fight credibility to either the promotion or its participants, and honestly, both the tag-team format and the length do not play well in capturing the essence of Shoot-Style.

ML: Similar to more or less every big show main event Gedo ever booked, this was long to the point the workers forgot about a sense of urgency & instead concerned themselves with merely finding ways to elongate the proceedings. I was excited to see Tamura & Anjo going at it again after their brilliant contest on the previous show, but whereas Tamura was shot out of a cannon there, nobody exerted themselves too much in the first half here. The legitimate kickboxing match being short was problematic, and the way they worked the opening 8 minutes, one wonders if they were asked to go longer than expected because they only got 25 minutes out of the undercard. Either way, this style isn't really meant for this sort of durdling, time filling long match, epics really need to be reserved for the sort of match of the year attempt we saw in Suzuki vs. Sano because diminishing returns are a thing in a limited, credibility based style. Though Takada vs. Anjo had too much of a sparring feel despite Takada landing a big shot now and then, Takada was generally much better here because he only went to the ground to immediately attempt a submission. He was working a more diverse striking game, trying to counteract Boss' wrestling with his knees & open hands. Tamura was somewhat disappointing in his first main event, it just never felt like his match with Anjo really being in striking mode and being more focuses on Takada, who they seem to be grooming him as real opposition for, if such a thing is allowed to exist on the native side in UWF-I. Meanwhile, Tamura wound up being the one who would slow things down by trying to work for something on the ground rather than just exchanging kicks, when anyone would even go to the mat. Boss' middle kick could use some work, but he was generally a competent, servicable but uninspiring type who would be fine early in the card. I was surprised that Anjo once again beat Tamura rather than Boss doing the job. Overall, this was fine, but skippable.

Final thoughts: This was a bit of a lateral move for the promotion. On the plus side, we seem to have the addition of a solid, and potentially great hand in Billy Scott, but it was pretty much a holding pattern in most other respects. It seems that until something or someone significantly changes the formula, this outfit will continually be the Rocky IV of the shooting groups. It is common knowledge that Rocky IV is the most entertaining film ever made, but that may be due to its complete lack of ambition, for where there is no risks, there are no mistakes to be made, and the true pinnacles of greatness will forever be out of grasp.

ML: Better than their debut show, but a big step down from the previous two. The positive is the discovery of Scott. Boss could potentially have been an upgrade, but he only had 2 more matches in UWF-I, and his brief career ended entirely in '92. They really need to get Kakihara healthy, as there's just not much fire on this roster.

In other news:

There are rumors circulating that Bob Backlund wishes to have a go in the UWF-I, possibly in December during his Christmas break (Backlund is a wrestling coach throughout the year). Some may remember the last time he tried his hand in this style during his 12/22/88 match against Nobuhiko Takada at the UWF Heartbeat event. The atmosphere was incredible during that evening, as the Japanese audience were really captivated by the match up and saw Backlund as a credible opponent. Backlund hasn't competed anywhere since defeating Masakatsu Funaki on 5/21/89, and it will be interesting to see how he looks in this style now that it has continued to evolve, but he has enough name value as one of the few guys to defeat Antonio Inoki & a longtime WWWF champion to be a meaningful big match win for Takada even though it's already been done.

It is being reported that the reason for the UWF-I nabbing a lot of jobbers from the state of Tennessee is due to one of their bookers, a man named Shinji Sasazaki, who happens to live & work at a Japanese restaurant there. All the westerners in the UWFI so far have hailed from this state, but to be fair, it seems like Billy Scott has some potential to grow into a solid performer. There is also some rumored blowback towards the UWF-I at the moment due to the cards only averaging about 1 ½ hours and having ticket prices hovering around $60.

Akira Maeda is supposed to face off against Dutch Judoka Willie Wilhelm in an upcoming Rings event. Wilhelm represented his country at the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles, and had high placings in the 1983 and 1985 World Judo Championships.