Five Years on Faith

Yushin Okami's bridge to Rio has been an international one. | Photo: T. Irei

While Okami may frame the realization of the rematch as something which “couldn’t be helped,” he has not taken the same approach to preparedness. Okami has thus not only become one of the few Japanese fighters to seek out training partners abroad, he also takes himself out of his comfort zone by basing his pre-fight camps outside of his native Japan, a practice that few top-level Japanese fighters undertake.

During the course of Okami’s UFC run, he has lost via decision only twice: once to former middleweight champion Rich Franklin and once to former middleweight title contender Chael Sonnen. Rather than wallowing in his latest defeat to Sonnen, Okami quickly turned loss into opportunity by approaching the brash wrestler with a request to train together in the hopes of better understanding how and why he lost. Contrary to his outspoken public character, Okami claims that Sonnen accepted him and his request with open arms.

“My training with Chael is a very important thing to me, and, naturally, it’s completely different from my training in Japan. Chael is a great fighter, very technical and very talented,” says Okami with a quiet reverence. “It’s been a very good experience since it taught me not only what my weaknesses were at the time but how else I could also progress as a fighter. It’s an opportunity that I am immensely indebted to and thankful to Chael for.”

Aside from the technical lessons Okami has and continues to receive from Sonnen and Team Quest, the most notable takeaway he claims to have received is an understanding of how Western and Japanese fight cultures approach and understand MMA. Naturally, that understanding extends through the actual practice of fighting right down to training for it.

“In Japan, we tend to be more regimented between disciplines when we train; we do have MMA training, but boxing is boxing, wrestling is wrestling and grappling is grappling. It’s all separated and doesn’t always flow into each other,” explains Okami.

“In America, however, they have fully established what MMA is. Technique-wise, American coaches are very studious in their understanding and development of technical knowledge. When you learn from an [American] MMA sensei, you learn MMA," he continues. "Disciplines aren’t so separated, everything flows into each other and you’re able to understand what exactly MMA is. I’m grateful to have learned these things, and I always love taking what I learn back to Japan to teach the younger fighters in my gym.”

Dave Mandel

Okami's training with Chael Sonnen
has paid big dividends.

It is in this spirit in which Okami is a great contributor to the Japanese MMA scene. Despite the UFC’s difficulties gaining ground in Japan -- let alone Japanese combat sport’s inability of late to captivate and maintain a casual television-watching or ticket-purchasing audience -- Okami is developing into an ambassador for Japanese fighters of what the possibilities of competing abroad can hold.

While most Japanese do not yet know who “Yushin Okami” is, he holds significant renown and respect within the local MMA sphere by simply being the most successful Japanese fighter in the Octagon. Aside from passing on unique, specialized knowledge from training and fighting in the West, he also serves as an example for young, aspiring fighters to emulate; particularly given
the recent troubles of Japanese promotions to deliver on
promises of a prosperous prizefighting career.

MMA will likely never be as popular a sport as baseball in Japan, but there is already an established cycle of Japanese baseball players traveling to the United States to play in the major leagues that MMA can mimic.

The successes of local players such as Hideo Nomo, Ichiro Suzuki, Daisuke Matsuzaka and others have not only built up the mystique of “American professional athletics” and its extravagant lifestyles in Japanese minds but also play to popular cultural narratives of native sons leaving the comforts of home to find international fame and fortune in the name of Japan.

By way of this dynamic, Okami holds a similar appeal for young mixed martial artists looking to break into the American sporting culture the way their baseball heroes have. Okami winning the UFC middleweight championship could not only provide similar -- though proportionately smaller -- financial success and recognition, but it could also be a much-needed shot in the arm of the flagging kakutogi industry.

“The lack of strong Japanese champions in the UFC is probably one of the reasons why popularity hasn’t picked up here yet. It’s the same in any international sport, really; if a Japanese player is really good, then Japanese people become curious and start watching, and the sport and the athletes become popular,” says Okami. “Of course, Japan is a culture that has a very close relationship to martial arts, so when they can see a Japanese fighter that proves Japanese are strong, that’s when I believe we’ll start watching and getting back into it.

“To show the beauty of the UFC, I believe, one has to see it live. That’s why I really hope they bring the event to Japan one day, so that people can see it and just feel the atmosphere. Someday,” says Okami wistfully.

Okami’s wish may be close at hand if White’s recent touting of a return to Japan in 2012 is realized. At the moment, Japan’s disinterest in MMA lies primarily in the fact that it has no media presence; it is out of sight, and thus out of mind. While the current game plan of the UFC would be to anchor a Japanese card with TV-friendly commodities of yesteryear, such as Norifumi "Kid" Yamamoto and Yoshihiro Akiyama, a fresh Japanese champion would be a boon to its efforts.

As a country in which national discourse still heavily resides in print periodicals, the potential for local sports magazines and newspapers to promote a native son as the champion of the world’s premier fight league could reinvigorate interest in a way that local promotions have been unable to do on their own.

“I want the UFC to come to Japan and I want Japanese people to know about it and to love it for having the best fighters in the world. But in order for these things to happen, I think we first need a Japanese fighter at the top of the UFC. So, I’m thinking I might have to become a champion. Once that happens, I can better help spread the popularity of the event in Japan,” says Okami.

T. Irei

Will Okami's hands next hold leather
and gold?

With so much riding on his shoulders, it’s difficult for Okami and those around him not to acknowledge the implications of what winning the rematch against Silva would mean. He remains cool and humble about the prospect, vaguely acknowledging its potential consequences but remaining firmly focused and respectful of the difficulties of the task ahead.

Not only would a win absolve him of the unintentional ignominy of his first meeting with Silva and net him the title of best middleweight in the world, but it may also prove to be the rebirth of an atrophying sport in his homeland.

While the rematch took many years to make, in that time, Silva and Okami have grown in stature, such that this weekend’s UFC in Brazil cannot be viewed simply as another perfunctory defense for the champion.

For Okami’s part, he has patiently taken that time to build his skills and experience alongside a faith that not only would the fight happen but that he would emerge victorious over one of the greatest fighters we have seen thus far.

For the past five years, that faith has sustained and supported him throughout early career anonymity, injury, the rare defeat and the alleged forgetfulness of UFC matchmakers to recognize him as the next challenger to Silva’s crown. Having brought him so far, it should not be too much of a stretch to believe it could carry Okami far enough to capture the middleweight title in a few scant days.

Mizuka Koike contributed to this report.