TOKYO, Aug. 26 — PRIDE held the weigh-in for the highly anticipated heavyweight match-up between Fedor Emelianenko (Pictures) and Mirko Filipovic (Pictures) in the luxurious Century Park Hyatt in downtown Shinjuku.
Things were pretty relaxed when I entered the conference room, but once Emelianenko arrived, the calm, relaxed atmosphere quickly became a circus with all kind of reporters jockeying to get the perfect shot of the champion.
The Russian went on the scale and took off his shirt to pose for the cameras before sitting down. While not ripped like Kawajiri or Baroni, the guy just looked really solid, like a ton of bricks. Seeing him on TV doesn’t really do justice to just how thick and strong this guy really is.
Unfortunately, neither Fedor nor his translator talked very loudly, so it was very difficult to catch their voices on the audio. Fedor looked extremely relaxed, quietly smiling throughout. He looked more like a guy about to go on vacation than someone who is going to step in the ring with one of the most dangerous fighters on the planet.
After the he spoke with the press, PRIDE officials ushered us out of the conference room into the adjacent foyer. At this point I was wondering what happened to Filipovic. Wasn’t he supposed to be part of this weigh-in?
Slowly, the rest of the fighters who are competing on this Sunday’s card began to gather in the conference room for the rule meeting. Tank, Vovchanchyn, and the entire Chute Boxe team all walked past the media on their way to the meeting, but still no “Cro Cop.”
PRIDE had decreed that this rule meeting would be a closed-door affair, with no media allowed to enter. However, they did allow us to come in once the fighters were seated to take some pictures.
While waiting outside during the rule meeting, I got the chance to talk to some acquaintances of Mirko who are part of the Croatian media here in Japan to film a documentary.
They said that he was a very popular figure back home, known to just about everyone in the country. While they couldn’t give me any concrete numbers, they stated that the Filipovic-Nogueira fight back in PRIDE Final Conflict 2003 drew a bigger rating on Croatian TV than the Croatian national soccer league game that played that same night.
They further stated that since arriving in Japan on Thursday, “Cro Cop” hasn’t quite adjusted to the time difference and sleeps during the day and plays cards at night. Perhaps this was is why he didn’t make it to the weigh-in.
Once the fighters started to exit the conference room, the media circus began to erupt again. Usually PRIDE likes to control what goes on regarding interviews and such, but I think it was a little difficult to keep a leash on things with so many fighters and media milling around.
The Sherdog team asked for and got permission to do a small interview with Alistair Overeem (Pictures). We also got to get a bit of footage of Arona talking to the Croatian media. The Brazilian Top Team fighter picks Fedor to win. Speaking in perfect English, he stated he likes Fedor’s style and that he thought that he was a good guy.