OSAKA, Japan, Dec. 31 — That was such a bummer, the Yoshihiro Nakao (Pictures)-Heath Herring (Pictures) fight. I was expecting a good fight from these two. Nakao is a great wrestler who’s been training MMA for a while. And his body size kind of reminds me of Kazuyuki Fujita (Pictures).
Nakao is supposed to be a rising star in the Japanese MMA scene. And K-1 needed some Japanese star to emerge, like Sakuraba is for the PRIDE organization.
Anyway, at the stare down, the referee was mentioning the rules to both fighters. Then for some reason Nakao decided to kiss Herring on the lips. Herring reacted by punching Nakao with a right hook, but not close to full power. However, it appeared to shake Nakao’s brain pretty bad.
Again, Nakao got knocked out ice cold before the bell rung for the start of round one. So this fight wasn’t held but Nakao got KO’d!
Can you understand this abnormal situation? More than 50,000 people are expecting a very exciting fight, also the TBS TV crew is hoping this fight would be great so they can push Nakao to be the next K-1 star. But, Nakao got knocked out before the bell … and he was totally out, his body stiff like Nathan Quarry (Pictures) after getting knocked out by Rich Franklin (Pictures).
K-1 immediately announced they would check on Nakao’s condition and do their best to have this fight tonight. But it never happened. Before the seventh bout Nakao was carried out of stadium on a stretcher, with his head and neck immobilized and his eyes closed. As of writing this, there was no update on his condition. I hope Nakao is OK to be back in ring in the future.
Now here’s where it gets interesting. After Nakao was carried out, Herring, wearing his coat and hat, stepped away from the ring and walked down the path to go back to the locker room. Yeah, he was still inside of arena. Some people booed. Others just shouted “Heath!! Heath!!!”
Suddenly, a bunch of guys just attacked Heath and his corner.
I was walking through that path for some reason (it was a cold day, and I drank a lot of coffee) when I stumbled upon this attack. Holy crap. Herring was pinned to the floor on his back by two to three people. And other guys tried to attack him too. Then, of course, Heath’s corner tried to protect him. And it seemed like their team defense worked pretty well.
A real “no rule” battle was held for about 30 seconds on Osaka. The guys from the Las Vegas Combat Club pinned one of the attackers on the ground by knee-on-belly and it was very good control. I was surprised — that is kinda hard to keep, but it depends on the guy. (You know this guy that used knee-on-belly position was very, very good. I almost gave him three points on that one.)
How did this rumble get calm downed? Yes, there was a bunch of security guys in stadium. But you know, nobody wants to stop pro MMA fighters in a “no rules” fight, especially when it’s like “battle royal” style. The attackers are not from the audience. It is said that they’re from Nakao’s corner, but nobody knows for sure. And nobody will find out who they were, so those Japanese security were just staring at the rumble.
But you know what? From out of nowhere this guy who looked like Busta Ryhmes came out and stopped the fight. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, Herrrrrb Deannnnn was in the house! He controlled the situation pretty good.
Oh one more time, about Herring’s corner: I didn’t see any of them punching the attackers back. I saw them trying to control the rumble.
Man. I’m sorry for the Texas cowboy. Nakao gave Herring a kiss on his lips. And it’s too bad the punch knocked Nakao out. But Nakao shouldn’t have done that. Or at least, he should have been ready for anything after he kisses a cowboy. Because, as Trace Adkins sings, cowboys are “rough and ready.”
The bottom line is a lot of people think Herring is a bad guy now. But what does K-1 producer Sadaharu Tanigawa think about this accident? After the show was finished I had a chance to talk to Mr. Tanigawa and he commented exactly what I felt.
“As the result, I heard that Herring was disqualified,” Tanigawa said. “But Nakao’s attitude was terrible. This is my personal opinion. But Nakao should have respected his opponent, then he shouldn’t have done that.”
Well, what’s done is done. Either good or bad. Now they made a story for the next time. The rematch for this fight will be very exciting. They’d go kill each other. So I wish Nakao gets back better soon. And I look forward to seeing both Herring and Nakao in the ring again.
OK, that’s about it for what I saw tonight. Actually, there are some other things I may be able to write, but in this country, on January 1, we go to shrine. And it’s very important. So I got to run.
This “Dynamite” show will air in America also, probably in two to three weeks on Dish Network. And for Europeans, Eurosport will air this show. So look for it on your local TV station.
Before I go I want to wish everybody a sweet year in 2006. Happy New Year from the Land of the Rising Sun.