TOKYO, Feb. 20 – Everybody in the arena caught the drum rhythm. “Den!-den!-de!-Den! Den!-den-de-Den!” Yes, that’s right, this is the sign another exciting fight show has just started.
There’s so many thing I’d like to share with fight fans from all over the world. In this column, I’ll tell you what was rally happening in the Ring when the fight between Mario Sperry and Hirotaka Yokoi was stopped.
I think everybody believes that Mario’s knees stopped the fight, but I tell you what, while Yokoi was the loser the truth was it didn’t happen because of a knee to the head—even though one knee looked so brutal it almost seemed to smash Yokoi’s head inside out.
Right before the fight was stopped, I heard Referee Toyonaga say, “Are you alright Yokoi? Are you alright Yokoi?” I’m glad Yokoi didn’t answer to the referee “Yeah, yeah.”
In the post-fight interview Yokoi told us, “I was answering referee, ‘I am okay. I am still good.’” but in real situation, the referee kept saying, “If you don’t defend yourself, I’ll stop the fight!”
But it didn’t happen until the moment the referee saw blood on Yokoi’s head. Now here’s the point. Watch it carefully, as soon as the fight is stopped, Yokoi lies down from the turtle position to his back and he holds the backside of his right thigh. Yes, that’s what was happening to Hirotaka Yokoi.
At the post-fight interview, he told us what really was happening while he curled up like a Ninja turtle. “I was taking the knee on my arms,” he said. “It really didn’t give me damage. My concern at that point was my hamstring area on my right thigh had inexpressible pain. So from that turtle position, I was thinking that I have two choices. Option number one, drive in, and try to catch Mario’s leg and get the better position. Option number two: pull Mario in my guard, then at least I can be looked better. But both options were too difficult for me at that time because, my right thigh didn’t listen to me at all. So there’s no way I drive in against Mario’s force. At the same time, if I pulled him in my guard, I have to use my leg a lot to control Mario. And it was impossible for me to move at that time.”
When he showed up after the fight he was half-carried by his training partner and could barely walk. I asked him at the interview if he could have withstood Sperry’s knees for another minute, since the fight was called with just one minute remaining in the first round.
“Again, [the] knee wasn’t damaging me, so I could,” he answered. “But I couldn’t do anything.” Now why did that happened? When he tried to take Mario down, he said, he “used too much power, and now I feel like having a tore muscle on that part.”
OK, I don’t need to defend him. Yeah, he lost. Compete loss. No excuse. What’s done is done, and he says that. He doesn’t say any excuse. He admits he lost. But I just wanted tell the real reason why he lost. At his post-fight interview, I didn’t see any damage on him except his leg. He didn’t have any tape or bandage on his head, and his face was still as clean as baby skin with beard. (Actually he got some “cherry tomato” size bumps on his left ear, but I found nothing else.)
This post-fight interview will be up on the site soon. So check the video out. Be a witness yourself. Even if you don’t understand Japanese, you’ll see he didn’t get damage on his head and I wish this does not effect his fight career because a torn muscle can easily happen again.
Every time he shows up at the interview space, he says he doesn’t feel any distance between him and his opponent who’s dominating the division (just like he spoke in exclusive interview in the past /news/interviews/hirotaka-yokoi-interview-2168). But the result is everything in this business and now I feel his heart is definitely caught up, or set in the same stage as Antonio Noguiera, or other top notch fight for sure. But, how about his body strength and technique?
After the show PRIDE president Sakakibara said Yokoi—or any other Japanese fighter who lost on Sunday—is not qualified to enter the middleweight tournament. Yokoi earned not only another “L” on his record, but also an “F” for the future tournament. Well, now he may have enough time to take care of his body so I want him to fix his body as a fully functional weapon, and come back with better technique, body strength, and same mentality. Good luck young man!