MMA news updates

Instead of spamming the boards everytime I see some cool news, I’ll post it here. I’ll also keep track of prospects I like, new signings to ufc/dwcs/Bellator/etc.

* Edited at 05.02.2022, 4:44 PM ET *

Mo Usman vs junior tafa added to April 22nd. That fight night looks awesome

@Ayy I appreciate the digging you so for RTU. Next update though would it be possible to add the fighters countries they are representing and their weight class? It sure would be a time saver from looking up the more obscure fighters one by one.

CHINA

Jiniushiyue: 11-2, 4 KO, 3 SUB. Last loss was three years ago to Zhang Shifa. Pretty much only fought cans so hard to determine if he ends up being anything special

Xiao Long: 24-7, 4 KO, 9 Sub. Getting what is now his third shot at a ufc contract. I really do not understand what the ufc sees in this guy that they think makes him so deserving. He was looking good against a solid guy on docs, but threw the fight away being an idiot. Even tho he pulled out of both RTU chances, he's still getting another one.

Daermisi Zhawupasi: 6-0 1 KO 5 SUB. Pretty interesting Chinese prospect. fought some decent comp as far as chinese scene goes. Picked up his biggest win in his most recent fight against a 20-8 vet. ran through everyone he's fought; could potentially do well. Striking is quite poor but his grappling is pretty impressive. he will chain wrestle and has a pretty solid bjj game. Im actually a big fan of his wrestling but obviously it is untested against a higher level. Not the best fight iq but he is pretty exciting to watch

Baergeng Jieleyisi: 12-3, 4 KO, 7 SUB. 5 fight winstreak. hasn't fought anyone good and lost to most notable names but does get a lot of finishes.

Li Kaiwen: 10-5, 6 KO, 1 SUB. Now this is a fun one. 12 fight ONE veteran with a record of 9-3. not very good but always exciting. he's a brawler with a lot of power. seems lost when he's not able to find his range. will probably get destroyed but if they give him another striker it will be fireworks

Yibugele: 21-11-1, 10 ko, 2 sub. long time JCK vet and won their 2021 tournament. 5 fight win streak. pretty exciting and on a good winstreak but not that good from what I've seen.

aili Muratbek: 13-2. 5 ko 2 sub. was supposed to be on last season of RTU but he had to withdraw. since then he stayed active and went 3-0 with all 3 by finish. fought mostly cans so not sure what to expect.

Bahatebole: 7-1-1, 4 ko 1 sub. Main training partner of Li Jingliang, Bahatebole made the switch with him to sanford mma and has been training there for the past year. His two loa appearances have been disappointing. First he lost to solid prospect hairs talundizc in a fight where he was just outmatched and gassed out, then he beat Ryan leininger in a fight he probably should have lost. Not sure how he stacks up compared to others but he definitely has some of the best training compared to others.

INDONESIA

All of these guys come from Graham Boylan's fight academy that he recently started. They have been training in the US for the last 4 months. In general,mi really don't trust Indonesian mma and as we saw last year, they are not very good.

Billy Pasulatan: 10-2, 2 ko, 5 sub. OPMMA SW champ (will be fighting at 125 for tourney). 6 fight winstreak with some highlight reel finishes, but his competition is really bad.

Ronal Siaahan: 7-0 5 KO. undefeated KO artist from indonesia

Eperaim Ginting: 6-0 3 ko 3 sub. OPMMA FW champ.

Reza Arianto: 5-0 4 ko

Wendi's Patilima: 8-0 3 ko 4 sub. Reigning and defending OPMMA WW Champ (2 defenses). fought really good comp for Indonesian mma scene. imo the best out of the Indonesians but not having super high expectations.


SOUTH KOREA

Sang Uk Kim: 7-2 3 ko 2 sub. Former AFC Interim WW Champ. Lost to relatively decent comp, but has beaten nobody.

Sung Chan Hong: 9-1 3ko. 7 fight winstreak. really poor comp for the most part but does have a win over ufc vet will chope. Funny enough, he has two no contest against the same person and both ended in accidental groin strikes, one even in the 5th round.

Chang Ho Lee: 7-1 2 ko 2 sub. fought all over the place including ONE and brave. only loss is to a really good prospect (and someone they should've signed for RTU), sim Kai Xiong. Watched him go to war with a. 2-4 guy so I doubt this guy goes far. he's a fun striker tho will also mix in takedowns occasionally but not a great wrestler.

Jung Hyun Lee: 8-0 4 ko. 8-2 as amateur and currently on a 13 fight winstreak at only 20 years old. Part of the insanely stacked flyweight bracket and one of the best signings of the show. Lee is a stud. Now, the level of competition is not good, and he's untested, but he passes the eye test. Super slick striker with a lot of power. Im not sure how ufc ready he is compared to his fellow opponents in his bracket, but he could do well.

INDIA

Rana Rudra Pratap Singh: 11-1 2 ko 9 sub. Indian bjj guy. no striking, poor wrestling, and low level bjj all against very poor comp. had a fight for brave but got quickly tkoed by the much better prospect. Only beaten cans for the most part. Unless he catches someone early I think he will get destroyed.

Sumit Kumar: 4-0 (should be 8-0 but fought jobbers so the fights aren't counted) 4 ko 4 sub. Really interested in this kid. So yes, he's fighting the worst of the worst in Indian regional scene, but he has some upside. He's 22, has a wrestling background, and trains at TAM and AKA. Watching his tape, his striking is super low level, but he's very quick and hits incredibly hard. I have a lot of questions about gas tank and what happens if he fights anyone with a pulse. Seems very low level but incredibly entertaining. hope he does well but I doubt it

Abdul Azim Badakshi: 13-3 10 ko 2 sub. Really really like this signing. Badakshi is one of the better guys coming out of India. He owns a gym with his brother and they are both big stars in India. Badakshi has fought all over, including brave and ACA. He's beaten some very solid guys like TUF vet Sascha Sharma, agashin babaev, and David moon. He's got a very well rounded skillset and fought great competition. he does have a weakness to wrestling but the only guy to really take advantage of it was Akhmed Magomedov who is very good.

JAPAN

Kouya Kanda: 11-4 6 ko. DEEP interim FW champ. Pretty ugly record but is consistent throughout career. Lots of decisions. beat undefeated prospect hiroto gomiyo In his last fight

Shin Haraguchi: 5-0 4 ko. Japanese wrestler with shining accomplishment being 8th place at the 2020 asian wrestling championships. Striking is a work in progress. its not horrible, but he just doesn't put out a ton of volume. his wrestling Is sick tho; times things well and has very good top control with devastating gnp.

Kazuma Maruyama: 12-6 5 ko 4 sub. really weird choice for this one. He's 12-6 and coming off of a loss to Adam assenza who is not very good. he's also got bad losses such as a ko loss to a 16-16 guy and a split decision to a 7-6 guy. not sure what ufc was thinking here.

Rei Tsuruya: 6-0 3 ko 3 sub. phenom prospect. 20 years old, his father is the owner of the parestra network (large chain of gyms in Japan), and has an expansive wrestling background. 2nd place in junior olympics, 2nd place in 2020 national high school tournament, and multiple national titles in wrestling as a youth. He also went 6-0 as an amateur, was a national samba champ, and has won 6 national competitions in bjj, including the Abu Dhabi pro bjj tournament as a white belt in 4th grade. He was bred for fighting and looks every bit the part. I would say he's a lock for the finals but his division is stacked as hell.

Shuya Kamikubo: 12-1-1 3 ko 3 sub. one of the best pickups skills wise on RTU. kamikubo is on a 9 fight winstreak and went 6a0 in one championship. his level of competition is very good and he was steamrolling people at the end of his tenure with one. His grappling is very high level. Great wrestling and educated bjj. He takes people down and mauls them. His transitions on the ground are so clean as well. I think he will go very far and have success in the ufc.

Phillipinnes

Mark Climaco: 8-1 2 ko 1 sub. Weird signing but a very good one nonetheless. Climaco is imo one of the USA's best prospects (he reps phillipinnes because he is of filipino descent). Lone loss is to yuma horiuchi who is talented but has a lot of holes. not the worst loss tho as it was an early ko. Besides that, climate has been perfect in his career. he's fought a very high level of competition in lfa and dominated all of them. His last two wins have been against two also very legit prospects in Cody Davis and Miguel Hanson; climaco ran through them with ease. He trains at AKA and has skills everywhere the fight goes. im most impressed with his wrestling however. Despite being in the most stacked bracket, I think climaco is my pick to win the whole thing, making finals at the least.


Myanmar

Joshua Van (Thawng): 7-1 5 ko 2 sub. Another odd choice but one that also makes sense since he's from Myanmar. I would've like van on dwcs but this isn't bad either. Van has been killing it recently; he went from blue chip prospect to very legit in just a year. Now, I will say he's still very green so I don't think he will win, but he has a very bright future and will be in the ufc regardless. He is super athletic and has insane power for flyweight. However, he still has some holes in his game that will prevent him from winning the tourney. first, is his tdd. Its just not good. he does the right things and gets back up, but its not at a level that he can beat Tsuruya or climaco. Second, he also does make some dumb mistakes like giving up position for heel hooks. nothing serious, but just part of him being green. he could shock everyone and end up going far, but I think he's just a little too green for ufc rn. great prospect tho

@random one step ahead of you lol

Great write up dude

@jrscolwell ty my friend 

I think Daermisi Zhawupasi has competed in the ADCC Asia trial before.

That would make sense. His grappling does look pretty good

@ayy you are the man! Thank you haha
Couple things I noticed:
1/4 of the field is Chinese this time around. They really are hoping someone comes through this time at the Chinese fighters got shut out last time and they are really pushing that market.

27/36 competitors announced so far. I assume they will all be in the brackets but I suppose some of them could be in non-tournament bouts.

Looks like the non-tournament bouts will continue to be used for fighters for heavier weight classes, womens weight classes and central Asians they dont want running through the brackets.

South Korea seems to have the most prospects while Japan has the most developed local scene thanks to the presence of Rizin, Shooto and Pancrase.

Interesting that Climaco and Van are in the tournaments. Personally I think they should reserve the tournaments for guys who are actually living and fighting out of those countries. Living near and getting the top notch training in America will take Climaco and Van very far here.

Lawrence Phillips is fighting again tomorrow against a Russian middleweight, ONE clearly wants to build his record up ASAP

@random I think the non tourney bouts get added after the brackets get set. 

As for the Chinese I think they’ve done a good job scouting talent this year. Hopefully they have some success. I have the most hood for daermisi but you never know what you’re getting w chinese prospects 

* Edited at 03.23.2023, 9:13 PM ET *

Haraguchi said he'd fight in the Featherweight or Lightweight tournament for road to the UFC. He's small for Lightweight, I was really hoping we'd see him at Featherweight, I think he's going to struggle a bit to impose his wrestling vs bigger guys but I hope he wins his bracket and then drops down to 145 in the UFC. 

Some really good pickups, particularly at Flyweight, I hope some of the flyweights get contracts even if they don't win because they have lots of potential, they're young though and can always win a few and get to the contender series. 

It's clear they didn't want central Asians in this tournament because 21-5 Edil Esengulov who's on like a 12 fight win streak tried to get on the LW tournament and Alibi Idiris tried to get on the Flyweight one but it sounds like Idiris is trying to square his visa away for the contender series now. 

@ayy yeah you're right. I expect all of these guys to get shuffled into the brackets first.


@Khanate I think it's pretty clear they dont want central Asians on RTU except for non-tourny fights. Mostly because the Kazakhs, Dagestanis, Armenians, Georgians, etc all have really developed wrestling, and combat Sambo programs before they even enter mma plusbwell developed mma scenes. As such they would run through brackets filled with less developed mma scenes like Chinese and Indian.

Magomed Kabardiev for example would run through those names like a hot knife through butter.

Dagestanis and Georgians aren't central Asians. It's mostly Kazakhs, Kyrgz and Tajiks, Uzbeks too but MMA hasnt caught on as much there yet for some reason. You're seeing a lot of Kyrgz doing well on ACA young eagles and there's a surprising amount of Tajik and Kazakh talent.

Also @ayylmaonnaise I found a match of Tsuruya at the Cadet world championships for Greco Roman but he got whooped really bad, still qualifying for the Cadet world championships means you are probably the best in your country in that weight bracket at that age, just qualifying is a big accomplishment but I'm curious if you know Tsuruya and Haraguchis wrestling backgrounds if their accomplishments are Greco, freestyle, some of both? Japan has a very good wrestling program for the lighter weights in both Greco and freestyle for whatever that's worth.

* Edited at 03.23.2023, 10:37 PM ET *

Pretty sure haraguchi is freestyle 

Tsuruya is probably both if I had to guess. He already has an extensive combat sports background as it is

* Edited at 03.23.2023, 10:40 PM ET *

Rei's takedowns in MMA have seemed pretty upper body focused, man I am excited for him and Makoto Takahashi, them training and coming up together at the same age really makes me hopeful about Japanese MMA. 

Both are very good. Tsuruya is better than Takahashi but both have very bright futures 

I think Tatsuya Ando is part of the tournament too