Fighting & Entertainment Group (FEG) has announced the first wave of match-ups for its New Year’s Eve supershow featuring participants from DREAM, K-1, K-1 MAX and K-1 Koshien.
FieLDS Dynamite!! ‘Power of Courage’ will take place on December 31, 2008 at the Saitama Super Arena in Saitama, Japan, and could feature as many as 20 fights.
Japanese MMA pioneer and ‘Gracie Hunter’ Kazushi Sakuraba will finally get the chance to face fellow aging veteran Kiyoshi Tamura, after publicly calling him out for a fight several years back at PRIDE Shockwave 2005, also scheduled on New Year’s Eve.
Joining them will be DREAM 2008 lightweight grand prix champion Joachim “Hellboy” Hansen as he takes on Gesias “JZ” Cavalcante in a rematch from their 2004 Shooto bout that saw Hansen take the majority decision, one of only two losses for JZ.
Expect fireworks in that one.
And for those of you who enjoy watching young children kick each other in the face, K-1 Koshien will be holding the finals and semifinals of its ‘King of Under 18′ tournament.
Here is the official card thus far:
MMA RULES:
Middleweight: Kazushi Sakuraba (24-11-1) vs. Kiyoshi Tamura (32-13-2)
Lightweight: Joachim Hansen (19-7-1) vs. Gesias Cavalcante (14-2-1)
K-1 RULES:
K-1 Koshien U-18 Tournament Semifinals: HIROYA (9-1) vs. Shota Shimada (3-0)
K-1 Koshien U-18 Tournament Semifinals: Ryuya Kusakabe (2-0) vs. Koya Urabe (2-0)
K-1 Koshien U-18 Tournament Finals: Winner of HIROYA/Shimada vs. Winner of Kusakabe/Urabe
Also expected to participate are Norifumi “KID” Yamamoto, Caol Uno, Hideo Tokoro, Masakatsu Funaki, Hayato “Mach” Sakurai, Shinya Aoki, Tatsuya Kawajiri, Mitsuhiro Ishida, Gegard Mousasi and Hong Man Choi.
While not yet listed, Mirko “Cro Cop” Filipovic has confirmed on his official blog that he will face Alistair Overeem to finish their match from September’s DREAM 6 that ended in a No Contest after Overeem played “Kick the Can” with Cro Cop’s man-bag.
Cro Cop was being dominated by Overeem prior to the sack mutilation and hasn’t looked sharp in almost two years. Overeem on the other hand has been unstoppable in his last five fights, including Sunday’s submission win over MMA veteran Gary Goodrich at Netherlands ‘Glory of 10′ event.
There’s even rumors of a Kimbo Slice vs. Seth Petruzelli rematch, probably scheduled to take place in the opening round of the 2008 ‘Who Cares?’ grand prix.
Stay tuned as this massive event continues to take shape.
41 Comments »
sadly cro cop will get battered… i hope hes tried to work out a new gameplan other than “get knee’d in the nuts alot”
JZ vs Hellboy!
HELL-Yeah! i was just thinking that JZ hasn’t fought in a while.. well what a better match-up to put him up against!
Cro-Cop has always been a power based striker, if he wasn’t kneed in the balls there is a good chance he would have knocked out Overeem eventually.
I though Kid was hurt?
LMFAO “who cares grand prix” you crack me up Jesse, couldn’t agree more!!!
I also heard that Gomi earned a title shot with his lackluster LOSS last month!
that was in Sengoku, not dream
Yeah i thought that was hilarious…
LOL! Someone doesn’t know what they are talking about.
The K-1 World GP 2008 looks great, you noobs.
AWESOME!!! I hope Hansen KTFO out of Cavalcante, cant stand that guy, another Thiago Alves wanna be rapper clown
You may be right about JZ but he won’t lose to Hansen. It will get ugly. I would love to see him fight alvarez too. Does anyone know if shaolin will fight at Dynamite? Alvarez-Shaolin would be sick too.
yeah it’s not like you’re creating a completely false stereotype not knowing the guy, and base it entirely on prejudice about the type of clothing he wears
clothing he wears, way he talks, yelling out his rap song on his entrance to the ring… looks stupid, acts stupid, is stupid… get my point?
This is going to be a stellar event. While Hellboy vs. JZ is a fight I have been dying to see, Hellboy promised my boy Alvarez 1st crack at the title. Whats up with that! If they wont let Eddie fight for the title ASAP, he might as well come to the UFC and kick Kenny Florians ass!
I havent wanted to see SAkuraba vs. Tamura forever!
RINGS vs PRIDE. Saku takes it by RNC after Tamura fails a leglock and gets his back taken. I guess we’ll see Alvarez-JZ at the next dream.
great event helboy vs jz is going to be sick, i wish it was alverez but this is the next best thing.
I really hope to see Mach vs. Diablo Diaz added to this card. Both fighters will fight on this card, but I want them to face each other. THat match up would be bad ass!
Kimbo vs. Bob Sapp! Anyone? Sounds like a fight the Japanese would LOVE!!!!!
shit i would watch it, i hope they do get diaz over there for this event, the good thing is i know its probally gonna get better even.
Bob Sapp would Kill Kimbo.
in under 14 seconds!!
maybe, but sapp didn’t look that good in his last fight, i think sapp is probally the better fighter but kimbo is in better shape either way its two big guys slugging it out sounds good to me.
ive read semmy schilt has been calling out fedor for this event, anyone think it will happen? i would watch kimbo vs sapp as well, who would’nt.
semmy would get murdered by fedor… he has zero ground game
i don’t know about murdered they already fought and he is still alive and did pretty good considering its fedor, semmy is a great fighter and could hold his own although i think he would still lose.
yeah, that was fedor’s 1rst fight in pride, but schilt is no slouch.
^^^No, he’s not. He’s the first person to realize that you gotta go to the body to KO hunt.
that became obvious when cro cop cracked him full force in the face with the left kick, anyways, didnt u guys see kharitonov own semmy on the ground, fedor would do the same thing
can’t wait to see Joachim/JZ – going to be a war. John, apparently this isn’t a title fight, and I was speaking with Antonio Carvalho (corners Joachim) a few weeks back and while he said this fight(vs. JZ) was more than likely going to happen – Hellboy still wants Alvarez to have that first title shot…cheers
THanks for the intel Seamus. Very happy to hear its not a title fight. Now I can just sit back and enjoy the fight! Cheers!
Nothing would please me more than to see Crocop knock Overeem’s head clear off his shoulders. He really needs to turn it on. I stayed up all night just to watch him get battered by Overeem’s ruthless knees. Come on Mirko, WTF happened to you?!?!?
i am still trying to hope he can turn it around and get back to the old mirko, but each time i see him fight i lose a little more faith thet it will ever happen.
I’ve been hoping the same for awhile roy…not holding my breathe!!
Cro Cop vs Overeem is the only thing that excites me about that card
jz vs hellboy is a very high end fight. that fight cant help but be exciting. if they get all the fighters expected to fight and match them up right, there could be alot of interesting fights on this event.
Hey mania did you here about the restraining order kim courture (i hate my spelling) put on mr. beard of afliction? crazy stuff please look into it.
cro cop would be a force at lhw, he is an idiot..
I wish the ufc would pick up some more of the better lw’s out there. so many guys i would like to see go up against the ufc lw div.
they try…it’s proven the “elite” asian LW’s are difficult to deal with. first off they think they are way better than they are, second japan and china need to give permission and want money just to talk to these guys! It’s a Fedor thing all over again!
It’ll be a shame if they don’t put Artur Kyshenko on the card.
Thanks kev good info to know and makes sense.
Kevin has no clue about what he is talking about, just to let you know.
geasias calcavanti vs joachim hansen
yoshiro akiyama vs gerard mousasi
fedor emalinko vs satoshii ishii
kiyoshi tamura vs kazushi sakaraba
mirko crocop vs alistar overeem
nick diaz vs hayato saukurai
tatsyua kawajiri vs carl uno
mitsuhiro ishida vs sheingya aoki
seichi ikemoto vs kuniyoshi hironaka
seth petruzelli vs kimbo slice
hong man choi vs segei kharitnovo
masakazu imanari vs nurfumi yamamoto
astushi yamamoto vs takeshi yamazaki
yashirio kido vs yoshiro sato
musashi vs ikushia minowa
masakatsu funaki vs yuichi nakanishi
katsuyori shibata vs junichi sawayashiki
daisuke nakamura vs luis buscape
zelg galstic vs taishin kohiruimakik
taei kin vs ronaldo jacare
andrews nakahara vs melvin manhoef
K1 dynamite
sorry for the spelling and these are just my rumors not facts but its seeming to be shaping up like this…i could be wrong but it would be sweet