Suzuki Defeats Smirnovas at ZST 13
TOKYO, June 10 -- It's been a busy weekend for MMA out on the
artificial islands of Tokyo's Odaiba district. First there was
Cageforce on Saturday, then just a mere twenty-four hours later,
Differ Ariake opened its doors for ZST 13.
The offshoot of Akira Maeda (Pictures)'s former Rings promotion, ZST is somewhat of a different creature amidst the MMA scene. In an effort to make a new and interesting show for the fans, the promotion instituted some rather unique laws, the most obvious of which being the "open guard rule," in which the fighters cannot cross their legs around their opponent while on their back. The end result of this prohibition is that there is a lot more offensive-based grappling playing out on the mat as compared to other promotions.
Another restriction, much akin to amateur Shooto, is that fighters
cannot punch to the face on the ground. While this obviously slows
down the action in the pugilistic sense, it's also conducive to
grappling, with the fighters not having to worry so much about
taking ground punches when going for more high-risk, complicated
moves such as leg submissions, gogoplatas and cartwheel guard
passes.
Perhaps the most bizarre of all of ZST's decrees (besides tag-team MMA matches) is that of no judge's decisions. If a fight goes the distance, it is automatically declared a draw, no matter how one-sided the fight may have been.
Nobutatsu, a former Kyokushin karate fighter, trains at several different gyms around Tokyo, including K'z Factory and Takanori Gomi (Pictures)'s Rascals gym. He's a very skilled striker with good takedown defense and a great ability to return to his feet quickly. Smirnovas of course, is probably best remembered for the brutal beatdown he laid on Kazushi Sakuraba (Pictures), nearly defeating the Japanese legend in his highly touted Hero's debut and causing an uproar over K-1's refereeing practices.
Smirnovas looked huge compared to his Japanese opponent. Both fighers started out cautiously, feeling each other out with some sporadic jousting. Suzuki did a good job of avoiding the clinch and getting away from Smirnovas's takedown attempts, but eventually the strong Lithuanian caught a kick and forced Suzuki to the mat.
Once on the ground, Smirnovas quickly passed Suzuki's legs and looked to be setting up an armbar, only to see his Japanese opponent buck hard to get back to his feet.
The fighters continued to trade punches once standing again, and in the last 15 seconds of the fight, Suzuki connected with a hard right hand to the head just as Smirnovas was coming in. The bell rang and the fighters returned to their corners.
This was where things got a bit strange. Just before coming out of their corners to start the second round, the doctor declared that Smirnovas was unable to continue and called for a stoppage, giving the fight to Suzuki.
The punch that Suzuki connected at the end of the first caused a bit of swelling above Smirnovas's left eye, but there were no cuts and the Shooto Europe champion looked more than able to continue fighting. The doctor continued to point to above the left eye admist Smirnovas's protests.
Whether this was a bad call on the part of the doctor or legitimate medical concern remains in question. Notheless, Sukuki walked away with the victory.
Former Shooto Featherweight Champion Masahiro Oishi (Pictures) nearly met with disaster in the early moments of his fight against Wataru Inatsu, taking a hard flying knee to the head, but the K'z Factory fighter managed to shake off the effects of the blow and shoot for the takedown before Inatsu could capitalize.
From here, Oishi eventually passed his opponent's guard and pulled off a textbook kimura-to-armbar submission, scoring the tapout victory fairly early in the round.
Paraestra Hachioji's Masanori Kanehara started off well in his fight against U-File Camp's Tashirou Nishiuchi (Pictures), scoring the mount, then taking back-position as his opponent twisted to escape. From here, he transitioned to an armbar and very nearly had it locked on, only to see Nishiuchi escape.
The beginning of the end for Kanehara happened once both fighters returned to there feet. After some jousting, Nishiuchi connected with a well-placed high kick that sent the Paraestra Hachioji fighter to the mat. A scramble ensued, and once back on their feet, Nishiuchi sealed the deal by connecting a hard punch at the 3:59 mark, sending Kanehara to the mat for good, forcing a referee stoppage.
Rodeo Style's Ranki Kawana was pretty much all over Keisuke Fujiwara (Pictures) on the ground, often passing the guard and taking side-control, back and mount. In the second round, Kawana pulled off a very nice suplex on his opponent and continued to maintain ground control. Fujiwara managed to escape the submission attempts thrown at him, but just couldn't compare to Kawana's mat prowess.
The fight went the distance and, according to ZST rules, was ruled a draw.
In a grappling only contest, Crosspoint Koenji's Naoya Uematsu (Pictures) squared off against Alliance Ju-Jitsu's Charles "Cobrinha" Rubens.
While Uematsu is renowned as one of Japan's top grapplers and competed in this year's Abu Dhabi grappling tournament, Rebens is just on a whole other level. The Brazilian schooled Uematsu in this one, taking his opponent's back early on and sinking in the rear naked choke for the tapout victory at the 1:04 mark of the first round.
The semi final of this card featured a tag-team MMA match, with U-File Camp's Masashi Takeda and P's Lab Tokyo's Yojiro Uchimura squaring off against Gold Gym South Tokyo's Masayuki Okude and Rodeo Style's Naoyuki Kotani (Pictures).
These types of matches, exclusive to ZST, are really for the entertainment factor more than anything else. Fought with one 15-minute round, the first team to score a knockout or submission is the winner. Fighters can make tags at any time, and when a tag is made, all holds must be broken.
This "saved by the tag" option was utilized twice by the team of Uchimura/Takeda when they were caught in submission techniques, while Okude and Kotani tagged out when then had taken too many shots from their hard-hitting opponents.
This somewhat bizarre bout was brought to a finish when Kotani scored the armbar on Takeda, taking the victory for his team.
The offshoot of Akira Maeda (Pictures)'s former Rings promotion, ZST is somewhat of a different creature amidst the MMA scene. In an effort to make a new and interesting show for the fans, the promotion instituted some rather unique laws, the most obvious of which being the "open guard rule," in which the fighters cannot cross their legs around their opponent while on their back. The end result of this prohibition is that there is a lot more offensive-based grappling playing out on the mat as compared to other promotions.
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Perhaps the most bizarre of all of ZST's decrees (besides tag-team MMA matches) is that of no judge's decisions. If a fight goes the distance, it is automatically declared a draw, no matter how one-sided the fight may have been.
The main event of ZST 13 saw Mushinjuku's Nobutatsu Suzuki confront
Shooto Europe champion Kestutis Sminovas.
Nobutatsu, a former Kyokushin karate fighter, trains at several different gyms around Tokyo, including K'z Factory and Takanori Gomi (Pictures)'s Rascals gym. He's a very skilled striker with good takedown defense and a great ability to return to his feet quickly. Smirnovas of course, is probably best remembered for the brutal beatdown he laid on Kazushi Sakuraba (Pictures), nearly defeating the Japanese legend in his highly touted Hero's debut and causing an uproar over K-1's refereeing practices.
Smirnovas looked huge compared to his Japanese opponent. Both fighers started out cautiously, feeling each other out with some sporadic jousting. Suzuki did a good job of avoiding the clinch and getting away from Smirnovas's takedown attempts, but eventually the strong Lithuanian caught a kick and forced Suzuki to the mat.
Once on the ground, Smirnovas quickly passed Suzuki's legs and looked to be setting up an armbar, only to see his Japanese opponent buck hard to get back to his feet.
The fighters continued to trade punches once standing again, and in the last 15 seconds of the fight, Suzuki connected with a hard right hand to the head just as Smirnovas was coming in. The bell rang and the fighters returned to their corners.
This was where things got a bit strange. Just before coming out of their corners to start the second round, the doctor declared that Smirnovas was unable to continue and called for a stoppage, giving the fight to Suzuki.
The punch that Suzuki connected at the end of the first caused a bit of swelling above Smirnovas's left eye, but there were no cuts and the Shooto Europe champion looked more than able to continue fighting. The doctor continued to point to above the left eye admist Smirnovas's protests.
Whether this was a bad call on the part of the doctor or legitimate medical concern remains in question. Notheless, Sukuki walked away with the victory.
Former Shooto Featherweight Champion Masahiro Oishi (Pictures) nearly met with disaster in the early moments of his fight against Wataru Inatsu, taking a hard flying knee to the head, but the K'z Factory fighter managed to shake off the effects of the blow and shoot for the takedown before Inatsu could capitalize.
From here, Oishi eventually passed his opponent's guard and pulled off a textbook kimura-to-armbar submission, scoring the tapout victory fairly early in the round.
Paraestra Hachioji's Masanori Kanehara started off well in his fight against U-File Camp's Tashirou Nishiuchi (Pictures), scoring the mount, then taking back-position as his opponent twisted to escape. From here, he transitioned to an armbar and very nearly had it locked on, only to see Nishiuchi escape.
The beginning of the end for Kanehara happened once both fighters returned to there feet. After some jousting, Nishiuchi connected with a well-placed high kick that sent the Paraestra Hachioji fighter to the mat. A scramble ensued, and once back on their feet, Nishiuchi sealed the deal by connecting a hard punch at the 3:59 mark, sending Kanehara to the mat for good, forcing a referee stoppage.
Rodeo Style's Ranki Kawana was pretty much all over Keisuke Fujiwara (Pictures) on the ground, often passing the guard and taking side-control, back and mount. In the second round, Kawana pulled off a very nice suplex on his opponent and continued to maintain ground control. Fujiwara managed to escape the submission attempts thrown at him, but just couldn't compare to Kawana's mat prowess.
The fight went the distance and, according to ZST rules, was ruled a draw.
In a grappling only contest, Crosspoint Koenji's Naoya Uematsu (Pictures) squared off against Alliance Ju-Jitsu's Charles "Cobrinha" Rubens.
While Uematsu is renowned as one of Japan's top grapplers and competed in this year's Abu Dhabi grappling tournament, Rebens is just on a whole other level. The Brazilian schooled Uematsu in this one, taking his opponent's back early on and sinking in the rear naked choke for the tapout victory at the 1:04 mark of the first round.
The semi final of this card featured a tag-team MMA match, with U-File Camp's Masashi Takeda and P's Lab Tokyo's Yojiro Uchimura squaring off against Gold Gym South Tokyo's Masayuki Okude and Rodeo Style's Naoyuki Kotani (Pictures).
These types of matches, exclusive to ZST, are really for the entertainment factor more than anything else. Fought with one 15-minute round, the first team to score a knockout or submission is the winner. Fighters can make tags at any time, and when a tag is made, all holds must be broken.
This "saved by the tag" option was utilized twice by the team of Uchimura/Takeda when they were caught in submission techniques, while Okude and Kotani tagged out when then had taken too many shots from their hard-hitting opponents.
This somewhat bizarre bout was brought to a finish when Kotani scored the armbar on Takeda, taking the victory for his team.
