Lions, Turkeys & Prom Queens

The Undercard

The evening's Class A action begins with 2007's 154-pound Shooto rookie champion Yutaka Ueda taking on veteran gutchecker Jin Kazeta. In what should make for reckless entertainment, the bout pits the ballsy brawling of Ueda against the one-dimensional precision of Kazeta. If this was a battle of inanimate objects, it would be a windmill against a scalpel.

Ueda, despite his rookie champ status last year, is not exactly the next great Shooto lightweight, with a repertoire of looping haymakers, lukewarm wrestling and earnest-but-underwhelming ground-and-pound. Kazeta, despite a definitively mediocre record, is still dangerous due to the fact his only offensive weapon -- brutalistic, murdertastic knees to the body -- happens to be the sort of thing that can end a night quickly if his patella meets your pancreas.

Unfortunately, a windmill is stable and can stay upright, while a scalpel can't balance on its own and its execution must be guided by man. What I'm trying to say in this ill-conceived extended metaphor is that Kazeta's wrestling sucks, and that despite having an extremely incomplete skill set, Ueda's ho-hum wrestling and ground-and-pound should be enough to salvage a decision victory, as long as he can protect his intestines from Kazeta's kneecaps.

With Rambaa Somdet having represented Shooto's 115-pound division stateside, the plucky "ATCH Anarchy" Atsushi Takeuchi and the gangly Katsuya Murofushi will square off in a bid to avoid being consigned to mediocrity in a gossamer-thin division.

While the Marfan-looking Murofushi will enjoy an extra-healthy reach advantage over the Lilliputian Takeuchi, Murofushi is much more of a grappler, while Takeuchi butters his bread by banging on the feet. Takeuchi has also already fought Murofushi's younger and considerably more talented brother Shinya to a debatable split decision, which bodes well for "ATCH Anarchy" breaking his three-fight losing skid and getting a W in a two-round decision.

Feigning relevance, Shooto's cold, barren and lifeless 168-pound division will get a potential 10 minutes of fun out of welterweight warring between Taisuke Okuno and Daisuke Okumiya, two bald-headed baddies who throw with abandon.

Both Okuno and Okumiya will likely be looking to do nothing more than wail on each other with big punches. Although he's a tad on the chinny side and hyperprone to flash knockdowns, look for the harder-hitting Okuno to punch and pound his way to a victory and prevail on the scorecards in an exciting bout in a virtually nonexistent pro Shooto weight class.

And, in an opening act that should set a provocative pace for the night, hard-luck Osakan Nobuhiro Hayakawa takes on the rugged and raw Yuta Nezu in a 132-pound square-off.

Despite carrying an impotent 1-4-2 record, Hayakawa isn't as bad as his record would indicate and is more an unfortunate example of what happens to strictly mediocre fighters in the tightly matched world of Class B Shooto. Unfortunately, he's not nearly as good as Nezu, who, despite being rough around the edges and needing to beef up his defensive grappling, has serious skills in the striking department, including fierce leg kicks and crackling counterpunching. Nezu should have no problem using his pro tools and battering Hayakawa into a fifth loss over two rounds.