3/15 DREAM - Pictures
Sunday, 16 March 2008
Then he realized this was DREAM's first ever fight, and he was all business. The fight was, as expected, very quick.
Monma entering the ring for his fight against crowd favorite Sakurai "Mach"
Hayato "Mach" Sakurai making his way to the ring.
"Mach" and Monma as the fight starts. As you can see, the disadvantage with the bigger organizations is the distance to the ring. It is very hard to get good action shots... As a consequence, there will be few good ones.
Then it was time for my personal favorite. Hellboy was facing a very strong opponent in Boku. I have read an interview that Hansen was almost KOed. Just to put the record straight, he was never close to being KOed in this fight, and from where I was sitting, never threatened. This is most likely a translation issue, things can very easily get lost when translating from English to Japanese and back...
It was a question of how long Boku could resist the attack from Hellboy. He lasted the duration of the fight and should be credited for the defence.
Then it was time for "Buscape" to face the underrated Miyata.
Miyata has a lot of potential, but is yet to show too much. This time, "Buscape"'s ju jitsu skills were too much.
Miata vs. "Buscape"
"Buscape" was very happy to secure his place in the next round.
Artur Oumakhanov fought Katsuhiko Nagata, and he has lost 3 of his last 5. I am sure he was disappointed, and this was the weakest fight in the tournament (IMO).
Korean Bu Kyung Jung is a much better fighter than his record. It is a question of time before he upsets someone big. It was not to be this time though.
Ishida walked into the ring as one of the favorites for the tournament.
Ishida took the decision, and I hope we get to see more of Bu Kyung Jung in the near future.
The ring-girls went through their routine during the intermission.
Murilo Bustamante took time to sign some autographs and talk with fans.
Then it was time for the big one, CroCop's back!
The fight was more about his return to Japan than the result, but he got his win.
Eddie Alvarez has arrived in Japan!
Alvarez took on "Dida", who was full of confidence after his performance in HERO's last year.
Alvarez got an impressive win, and is definitely an outsider to this title.
At this point, I was running out of batteries, and wanted to make sure I got some pictures of Aoki vs. JZ. That meant that I didn't get any pictures of Kawajiri vs. "Black Mamba". I will check with friends and see if they have some good ones.
Anyway, it was time for the main event!
Aoki made his entrance. As always to "Baka survivor".
J.Z. made his entrance. The Japanese crowd was very excited about this fight.
The fight started good, but ended way to quick, the result was a No Contest... Hopefully these fighters get another chance to face each other.
As you saw by my post yesterday, I was a little disappointed. Now that I look back, it was unfortunate that it ended the way it did. But this was the beginning of something REALLY good!! For me, it was good to see Hellboy as we know him, entertaining the crowd, he was dominating and very agressive. But there are so many good fighters in this tournament! I can't wait to see how the fighters match up in the next round!
FightOpinion has put up an estimated paying attendence of 19,120.
4 comments:
Great pics man
Awesome pics.
BTW, did the winners get to hold up big checks like in Pride?
From the online vids, seems they aren't using the same Pride 'victory' music after the fight ends, new victory theme seems disappointing.
-> And Eddie Alvarez scared the crap out of the ref when he did the crazy backflip after he won. It would have been crazy if he flattened the ring girls.
I heard the TV Ratings were pretty bad for the event and had a 19K attendance. Can you compare WVR and DREAM and which one the Japanese fans would support the most? Any opinions on this matter? Thanks!
Its hard for me to compare WVR vs. DREAM, as I was watching Sengoku on TV and DREAM live...
The Sengoku fights were very good, but fewer. Dream, suffered under the rush to hold the event (or at least that is what I think). Crocop and Minowa didnt really have top opponents, and the tournament was 1 fight short.
All in all, I think they were pretty event. Lets wait until the second event by both these productions.
One thing is for sure though, second round of the Dream Lightweight tournament will be VERY good.
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