Paid Members Carbomb Posted December 30, 2025 Paid Members Posted December 30, 2025 One of the most off-putting things about one is their insistence on covering so many disciplines. Having an MMA and a Muay Thai division makes perfect sense for their pan-Asian brand, but they're also doing kickboxing, and I think I saw they had a division for something else, possibly judo? Quote
Paid Members wandshogun09 Posted December 30, 2025 Paid Members Posted December 30, 2025 (edited) Yeah they’ve done grappling only stuff on their cards as well. On the one hand I like that they’re trying to be different but it’s jarring going from one to another. Mixed shows rarely work. Even when Pride or K-1 did it it just felt a bit odd but they got a pass because there were actual big stars and names involved. ONE doesn’t have that. Edited December 30, 2025 by wandshogun09 Quote
jimufctna24 Posted December 30, 2025 Posted December 30, 2025 I recall seeing footage of Yoshida choking out Royce Gracie in a Pride ring. I was confused as I swore their MMA fight ended in a draw. I rushed to fight finder and saw their MMA bout was indeed ruled a draw, which confused me further. Turned out the bout Yoshida won was a purely a grappling bout. Quote
Paid Members Carbomb Posted December 30, 2025 Paid Members Posted December 30, 2025 1 hour ago, jimufctna24 said: I recall seeing footage of Yoshida choking out Royce Gracie in a Pride ring. I was confused as I swore their MMA fight ended in a draw. I rushed to fight finder and saw their MMA bout was indeed ruled a draw, which confused me further. Turned out the bout Yoshida won was a purely a grappling bout. I saw that match, it was boring as a drill. And I'm not a Just Bleeder who hates grappling. It was just the same thing over again, Yoshida trying to get a sub from the same weird standing figure-four and getting nowhere with it, and Gracie constantly trying to get some kind of purchase in vain. Quote
Paid Members wandshogun09 Posted December 30, 2025 Paid Members Posted December 30, 2025 Gracie fights in general are pretty much all terrible to watch barring a few exceptions where they just subbed opponents early. Royce vs Takada in the Pride GP in 2000 is rotten, Renzo had some absolute stinkers in the early Pride days and that 90 minute Royce vs Sakuraba fight is a real slog as you’d expect and only remembered with any fondness because Saku schooled him and forced the Gracies to admit defeat and throw the towel in. You have to give the Gracies their place in the history of the sport, they obviously had an important part to play. But man, those fights don’t hold up well at all. Quote
jimufctna24 Posted December 30, 2025 Posted December 30, 2025 I should probably receive pelters for this, but I've never watched Shockwave 2002 in full. I've only ever watched the Sapp vs Nog bout (which holds up well as a spectacle and as an example of Nog's freakish durability/heart). I've never even got round to watching Cro Cop vs Sakuraba, let alone the Gracie vs Yoshida grappling bout in full. Quote
Paid Members wandshogun09 Posted January 4 Paid Members Posted January 4 Yeah even when I was collecting up all the Pride DVDs, it was years before I saw the full Pride/K-1: Shockwave/Dynamite show. It wasn’t as easily available as the normal Pride events, I’m guessing that was because they had to share the rights to the footage with K-1 maybe? But it was never released officially in the US or UK as far as I know. It was released in France oddly enough though. I got a copy of the US PPV version off some DVD trader. So the quality isn’t the best but it’s got the English commentary which is obviously a big plus. Think it was the first MMA show I ever actively hunted down when I started buying off traders. I did get the official French release off eBay a few years later though. From what I remember, this version is longer than the US PPV version that’s floated around for years but I’ve never sat and compared what’s on this that wasn’t on the other one. Only problem with this is there’s no English commentary. Think there’s just options for French commentary or no commentary at all. Can’t even remember what I paid for this but I just looked it up on eBay now and they’re listed for around £50-70. I haven’t watched the show in forever, apart from a Nog vs Sapp rewatch for that Top 50 Fights Of The Decade thread I did a while back. But it’s a fairly fun show from what I remember. A good mix of big names, freakshow stuff, the novelty of seeing Pride and K-1 crossovers and the spectacle of it being held in front of such a massive crowd. Nog vs Sapp is a legendary fight for me. One of my favourite fights from those days. But aside from that, there aren’t any real killer fights on the card. But I love the show anyway. It was one of those cards that had huge buzz for me even seeing it way after the fact. Anyone digging into MMA in the early to mid 2000s couldn’t move on the forums without hearing about Sapp’s ridiculous powerbomb attempt on Nog or seeing this gif of Jerome Le Banner murdering Don Frye… So by the time I actually got to sit down and watch the whole show, it was kind of never gonna live up to the hype. But even still, I found it really entertaining on the whole and I was just happy to finally plug that hole in my Pride collection. I’ve definitely mentioned this before but that show could’ve also had a Bas Rutten vs Wanderlei Silva fight! Bas wanted to do it in the small Pride gloves but under K-1 rules. He talked about it on Rogan’s podcast years ago… Insane. On the one hand, I’d have been gutted to see either of them lose. But I wish we got that fight. There are a few Bas fights that should’ve happened but got away. I remember him getting in the ring at Pride 3 back in 98 or whenever it was and saying his plan was to fight Randy Couture in the UFC, then come to Pride and challenge Rickson Gracie. Anyway yeah, with all this talk that this Paramount deal might lead to Fight Pass suffering the same fate as the WWE Network, I’m glad I kept all those Pride DVDs especially. Because I imagine if this does happen and Fight Pass gets phased out, we’ll probably see them do similar to what WWE do, uploading specific fights or shows to YouTube. And I can’t see Pride being a big priority for them at this point. They’ll understandably mostly wanna focus on UFC stuff and we’d probably just got bits and pieces of Pride. Hopefully it doesn’t come to that but I’m keeping the physical media just in case. I wanna be able to whack the 2003 Pride GP on on a random rainy Tuesday and see the opening ceremony and all that bollocks. Not just a single upload of Nog vs Cro Cop in isolation. Quote
jimufctna24 Posted January 4 Posted January 4 @wandshogun09 The US PPV version has been uploaded to YouTube. For what its worth, its running time is 2 hours 40 minutes. The show officially drew 91k fans, but it's since been claimed that it actually only drew 71k fans. Either way, it remains the MMA show that had the largest attendance in history. I assume that it was Yoshida vs Gracie that drew the house, with assists from Sapp, Sakuraba and Cro Cop. Funnily enough, Pride Final Conflict 2003 in the Tokyo Dome drew almost as much (67k) as the unofficial figure for Shockwave 2002. That show also featured Yoshida, Cro Cop, and Sakuraba. Quote
Paid Members Egg Shen Posted January 7 Paid Members Posted January 7 It always hurt a little when you'd see an MMA fighter get absolutely ruined in a K-1 fight, felt like it killed the mystique around MMA fighters, especially in the the pre-social media era. Le Banner absolutely murdering Don Frye may have stung the most. Quote
Dai Posted January 7 Posted January 7 Yeah, was a stuipid thing when they did that, but did provide a great spectacular. There was another great one where Gilbert Yvel got sparked cold on the Inoki Bom Ba Ye show. Completely flattened. Quote
jimufctna24 Posted January 7 Posted January 7 It could happen the other way round too. For example, Stefan's Leko's Pride/MMA run was a complete disaster. 3 fights, 3 quick stoppage defeats. Quote
Tamura Posted January 7 Posted January 7 14 minutes ago, Dai said: Yeah, was a stuipid thing when they did that, but did provide a great spectacular. There was another great one where Gilbert Yvel got sparked cold on the Inoki Bom Ba Ye show. Completely flattened. Have you mis-remembered this? The only fight I can find that vaguely resembles what you say was against Ray Sefo at K-1 Fukuoka 2002, only he lost via leg kicks. Quote
jimufctna24 Posted January 7 Posted January 7 Possible that Dai is recalling the Gary Goodridge vs Mike Bernardo bout from the 2002 Inoki show. Quote
Dai Posted January 7 Posted January 7 Ah shit, my apologies. It was the Goodrige one I was on about. As scary and tough as he was, he got destroyed. That Yvel one was brutal too, and probably actually worse than the KO, as he probably couldn't walk for a week. I think that's the one where he knows his leg is cooked and just decides 'screw it', goes on an all out attack, gets kicked again and it's all done. Quote
Tamura Posted January 7 Posted January 7 (edited) Anyway back to Shockwave 2002, there is also a Japanese commercial DVD release of the show (as you'd expect), two discs (or possibly one of those double sided discs from back in the day) with a running time of 2:20 which somewhat curiously is 21 minutes less than the US PPV version. However unlike the US PPV version all fights are complete, as only the third round of the Daijiro Matsui vs Jerrel Venetiaan fight was shown on the US PPV (which is a bonus in my eyes to be fair), so I'm guessing they must have cut some ring entrances on the Japanese DVDs (music issues maybe?). The last three fights on the Japanese DVDs also have multiple angles available, just in case anyone was wondering if the "Angle" button on remote controls was ever used by anyone ever. Edited January 7 by Tamura Quote
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