Much is being made of Aoki’s ‘flipping off’ of Hirota after the match. For now I’ll reserve judgment and see if I can get some context from our people in Japan, but on appearance alone it was an uncharacteristically classless move by the Japanese submission god. Someone I spoke with familiar with Japanese [...]

Still not a lot of details, but a lot of talk the great Shinya Aoki could appear on a March Strikeforce card. No secret we’re huge Aoki fans. Still no idea what the significance of the animated mouse is. Also worth noting in this video–Jung Bu-Kyung’s entrance music, a techno updated version [...]

Aoki is a force of nature…

And I’m sure you all know how excited *this* makes us–Sherdog is reporting that the DREAM lightweight champion and submission virtuoso Shinya Aoki will be attending Saturday’s Strikeforce event AND could make his US debut early next year:
Japanese star Shinya Aoki could make his U.S. debut in the Strikeforce cage in early 2010, the promotion’s [...]

Here’s a highlight video of Shinya Aoki featuring not only his PRIDE/DREAM fights but a bunch of grappling type stuff as well. Watching Aoki fight always reminds me why I got into the business in the first place.

It’s been a rumor for awhile now, but the rematch between Joachim Hansen and Shinya Aoki has officially been added to the DREAM 11 fight card. This fight will be for Hansen’s DREAM lightweight title. DREAM 11 will take place on October 6th at the Yokohama Arena.

Mostly in Japanese, but here’s the DREAM 10 press conference:
Part 1:

Part 2:

Shinya Aoki will defend his WAMMA light heavyweight title against Joachim Hansen in the main event of DREAM 10 at the Saytama Super Arena near Tokyo on July 20th. This was the date of a rumored Affliction/DREAM co-promotion event, but we haven’t heard anything about that since. More info as we get it. [...]

Even though it was technically ruled a TKO, Toby Imada’s upside down inverted triangle choke that rendered Jorge Masvidal unconcious has to be considered an early favorite for MMA ’submission of the year’. It’s Shinya Aoki-esque in its insanity. Here’s the fight highlights along with the submission:

Potentially big news if the information is accurate–our Eastern Europe correspondent Edo Balic gives us the following information from a major Croatian newspaper (Jutarnji list). Reporting on Mirko Cro Cop’s near term plans they indicate that he’s planning to fight Overeem in Japan at a DREAM/AFFLICTION co promoted event:

“Cro Cop: I’ll revenge Overeem in [...]