Yoshihiro Akiyama set for UFC 100 debut

Written by Lyman Hoyt   |   Saturday, April 11 2009

SAVSCI's Japanese fight sport expert Lyman Hoyt previews Yoshihiro Akiyama's UFC debut and suggests that he could provide a formidable challenge to current middleweight champion Anderson Silva (Photo: Susumu Nagao)

While most of the fight sport media attention in Japan has been focused on the on again/off again courtship between the UFC and Olympic judo gold medalist Satoshi Ishii, there has been considerably less attention given to Zuffa’s signing of another high profile judoka:   Yoshihiro Akiyama has signed a deal with the UFC and will make his octagon debut at UFC 100 in Las Vegas against tough veteran Alan Belcher. 

You can accuse UFC President Dana White of many things, but not having a perverse sense of humor isn’t one of them.  How else to explain the signing of Akiyama at the height of the ‘grease-gate’ controversy between BJ Penn and Georges St. Pierre?  Akiyama had already been accused of being ‘overly slick’ several times during his amateur judo career before he became the most reviled ‘heel’ in Japanese fight sports in the aftermath of his New Years’ Eve 2006 fight against legend Kazushi Sakuraba.  During the fight Sakuraba informed the referee that his opponent felt ‘slippery’.  Akiyama won the fight via stoppage, and initially tried to explain Sakuraba’s accusations by suggesting that he sweats more profusely than the average fighter:

"I have no idea why Sakuraba felt slippery. It may be my sweat, as I sweat a lot always and it often drips off my body."

Needless to say, you’re not going to prevail in the Japan fight fan court of public opinion against the beloved Sakuraba and the dominant feeling was that Akiyama had applied some sort of lubricant before the fight.  For that reason, it wasn’t much of a surprise when on January 11, 2007 FEG (parent company of K-1) held a press conference to report that Akiyama had applied Oil of Olay before the Sakuraba fight.  They even had video footage of Akiyama rubbing lotion all over himself in his dressing room earlier in the evening.  Akiyama maintained that he did not use the lotion to gain an unfair advantage, but to treat his dry skin.  Nevertheless, Akiyama’s victory over Sakuraba became a ‘no contest’ and he was suspended by FEG. 

Japanese fight fans are usually quick to forgive any malfeasance by a competitor (witness the quick ‘forgiveness’ of Badr Hari after his outburst at the K-1 World Cup Final in December) but Akiyama was clearly an exception.  Nike found this out when they were deluged with complaints after a commercial featuring Akiyama began to run on Japanese television.  Akiyama was featured in the spot along with LeBron James and Roger Federer , but many of those complaining felt that he didn’t belong in the company of such luminaries given his ‘Olay-gate’ issues. 

Akiyama served out his suspension, but was soon involved in another controversial fight at Yarrenoka which took place one year to the day from his fight with Sakuraba.  On that occasion Akiyama fought another popular Japanese entrant, ‘Grabaka Hitman’ Kazuo Misaki.  In the first round, Misaki knocked Akiyama to the canvas with a left hook and finished him off with a powerful kick to the head as his opponent attempted to regain his footing.  Akiyama protested the outcome, saying that his hands were touching the ground which meant Misaki’s KO blow was delivered ‘to a ground opponent’ in violation of the rules for the event.  After reviewing the video of the finish, Yarrenoka officials agreed with Akiyama’s version of events and ruled the fight a ‘no contest’.   In this case, however, many fight fans felt that Akiyama was trying to weasel out of a loss despite the video footage that validated his claims.

While you could probably make a ponderous, though somewhat valid, case that the Japanese fight fans' disdain for Akiyama has deep sociological roots since he’s of ethnic Korean decent, the reality is that he’s reveled in his ‘bad boy’ status much in the same way that boxer Floyd Mayweather, Jr. has done.  Akiyama has basically gone out of his way to make himself as ‘unlikable’ as possible, realizing that from a business standpoint having the fans ‘love to hate you’ is equally as lucrative as having them love you.    His ring entrances, for example, are purposefully designed to give fans any number of excuse to boo from the big entourage, to his ‘moment of meditation’ to his odd choice of ‘Time To Say Goodbye’ by Sarah Brightman and Andrea Bocelli as his entrance music.

All of the controversy and ‘heelish’ pomp reminiscent of old time wrestler Gorgeous George obscures the most salient fact about Akiyama:  he’s an extremely tough and talented fighter with a professional MMA record of 12-1.  The only loss on the resume was to K-1 legend Jerome LeBanner in his second professional bout, and it should be noted that LeBanner is a natural heavyweight who enjoyed a 5” height advantage and a 70+ pound weight advantage.  He’s earned stoppage victories against a number of very impressive opponents including  Denis Kang and Melvin Manhoef.  After his two controversial ‘no contests’ he found himself somewhat on the outs with the FEG management who booked him in midcard bouts against vastly overmatched opponents.   This fact, as much as anything else, led him jump to the UFC when his contract with the Japanese promotion expired.

On the surface, Akiyama and the UFC are a somewhat curious pairing.  The UFC has never really been able to figure out how to properly promote the top names that they’ve signed from Japan, and there’s a chance that Akiyama could end up in the same career void as Akihiro Gono.  Without his elaborate ‘DJ Gozma’ entrances that became a PRIDE trademark, Gono is just another journeyman pro fighting in the very deep UFC welterweight division.  Therein lies the difference between Gono and Akiyama:  Akiyama is simply of a higher competitive class than Gono. 

While Akiyama reportedly turned down more money from both the Korean Spirit MC promotion and World Victory Road in Japan (who were anxious to put together a Akiyama vs. Hidehiko Yoshida fight on a Sengoku card) to come to America and fight in the UFC, it offered him a chance to ‘reinvent’ himself as a fighter.  For better or worse, all but the most hardcore UFC fans are completely oblivious of his professional background in Japan.  And he definitely won’t have to worry about the complex social proximity and somewhat ‘second class’  status afforded those of Korean heritage in Japan.  He’ll probably even lose the Sarah Brightman/Andrea Bocelli entrance music in the process.  Instead, he’ll be judged on his performance in ‘the octagon’.

More significantly, Akiyama may have found himself ‘in the right place at the right time’ professionally.  Dana White has made no secret that he’d like to see the UFC become a bigger player in Japan, and this is a significant reason why he’s tried to land Ishii.  Japanese fighters have to be encouraged by the high profile opportunity afforded Shooto veteran Takeya Mizugaki, who gave WEC bantamweight champion Miguel Angel Torres a tough test despite losing by unanimous decision at WEC 40.  While no one ever suggested that anyone in the UFC held a bias against Japanese fighters, they have certainly been underrepresented in the promotion given their qualitative status in the sport and particularly at the lower weight classes.  

Also of relevance here is the future of the UFC middleweight champion, Anderson Silva.  Despite his youthful appearance ‘The Spider’ is days away from his 34th birthday and has maintained that he will retire when his current contract with the UFC expires.  Following his defense against Thales Leites at UFC 97, he’ll have four fights left on that deal.  Zuffa has spent the past years creating the perception that he’s without a doubt the ‘pound for pound’ best fighter in the sport, and now they’re faced with the reality of his retirement in the near future.  There’s already been some noticeable revisions in the Zuffa ‘party line’ concerning Silva’s status as the ‘pound for pound’ best:  at WEC 40 Frank Mir suggested on several occasions that Miguel Torres may hold that mythical title without Silva’s name being brought up as a qualification or refutation.

While ‘The Spider’ would no doubt like to retire as UFC middleweight champion, this clearly would not be in the best interest of the promotion as it would severely diminish the prestige of the title should this occur.  It would create the impression that whomever wore the belt ‘post Silva’ was not a legitimate champion, which is bad for business and can take years to rectify (witness the struggle the UFC has had reestablishing the legitimacy of their heavyweight title following Randy Couture’s departure).  Best case scenario for the UFC would be for Silva to lose the belt within his next couple of fights.  This would allow them to preserve the legitimacy of the championship, and would allow them to book Silva into some catchweight ‘superfights’ against opponents like Georges St. Pierre or Chuck Liddell for the remainder of his contract.

In any case, Akiyama could prove to be the most dangerous challenger for Silva’s belt to date.  While he’d still give up several inches in height to the freakishly tall-for-the weight Silva, he’s got valuable experience fighting bigger opponents with greater striking power than ‘The Spider’ (LeBanner, Manhoef in particular).  Akiyama has arguably done a better job integrating his judo background into MMA than anyone in the history of the sport.  His striking skills, in particular, are exceptionally refined for a competitor with a judo background.  All twelve of his career victories are by stoppage, and are almost equally split between knockouts (5) and submission (7). 

Despite Silva’s reputation as a dominant ground fighter, he’s become fairly one dimensional in his UFC tenure and really has been that way for his entire career.  Of his 23 career MMA wins, only 4 are by way of submission with 14 knockouts and 5 decisions.  Two of the submission victories have come during his UFC reign:  he submitted overmatched and overweight Travis Lutter via triangle choke, and tapped out Dan Henderson via rear naked choke after all but knocking him out with strikes.  Also worth noting is the fact that two of Silva’s four career losses are via tapout (he lost a decision in his MMA debut and lost to Yushin Okami via DQ in 2006).  It’s not a stretch to suggest that Akiyama is the superior ground fighter of the two and, more importantly, versed in a discipline that by MMA standards is somewhat ‘unorthodox’.  He’s comfortable fighting without the ‘gi’, though like many competitors who’ve come to the UFC from Japan will have to familiarize himself with fighting in a cage. 

Akiyama’s greatest weapon in a potential matchup with Silva could be his strong mental game.  He’s definitely not lacking in confidence, and has demonstrated throughout his career that he’s able to perform well in a variety of fight styles.  He’s also demonstrated a ‘win at all costs’ attitude which definitely makes him a more formidable challenge for ‘The Spider’.    In any instance, Silva will need to realize that Akiyama is a serious threat to his title reign, and that he won’t be able to get away with a sloppy performance such as the one he had against Patrick Cote at UFC 90.

In many ways, Akiyama’s arrival in the UFC is oddly similar to the arrival of Quinton ‘Rampage’ Jackson after a lengthy career in PRIDE.  Aside from us Japanese fighting cognoscenti, few gave ‘Rampage’ any chance of defeating then UFC light heavyweight champion Chuck Liddell (in this case, despite the fact that Jackson had defeated Liddell earlier in his career).   Could Akiyama, likewise, ‘shock the world’ by defeating Silva for the middleweight belt?  Only time will tell, but his arrival certainly makes things in the UFC and at the weight much more interesting.

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