Japanese MMA Fighters to Watch Out 2015

Here is the 2015 edition of Fighters to Watch For. Michinori Tanaka and Uruka Sasaki landed themselves a spot in a major organization (UFC) last year. There is, of course, a few new faces this time around and we have more fighters with clean records. How I evaluate is based upon who won against whom, but if a specific performance convinced me, I’ve done a more risky pick. I hope that, with this list, hardcore MMA fans will take note of who are JMMA's up-and-comers.

Yuki Motoya 

Motoya's 2014 was an active one and perfect for what he wanted. He avenged a loss against Tatsumitsu Wada and won his first international fight against former RFA champ Matt Manzanares. He used a variety of kicks to make his movements harder to read and his front kicks stopped Manzanares's pressure. Motoya is the most highly-touted rookie who remains in local Japanese promotions and he will soon move on to fight in a major organization.

Tatsumitsu Wada

Wada lost his DEEP flyweight strap against Motoya this past year, but his year-end performance against Ryuichi Miki defined him as a top-three Japanese flyweight. Wada is known for his boxing skills and often continuously jabs his opponents. Not only that, he avoided Miki's strike-takedown combinations and finished Miki with a rear-naked choke.

Hiromasa Ogikubo

Ogikubo's year was all about winning the VTJ flyweight tournament. He had a competitive fight against Takeshi Kasugai, but after that he choked out Kana Hyatt and showed positional grappling superiority against Czar Sklavos. Ogikubo asked for a fight against Yuki Motoya, but his injury prevented the fight.

Koji Ando

Ando signed with One FC and his wins against Rafael Nunes and Zorobabel Moreira both ended with finishes but in different ways. He choked Nunes and tapped him out, then fought a striking battle against the huge-framed Moreira. Ando forced Zoro to fight passively after pressuring him and, with Zoro’s mind weakened, Ando finished him with a body shot.

Taiyo Nakahara

Nakahara's 2014 did not go well because he did not have an opportunity to fight. He was supposed to face Honggang Yao, but the fight was scrapped because Yao missed weight. When I think about Nakahara’s record and improvement curve, he remains here on this list.

Hisaki Kato vs Yuki Niimura

Hisaki Kato

Kato is not yet well-known, but he is the current HEAT middleweight champion and also a Daidojuku champion. HEAT is a Nagoya-based organization, so I haven't watched his fights yet, but from his record and quick finishing times he should be seen as at least a top-three Japanese middleweight. Another reason why I am interested in him is his Daidojuku skill. The first Japanese fighter in the UFC was Minoki Ichihara and he had no solution against Royce Gracie's grappling, but after all of these years of MMA evolution, perhaps Daidojuku can contribute to major MMA's style diversity? That's not a pure fighter evaluation, but I am interested in him for such a reason, too.

Ayaka Hamasaki

Ayaka's 2014 was about testing herself in a new division. She dominated former Jewels featherweight champ Naho Sugiyama in striking and on the ground, then fought and defeated Mei Yamaguchi. We can expect that she will soon fight in the U.S. since she did not participate in the DEEP Jewels featherweight GP, which is being held in her new division.

Mizuki Inoue 

Mizuki's 2014 did not go how she had wanted. She missed weight in the finals of the DEEP Jewels lightweight GP and lost by DQ even though she submitted Emi Tomimatsu. She avenged her “loss” against Tomimatsu in her next fight to become Deep Jewels featherweight champion. Mizuki next fought Karolina Kowalkiewicz at Invicta FC 9, but her precision striking was not favored against Karolina's volume of strikes. She will begin 2015 against Alexa Grasso at Invicta FC 11. Mizuki is still only 20 years old, but she needs to develop more physical strength to give her precision striking more value.

Kento Kanbe vs Suguru Hayakawa fight from 10:10

Kento Kanbe

Kanbe may not be expected to be on this list because he is so early in his career at 18 years old, but his dominance over opponents with his grappling made me convinced that he needed to be included here. Kanbe trains at Alliance Square and is a grappling-based prospect at the moment. His strong point is obviously his ground game, but we know that current fighters in major promotions can't rely too much upon grappling. Alliance Square’s coach, Tsuyoshi Kosaka, knows how to build MMA talent, so I think that Kanbe will develop considerable striking skills but I don't know how far he can go. I think we will someday see him challenge for a Pancrase title.

Ryohei Kurosawa vs Tateo Iino

Ryohei “Ken Asuka”  Kurosawa

Kanbe is Pancrase's lightest weight prospect. I don't know if he will fight in the upper divisions in the future, but Shooto's lightest prospect is Ryohei Kurosawa. His nickname, “Ken Asuka,” is from Karate Manga. His style is karate, which he began training at age six, but what impressed me most was his sprawl against the takedowns of Ryuto Sawada, who is a top prospect.

Tatsuya Ando

Ando's career is too short yet, with only three fights so far, but he was a top-three wrestler in college. In his third bout, he beat Takahiro Ashida, who has 16 fights on his record and fought to a split decision against Miguel Torres. It shows Ando’s potential and what kind of athlete he is.




Ryuto Sawada vs Masayoshi Kato

Ryuto Sawada

Sawada had a breakout performance after his loss against Kurosawa. He outpaced and outwrestled Yuki Shojo for the entire fight and ground-and-pound KOed him. That was surprising for me since Ryuto is small for Shooto’s flyweight division. He displayed big KO power against Shojo, who only had one prior TKO loss in his career. Sawada is expected to face champion Yoshitaka Naito next year.

Big thanks to Robert Sargent  (MMA Rising) for English editing.

Japanese MMA scene Fighter to watch out 2014

Here is the 2014 edition of Fighters to Watch For. Kyoji Horiguchi landed himself a spot in a major organization (UFC), but there are many newcomers on this year's list.

Michinori Tanaka

Tanaka's 2013 campaign involved winning a championship in Guam/Philippines promotion PXC and carefully developing his career. While fighters he has defeated have begun to land themselves positions in the UFC, Tanaka's coach Katsumura has a conservative plan for his career. I think he needs improvement in his striking, but his grappling is already top-level. Tanaka went to donate money to the Philippines embassy for victims of Haiyan and I am looking forward to his 2014 campaign.




Yuta Sasaki

Sasaki beat Wajyutsu Keisyukai mentor Tetsu Suzuki and took Shooto's Pacific rim title during his 2013 campaign, and he beat Naoya Uematsu in a grappling match. He has become Japanese MMA's best grappler in his weight class. I am curious about what will happen when he can't take opponents down. He struggled against Kota Onojima when he could not get him down. His 2014 campaign starts with a fight against Keisuke Fujiwara, who is ZST champ.



Shintaro Ishiwatari

Ishiwatari's 2013 campaign did not go the way that he had wanted it to. He lost to Shooto champ and current UFC fighter Kyoji Horiguchi in the Japanese fight of the year and best comeback in Japanese local MMA history. His 2014 campaign begins with a title defense against Yo Saito, who is known as a guillotine specialist.



Mizuki Inoue

Inoue's 2013 campaign is best remembered for her first appearance in Invicta FC. She showed continuous improvement in her striking against Bec Hyatt. In that fight, she won clearly, but it wasn't a perfect game since she get overpowered in the clinch. After that, Inoue faced Emi Fujino, who has outstanding power for a Japanese female MMA fighter, but Fujino never got a chance to use that power. I saw drastic improvement in Inoue and I am looking forward to her next fight against Emi Tomimatsu.



Koji Ando

In 2013, Ando was best known for becoming a champion for Legend FC. Not only that, but he became champ by defeating Jadamba Narantungalag, who is considered to be one of top talents in the Asian MMA scene. Their fight ended due to an unfortunate ankle injury when Jadamba's weight was only supported by his right leg and his ankle broke, but Ando's win is legit since he led the fight at that point. His 2014 campaign will decide how his new contract goes and hopefully he will fight again soon.


Taiyo Nakahara

Nakahara's only fight in 2013 was against UFC veteran Marcos Vinicius Borges Pancini for Rebel FC. He finished Pancini, but I want to emphasize that his left body shot determined how the fight went. It's hard to land effective body blows in the lower weight classes.


Takaki Soya

Last year's Shooto Rookie tournament MVP was Paraestra Matsudo's Takaki Soya. 2012's MVP Masatsugu Sakaki, 2011's MVP Michinori Tanaka and 2010's MVP Kyoji Horiguchi are all still unbeaten in their professional MMA careers. Before entering the tournament, Soya won the East Japan Amateur Shoooto tournament and became the youngest professional Shooto fighter at age 17.

This year's rookie tournament's number of participants was reduced because of Shooto's policy change for non-Tokyo fighters who build their early careers in the regions where they live. That reduced regional promoters' expenses, but at the same time I can't say that this year's rookie tournament was the same as the previous three in terms of quality.
Still, I can say that Soya is a good finisher. I can't say that he'll become a local Japanese champ because bantamweight is the most crowded division in this country and the fighters he faced in the tournament aren't as good as the ones that Horiguchi and Tanaka faced in their tournaments. Shooto Rookie tournaments are still high quality and they bring about awareness of young talent like Soya.



DEEP Flyweights (Photo is Yuki Motoya)

I said last year that I was looking forward to the DEEP flyweights and Tatsumitsu Wada vs. Yuki Motoya was one of the best fights of 2013 in DEEP. Wada took down Shooto striker Haruo Ochi for a decision win. Former champ Yuki Motoya got a decision win over Pancrase champ Kiyotaka Shimizu. With those wins over rival organizations' champs and contenders, I feel that DEEP's most high-level weight class is flyweight.



Mikihito Yamagami

Last year, one of the best upsets was Mikihito Yamagami's decision win over Mamoru Yamaguchi. Yamagami succeeded by continuously taking the back of Mamoru. Allowing back-takes is considered to be a primary fault in Mamoru's fighting style, but people did not expect that Yamagami would be able to exploit that so well. Yamagami used 2013 to build up his body for a new weight class and he will appear for Road FC this year.



SKILL MMA : Japanese MMA scene Fighter to watch out 2013

Big thanks to Robert Sargent  (MMA Rising) for English editing.