For those of you MMA'ers out there who dig UFC, but also like MMA on a global scale ... They're calling this the re-birth of PRIDE (much to the chagrin of UFC, I bet):
From Sherdog.com: M-1 Global and former members of Dream Stage Entertainment announced Wednesday in Tokyo that they will collaborate on a New Year's Eve event at Saitama Super Arena.
Among the representatives present at the news conference, which was held at the arena, were M-1 Global executive committee member and M-1 Mix Fight president Vadim Finkelstein, PRIDE heavyweight champion Fedor Emelianenko, former PRIDE president Nobuhiko Takada, PRIDE's former public relations representative Keiichi Sasahara, DEEP boss and former Bushido matchmaker Shigeru Saeki, former PRIDE MC's Kei Grant and Lenne Hardt as well as Daisuke Sato, the man behind the production for the company.
The large group of former and current power brokers of the Japanese MMA market announced a joint venture for Dec. 31 that will have Emelianenko fight in the main event against Korean kickboxer Hong Man Choi.
Other possible participants named were former Bushido aces Hayato Sakurai, Shinya Aoki, Tatsuya Kawajiri, Mitsuhiro Ishida and Kazuo Misaki. Top foreign free agents mentioned were Joachim Hansen, Ricardo Arona, Gilbert Melendez and Luiz Azeredo. M-1 also brought up Russian heavyweights Aleksander Emelianenko and Roman Zentsov.
Although the event will not be available on Japanese cable TV, SkyPerfecTV has agreed to carry the show on pay-per-view.
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