In the spotlight that surrounds Yarennoka's recent announcement that Fedor Emelianenko will in fact fight Hong Man Choi on New Year's Eve in Japan, the general fanbase seems to be coming to the conclusion that this recent move confirms that Fedor Emelianenko is running from the world's top tier of fighters in the Heavyweight division. Few people have looked at an entirely different reason as to why Fedor has taken this fight, and it could simply be the most obvious or the lack of knowledge of American fans to the Japanese ways during the New Year. Let's take a look.
Japanese love spectacle!
As mentioned here in previous articles, the Japanese are generally glued to the television on New Year's Eve. According to Tim Leidecker's article at Sherdog.com, nearly 50 million people tuned in to view the PRIDE and K-1 shows on New Year's eve in 2004. That's a very large number of viewers for two combative sports cards that featured a great PRIDE Shockwave card that headlined with Fedor vs. Minotauro. The K-1 card, however, was much more of an entertainment card. Sapp vs. Le Banner, Frye vs. Nakao, appearances by Royce Gracie, Fujita, Akiyama, and Ologun. Moving up on the time table, Zuluzinho vs. Fedor was even done at one point during a New Year's Eve event. It should be no surprise that this fight between Fedor and Hong Man Choi is happening.
With that said, it's obvious that Yarennoka is looking to produce some great fights on the card and wanting to mix in some spectacle fights to woo the masses to see their card. It's rumored that K-1 may show the Fedor fight on their network TV affiliate when it occurs. This would only add to the already stacked entertainment card of K-1 Osaka Dome.
Is Fedor running?
This argument has been talked to death in the minds of many MMA fans. Many people in the American fanbase feel that if he has told everyone that he wants to fight the best, why didn't he sign with the UFC? Money, fame, proximity to Russia? From all the rumored figures that Fedor was offered, we can come to the conclusion that it probably wasn't because of money, but more because of the demands Fedor was asking. M-1 met those demands due to the closeness Fedor has with it's promoter, Vadim Finkelstein. Now, M-1 Global will build around Fedor an entire promotion. So, what did the fans expect?
Fedor wasn't going to fight a top contender out of the gate. M-1 Global can't risk losing such a high profile piece of the puzzle right off the bat. This is the obvious conclusion most people can come to, but there is another explanation for fighting such a low-echelon fighter. It's New Year's Eve. Spectacle overthrows quality during the New Year. Fedor simply takes this fight for a good purse, defeats an inexperienced MMA fighter in Hong Man Choi, and then takes off. Do you seriously blame the guy?
Fedor in the future
Once he takes off with his easy win and big purse, look for M-1 to begin the process of trying to mount an attack on the European MMA fanbase. We talked about their expansion efforts into Germany yesterday. Pedro Rizzo is likely to be next. After that, fans will hope for Josh Barnett or Ricardo Arona down the line. We may even see Randy Couture if Zuffa miraculously becomes generous.
Fedor could very well be running, but understanding the network share battle in Japan during the New Year's rush definitely explains such a horrible matchup, although compelling to someone who doesn't regularly watch MMA in Japan. In my opinion, Fedor is simply grabbing a paycheck, getting a nice teaser/warmup fight, and then heading home to begin training for Rizzo.
Will we ever see him in a relevant fight outside the UFC? Josh Barnett is really the only man I'd like to see Fedor fight. If Couture can somehow manage to escape his contract, that is a very good fight I'd like to see. Hong Man Choi, I don't want to see it, but I'll watch it to see how Fedor looks. I'm not a fan of this type of spectacle fight, but then again, it isn't geared toward us, it's geared toward the Japanese public. Realize that and focus on not getting a migraine over it everyone.