After being booted from their primetime slot yesterday, I started thinking about some of the other details that surround the promotion as a whole. For a few months, I've been aggravated by the constant news that comes out of Japan regarding both the lightweight and middleweight tournaments. Rumored fighters are on the card, but nobody has been confirmed while other fighters are asked about the tournament and have no idea that they have been contacted to appear. Case in point: Frank Trigg.
Frank was announced by the promotion to be taking on Brazilian jiu-jitsu phenom Ronaldo Jacare at the DREAM 2 Middleweight tournament coming up on the 29th of April. Unfortunately for fans, DREAM happens to run along the same lines as many of the bigger Japanese promotions have done in the past. DREAM announced the battle, but had yet to sign Trigg to a contract or have the fight even confirmed verbally from him. From listening to the show, it was explained that K-1 tried to get Trigg to fight, but they did not reach a deal by the deadline. Instead of immediately taking him off the card, Trigg's name was left there until today in which Ian Murphy has been announced.
Unlike the UFC, DREAM and other major Japanese promotions really need to get on the ball when it comes to announcing these fights. There is almost always a guarantee of a bigger name fight not happening due to the laziness of K-1. The UFC happens to confirm bouts months in advance, and confirms their cards weeks in advance.
Another potential stirring of the pot is Sakuraba's recent comments that Fightlinker has quoted on their site. To make a long interview short, Sakuraba doesn't like tournaments. In fact, the tournament is next week, and he has yet to decide if he wants to fight in it. To make matters more ridiculous, he states that he absolutely hates tournaments in the first place because he's always thinking about the next fight. Good reasoning, but why wait until nearly a week before the event? He is almost certainly going to pull out.
DREAM should probably work out these small details before the actual week of the fight, and it's very unprofessional. Of course, I've been hearing this for years from Japanese promotions, and it isn't new news to me.