Herring KO's Nakao before fight

angryjonny · 12-31-2005, 05:55 PM

WTF??? We always miss the wild stuff like this over here in the states!

OSAKA, Japan, Dec. 31 — That was such a bummer, the Yoshihiro Nakao -Heath Herring fight. I was expecting a good fight from these two. Nakao is a great wrestler who’s been training MMA for a while. And his body size kind of reminds me of Kazuyuki Fujita.

Big ole wrestler guy fighting against American guy. Who I was cheering? I was on Heath as I was wearing a Texas Longhorns cap, but unko happened even before the fight, at the stare down. Oh boy. I bet that was a nightmare for the K-1 staff and TBS, which broadcast this show on TV.

Nakao is supposed to be a rising star in the Japanese MMA scene. And K-1 needed some Japanese star to emerge, like Sakuraba is for the PRIDE organization.

Anyway, at the stare down, the referee was mentioning the rules to both fighters. Then for some reason Nakao decided to kiss Herring on the lips. Herring reacted by punching Nakao with a right hook, but not close to full power. However, it appeared to shake Nakao’s brain pretty bad.

Again, Nakao got knocked out ice cold before the bell rung for the start of round one. So this fight wasn’t held but Nakao got KO’d!

Can you understand this abnormal situation? More than 50,000 people are expecting a very exciting fight, also the TBS TV crew is hoping this fight would be great so they can push Nakao to be the next K-1 star. But, Nakao got knocked out before the bell … and he was totally out, his body stiff like Nathan Quarry after getting knocked out by Rich Franklin.

K-1 immediately announced they would check on Nakao’s condition and do their best to have this fight tonight. But it never happened. Before the seventh bout Nakao was carried out of stadium on a stretcher, with his head and neck immobilized and his eyes closed. As of writing this, there was no update on his condition. I hope Nakao is OK to be back in ring in the future.

Now here’s where it gets interesting. After Nakao was carried out, Herring, wearing his coat and hat, stepped away from the ring and walked down the path to go back to the locker room. Yeah, he was still inside of arena. Some people booed. Others just shouted “Heath!! Heath!!!”

Suddenly, a bunch of guys just attacked Heath and his corner.

I was walking through that path for some reason (it was a cold day, and I drank a lot of coffee) when I stumbled upon this attack. Holy crap. Herring was pinned to the floor on his back by two to three people. And other guys tried to attack him too. Then, of course, Heath’s corner tried to protect him. And it seemed like their team defense worked pretty well.

A real “no rule” battle was held for about 30 seconds on Osaka. The guys from the Las Vegas Combat Club pinned one of the attackers on the ground by knee-on-belly and it was very good control. I was surprised — that is kinda hard to keep, but it depends on the guy. (You know this guy that used knee-on-belly position was very, very good. I almost gave him three points on that one.)

How did this rumble get calm downed? Yes, there was a bunch of security guys in stadium. But you know, nobody wants to stop pro MMA fighters in a “no rules” fight, especially when it’s like “battle royal” style. The attackers are not from the audience. It is said that they’re from Nakao’s corner, but nobody knows for sure. And nobody will find out who they were, so those Japanese security were just staring at the rumble.

But you know what? From out of nowhere this guy who looked like Busta Ryhmes came out and stopped the fight. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, Herrrrrb Deannnnn was in the house! He controlled the situation pretty good.

Oh one more time, about Herring’s corner: I didn’t see any of them punching the attackers back. I saw them trying to control the rumble.

Man. I’m sorry for the Texas cowboy. Nakao gave Herring a kiss on his lips. And it’s too bad the punch knocked Nakao out. But Nakao shouldn’t have done that. Or at least, he should have been ready for anything after he kisses a cowboy. Because, as Trace Adkins sings, cowboys are “rough and ready.”

The bottom line is a lot of people think Herring is a bad guy now. But what does K-1 producer Sadaharu Tanigawa think about this accident? After the show was finished I had a chance to talk to Mr. Tanigawa and he commented exactly what I felt.

“As the result, I heard that Herring was disqualified,” Tanigawa said. “But Nakao’s attitude was terrible. This is my personal opinion. But Nakao should have respected his opponent, then he shouldn’t have done that.”

Well, what’s done is done. Either good or bad. Now they made a story for the next time. The rematch for this fight will be very exciting. They’d go kill each other. So I wish Nakao gets back better soon. And I look forward to seeing both Herring and Nakao in the ring again.

OK, that’s about it for what I saw tonight. Actually, there are some other things I may be able to write, but in this country, on January 1, we go to shrine. And it’s very important. So I got to run.

This “Dynamite” show will air in America also, probably in two to three weeks on Dish Network. And for Europeans, Eurosport will air this show. So look for it on your local TV station.

Before I go I want to wish everybody a sweet year in 2006. Happy New Year from the Land of the Rising Sun.

I don't even know what to make of this situation. I haven't seen what happened yet but I don't blame Heath for hitting the dude for kissing him on the lips. Who the hell does something like that. I've seen the blowing kisses and taunting but never heard of someone planting one on his opponent before the fight. I know BJ did that to Matt Hughes but it was after the fight was over and I don't think it was on the lips. This is just bizarre.

Article taken from Sherdog

AikaImmortal · 12-31-2005, 07:26 PM

Yeah i heard about that from sherdog too.. its just all around insane.

Unknown · 12-31-2005, 07:35 PM

Ummmm.... right. I am speachless upon hearing this and don't know what I would have done had I seen this live.

angryjonny · 12-31-2005, 11:54 PM

I ran across this on Sherdog. Had to share it.

Talk about a jaw made entirely of glass. Heath doesn't even swing full power just like the article said and the guy is knocked out harder than most KO's I've seen this year.

Unknown · 01-01-2006, 12:11 AM

I just saw the same thing myself Jonny and was getting ready to share it. Many he looked worse than Quarry. And that wasn't even a great punch.

angryjonny · 01-01-2006, 12:30 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Unknown

I just saw the same thing myself Jonny and was getting ready to share it. Many he looked worse than Quarry. And that wasn't even a great punch.

I know man. It's crazy. He slid like 5 feet while completly unconcious. Heath was standing with both feet planted and had no power behind that punch. I actually think it was good these two didn't actually fight. I hate to imagine what a full powered punch from Heath would have done to Nokai's brain.

Unknown · 01-01-2006, 05:06 AM

The Ref's reaction is priceless.

Thrash13 · 01-01-2006, 05:16 PM

Holy crap, Herring packs a lot of punch! He did a half-ass swing, and it knocked the guy silly.

Like jonny said, I would have done the same thing if a guy kissed me before the fight, but it would have been nice to see Herring just shake it off and KO him during the fight. But I definitely don't blame him for what he did.

That is some serious drama to hold me over until Shockwave tonight.

PINOYPRIDE · 01-01-2006, 05:23 PM

Wow, I agree that wasn't a full force punch.

666 · 01-02-2006, 12:49 AM

Thats so friggin funny, I wanna see the whole video of what happened before and after

[Danny] · 01-02-2006, 01:13 AM

Why did he get DQ'd. That's bull**** that he kissed him. I know he's gaining fans by that DQ. I would have done the same thing.

angryjonny · 01-02-2006, 01:33 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by [Danny]

Why did he get DQ'd. That's bull**** that he kissed him. I know he's gaining fans by that DQ. I would have done the same thing.

That is bs that it was a DQ. It should be changed to NC because it literally was just that because there was no fight. I don't get how he deserves a loss for a fight that never happened.

[Danny] · 01-02-2006, 01:42 AM

Plus, he got jumped during the "mess". Why doesn't the otehr fighter get DQ'd for his teamates?

Herring is in the right in my book. You can lightly shove after the referee's rule discussion, but kissing. . . Uhhh nope. Plus, Herring didn't start it. Bull**** on K-1's part.

Unknown · 01-02-2006, 01:45 AM

It should be a NC. Herring dosn't deserve a loss because Nakao's jaw is made of the weakest glass you can find.

From my own research into It it looks like Nakao lost a point for the kiss and Herring was DQed because he knocked him out. I think that they should have taken a point away from Herring and called it a NC.

[Danny] · 01-02-2006, 01:47 AM

Hell, I think that kisse had more pop to it than the punch. That should be webster's definition of glass jaw.

Unknown · 01-02-2006, 01:49 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by [Danny]

Plus, he got jumped during the "mess". Why doesn't the otehr fighter get DQ'd for his teamates?

Herring is in the right in my book. You can lightly shove after the referee's rule discussion, but kissing. . . Uhhh nope. Plus, Herring didn't start it. Bull**** on K-1's part.

I didn't even think about the rumble afterwards. I agree.

The worst part of it all was that Herb Dean had come out of the audiance to stop it.

[Danny] · 01-02-2006, 02:07 AM

WAR HERB!!! Best referee in MMA!

Crashsti · 01-02-2006, 11:16 AM

i think this is absolutely hilarious. even though they did'nt fight under the Nevada State Athletic commisions rule of "protect yourself at all times" you'd really think that Nakao would have expected retaliation after kissing Herring. Herring certianly has drawn lots of attention to himself now, which is never a bad thing is in the fight world.