It’s been almost a year since Shinya Aoki famously stated that if he lost to Gilbert Melendez at Strikeforce: Nashville ‘Japan will become a colony of US MMA‘. The Baka Survivor did zero training in a cage for his title fight and in turn decided to butt scoot for 25 minutes in front of a national audience, sometimes these things happen in MMA.
Now, Tatsuya Kawajiri, is following in the Tobikan-Judan’s footsteps (or butt scoots) and hasn’t spent anytime whatsoever in a cage for his potentially 25 minute…cage fight. It’s kind of like a baseball pitcher doing quarterback drills in spring training, yeah you’re throwing a lot but it’s pretty different.
We learned this information via MMAWeekly, who spoke to Kawajiri who spoke to a translator who then took what the Crusher had to say and put it into English for all of us to read below, enjoy.
“I’ve been training as usual (with) no specific training geared towards a fight in the cage,”
“I feel that I have advanced as an MMA fighter and I will be able to fight a smarter fight this time,” “And I am obviously training to become a better MMA fighter every day. So that’s what I am looking forward to in my second fight against Gilbert.”
I want to meet the expectations of my fans and my friends,” “I’m looking forward to seeing my fans, friends, and family smiling after the fight.”
Just 5 more days until Kawajiri and Aoki can attempt to wrest control of Japan back from the west. Or are we easterners to them? I better ask Michael Hackler at MMA-Japan.com.
[source]
