Strawweight MMA: Fights to Watch in February
Photo by Josh Hedges/Zuffa LLC/Zuffa LLC via Getty Images
As a part of the effort to spread strawweight information, I will be sharing several several significant fights taking place in the SW division every month, along with other notable fights when they relate to the division (like Hayato Suzuki's March return to Grachan's FLW division).
Professional Shooto 2020 Vol.2
Feb. 16th
Tomoharu Umezawa vs. Koyuru Tanoue
On the February Shooto card, in a rarely-seen-at-a-high-level matchup of fighters with significant age differences, the far-better-than-his-record-suggests and ageless 43-year-old Tomoharu Umezawa is fighting the 17-year-old high-school student & 2018 Amateur Shooto Champion Koyuru Tanoue.
- Tanoue holds a 2-0 record and turns 18 in a few days, and defeated a 3-0 prospect in his last outing.
In a division dominated by speed, in one way or another, the youthful athleticism of the young SWs that come out of Shooto means championship-level improvement arcs can explode in any of these young fighters at any moment, and Koyuru is in a supreme position to become one of these men against his elder Shooto-ranker opponent.
- While 6-6 & 43 are not spectacular things to notice at a first glance, this does not tell the story of Umezawa.
Pulling off the SW upset of the year for 2018, Umezawa defeated current Shooto world champion & #10 SW Hiroba Minowa by decision. The decades of wrasslin’ experience Umezawa earned through his years training & instructing at the legendary AACC gym were too much for the powerful young wrestler to navigate in 2018.
Several months later, Umezawa avenged a loss to Jo Arai, advancing to 5-1 in Tomoharu's last 6. In Tomoharu's most recent fight, March, 2019, he dueled elite-level SW who's ranked just outside the top-20, “The Skinny Zombie” Takamasa Kiuchi, to a narrow split decision loss.
If Umezawa wins, because of his history with Hiroba, there’s a very good possibility that a title-fight could be rewarded to Tomoharu— the man who made his pro debut against former-#1 BW & Shooto world champion Ryota Matsune back in 2001.
What also awaits Umezawa: a chance to break his .500-record Hell.
PANCRASE 312
Feb. 16th
Ryo Hatta vs. Mijikai Nagai
Hoping to break the two-fight skid-- both 3rd-round (T)KOs-- that saw him fall significantly from the top-15 SW he was in 2018, crafty grappler Ryo Hatta is hoping to rebound against tough Shooto and DEEP vet Mijikai Nagai.
- Hatta was the former ZST FLW champion when he debuted in Pancrase in 2016, losing in the 3rd round against Mitsuhisa Sunabe.
Starting his Pancrase career an unspectacular 1-3, Hatta went on a 3-fight submission streak after losing a decision to Hiroaki Ijima in 2017.
Capped off by a submission win over then-top-15 SW and #1 in Brazil Marcus Paolo Amaral, Ryo was one of the most elite SWs in Japan at that moment, and one of the more feared grapplers.
Unfortunately, despite a strong first round, Hatta's unspectacular loss to URCC champ Anthony Do halted this momentum in 2018.
A year later, a much-improved Hatta had another strong 1st round against Tatsuya So, but the tough-as-nails, deceptively-skilled-and-strong Okinawan turned up the pace and got a highlight-reel KO over the ZST champ.
- Nagai's 4-5 record belies his toughness. Going an unspectacular 1-3 to start his career at FLW, Mijikai— who trains out of the team of hard-nosed, powerful & crafty submission wrestlers that is Cobra Kai, with JMMA legend Dokonjo' and strong vets Kiichi Strasser, Macho The Butterfly, Motonobu Tezuka, “Let's Gota” Yamashita, and Dericott Yamamoto— has gone 3-2 since dropping to SW.
What's noteworthy: his losses were to SW legend Junji Sarumaru, and a narrow split-decision loss to 7-1 Shooto rookie champ Jun Nakamura.
His most recent win was a massive upset over 5-1 DEEP prospect Taichi Isogai.
Yuta Miyazawa vs. Toshiya Takashima
- When Yuta debuted in Pancrase as a promising 4-0 ZST wrestler, his 15-second KO loss to Takafumi Ato shocked many.
However, despite losing his first Pancrase match and his sophomore appearance against Neo-Blood runner-up Satoshi Miyokawa, Miyazawa has since emerged as the highly-touted prospect he originally signed up as.
Having won his last three matches, including avenging the loss to Ato via decision in one of 2019's most thrilling SW bouts, Yuta Miyazawa's last fight of 2019 was a decision win over skilled JMMA vet & darkhorse SW contender Yusuke Uehara.
Yuta's ranked 5th in Pancrase and is the most highly-touted prospect in the promotion's SW division.
- Toshiya Takashima, the 2017 Pancrase Neo-Blood SW champ, holds a 5-3 record and is ranked 7th in Pancrase.
A grinder, with 4 of his wins coming by decision, a notable fact about Toshiya is he defeated Takafumi Ato in Ato's fight immediately preceding his KO of Miyazawa.
Toshiya had a two-fight skid, both finish-losses to Pancrase ranker Teppei Meiyama & 2018 Neo-Blood SW champ Ryosuke Noda, broken when he defeated 37-fight JMMA vet Suguru Hayasaka via decision, breaking Suguru's two-fight winning streak in the process.
If Miyazawa wins, a fight with the hyper-elites of Pancrase is only a step away, and a rematch with Meiyama could be awaiting Toshiya should he upset the highly-touted prospect.
FORCE 3: Garcia vs. Urena
Feb. 22nd
Jeremy Tiburcio vs. Franklin Mireles
An interesting fight I found scrolling through Tapology, on the Force MMA 3 card— the new fight promotion out of the Dominican Republic— amateur Dominican Republic SW champion Jeremy Tiburcio is making his pro debut in the FLW division against 1-5 Franklin Mireles on February 29th.
While Mireles’ record isn't astounding, and Tapology's crowd has Tiburcio as a heavy favorite, Mireles is a big FLW who's coming off a major upset over a 4-1 foe on the debut Force MMA card, and may have a handful of unsanctioned MMA wins to his name.
The winner of this fight could easily end up being one of the top fighters in the Caribbean's athletic-and-open lower divisions in the next year, and a contender for the oncoming Force MMA FLW title. And depending on how Tiburcio adapts to the pro environment, a return to SW could be an inevitable event should his wins in his native Archipelago amass.
The main-event is a BW title-match between 2-0 Tommy Garcia & 4-2 Micaias Urena.
ONE Championship: King of the Jungle
Feb. 28th
Hexi Getu vs. Adrian Matheis
- Hexi Getu, “The Wolf of the Grasslands", has surprisingly managed to find himself a home in ONE despite being such an innocuous name in the promotion, which few would have thought watching his FLW loss to Ma Hao Bin years ago. That Getu got to return to ONE was fortunate in a way, and he's made the most of this fortune by dropping to SW in his 2019 return, and is en route to become the next top Chinese fighter to inhabit the division in 2020.
A muscle-bound Chinaman even for FLW, Hexi's strength at SW has only been magnified and with his well-rounded style, gives him the ability to crush many fighters in ONE's growing SW division. Hexi's 2-0 in the division & 7-4 overall.
His breakout win was over athletic Filipino Karate champion Ramon Gonzales, who was coming off a 1-minute sub over then-5-0 OWS winner Akihiro Fujisawa. Getu also holds a win over former ONE China tournament champ & explosive Wushu fighter Wu Ze.
- Adrian Matheis, the 2016 ONE SW Indonesian tournament winner, has been hot-and-cold throughout his entire career, and being thrown to the wolves like Kritsada Kongsrichai & Dejdamrong in your 4th & 5th fights doesn't help
A brawler who wins with his heart, right-hand and scrappy grappling rather than technique and strategy, Adrian's experience in ONE has managed to pay off as his fights pile up.
At 9-5 and with matches against world-class strawweights like Rene & Robin Catalan, and Dejdamrong, and victories over more international opponents than any other Indonesian SW, Adrian's fight experience and progressive-and-fair Matt Hume matchmaking is fine-tuning his natural fighting sense into a well-rounded and aggressive wrestling-slugger.
Still in his early 20s, and with the ever-improving and hard-working Indonesian submission grappling circuit to train from, it will be interesting to see if Matheis in the coming years can evolve his wrestling-slugging to match the world-class levels this style was brought to at the hands of a prime WEC-era Scott Jorgensen.
Adrian was on a four-fight winning streak until last October, when he lost a decision to Stefer Rahardian. Matheis is the #4 SW in Indonesia; only Brando Mamana (#3), Rahardian (#2) and Gunawan (#1) are ahead of him.
GRACHAN 43 X BRAVE 22
Mar. 1st
Hayato Suzuki vs. Ryosuke Kano
While this technically takes place in March, I think it's close & significant enough to include, and the fight will be over by the time the March previews come out.
- Hayato Suzuki's series of rear-choke victories throughout his 4-1 SW & ONE career, highlighted by his massive size for the division, lightning-fast Japanese Wrestling Champion shoots, and crushing power, netted him a top-5 ranking and a title-shot against former victim Joshua Pacio at the start of 2019.
Unfortunately, Suzuki had to pull out of the January, 2019 rematch due to injury, as 3 high-level fights in less than 4 months was too much wear-and-tear for the Kazuyuki Miyata student.
He was replaced by another former victim of Suzuki's: current top-5 SW and former ONE & Shooto champ Yosuke Saruta.
While the exact reason for the rest of Hayato's 2019 inactivity remained unclear, it was revealed a cyst in his head led to Hayato failing his ONE medicals and being declared unfit to fight.
As a result, he lost his SW ranking at the end of 2019— with 14 months of inactivity by January 1st— and asked for his ONE release, which was granted. Suzuki re-signed with his old home, Grachan, which co-promotes with the BRAVE gym Hayato's a longtime member of. He's returning at FLW, but wants to win the SW titles of Pancrase, DEEP and Shooto, and compete in RIZIN against Jarred Brooks.
- Ryosuke Kano, a 7-7 FLW, trains out of the aforementioned Cobra Kai gym under Dokonjo, and is 1-4 over his last 5, his last 3 being in Pancrase.
It's worth noting, however, that his last 3 losses were split decisions, and he's a former GLADIATOR champ (a small but significant JMMA promotion that's been alive for years) and challenged for the ZST FLW belt in 2018.