Way to go DSE!

In a matter of hours, Pride Fighting Championships will kick off its first ever open weight grand prix at the Osaka Dome in Japan. When Dream Stage Entertainment, the company that runs Pride events, first announced this tournament many fans cringed at thoughts of a Takanori Gomi vs. Fedor Emelianenko massacre. Those thoughts were quickly put to rest when the Pride 31 event showcased what could actually be a very exciting event. Opinions of the open weight format changed to quiet excitement and grew to genuine anticipation. That is, until the actuall fight cards were announced and something started to smell fishy.

Reports of Yakuza interference in the DSE buisiness offices started surfacing and with those reports came highly unusual behavior from a company that just six months ago was dominating the Japanese MMA scene and was poised to make huge waves in the United States as a challenger to the UFC. Most of the MMA press has completely ignored this story. In fact, kudos should be given to fightopinion.com for leading the charge in bringing this story to U.S. fans. Especially when you consider that that particular site makes money from Pride advertising dollars. Other more popular sites have cast away the story as tabloid-ish and without basis. Then, a bombshell was dropped yesterday when Pride lost their poster boy and founding star Kazushi Sakuraba to rival organization K-1.

And, backing up a few days prior to the announcement, Pride rounded out the lineup for the much heralded open weight tournament with... Mark Coleman? Nope. Phil Baroni? Try again. Wanderlei Silva? Not even close. Instead, Pride brings you Zulu! Way to go DSE! Nothing silences the critics and rumors like finding the cheapest fighter you can and pitting him against one of the greatest heavyweights in the world in Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira. This announcement is so last minute that, with hours to go before the event, Pride's website still doesn't even show this matchup on the fight card. All this, and we are to believe that there are no major problems in the Pride organization.

DSE has essentially blown the opportunity to put together what would have been the most amazing MMA event to take place in years. All those hopes that fans had of fantasy matchups were dashed. There are still some great fights on this card. It could still turn out to be a memorable event. Granted, it's easy to talk about what could have been but the circumstances surrounding this make the resulting product downright depressing. I hope I'm wrong. I hope DSE just made some bad match making decisions. Maybe it's just my ignorance to the Japanese culture and market.

Nonetheless, this event is going forward. For what it's worth, here are my thoughts on the matchups as they stand.

Gilbert Yvel vs. Roman Zentsov - Yvel is basically a shadow of the potential we saw early in his career. Not to mention that as far as a sportsman goes, he's not one. Roman shows a lot of talent and promise and he's a Red Devil fighter so that's enough to get my vote. Roman by TKO in round 1.

Kazuyuki Fujita vs. James Thompson - On paper this is a classic Pride mismatch. Fujita has the edge in both experience and skill and looks to be able to walk through to the second round. For some reason, I smell upset here. I have no educated technical analysis as to why Thompson could win. James hit hard and I have a feeling. So with that, Thompson by K.O. in round 1.

Hidehiko Yoshida vs. Yosuke Nishijima - Nishijima wanted to wear boxing gloves and he should thank Sakakibara for telling him no. It probably wouldn't efect anything. Yoshida by easy sub in round 1.

Josh Barnett vs. Aleksander Emelianenko - I think this will be the fight of the night. Josh has the experience and skill to handle Aleksander and I think he will. It won't be easy though. Barnett is going to have his hands full but Emelianenko has few fights against top notch competition and Barnett is the as top notch as it gets. In the end, the experience will be too much for the Russian. Barnett by decision.

Alistair Overeem vs. Fabricio Werdum - Werdum will try to keep this fight on the ground but he probably won't succeed. If he does get it to the ground Overeem might smash him to a pulp. Alistair has improved dramatically in the past two years and after seeing him in his last fight, he could get to the finals of this tournament. Overeem by T.K.O. in the 2nd.

Mirko Cro-Cop vs. Ikuhisha Minowa - Cro-Cop is just too much for Minowa who I predict will try and stand with Mirko. Why would Minowa stand with Cro-Cop? Because he's a proven psychopath. Cro-Cop by K.O. in round 1.

Tsuyoshi Kosaka vs. Mark Hunt - This is an interesting fight to handicap. Hunt has never fought as intelligent a fighter as T.K. That is, except in his Pride debut with Yoshida and that didn't turn out well for Hunt. I see the same result here. Kosaka is going to continually pursue the takedown. He will eventually get it and along with it, a submission victory. T.K. by submission in round 2.

Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira vs. Zulu - This one's easy. Zulu wins by kneebar off of a gogoplata transition.

If these fights go the way I've predicted (given my past attempts at predicting fights, they won't) the potential second round matchups are very interesting. Especially with Fedor getting a bye into the second round of the tournament. Maybe by then we will have a better idea of how DSE is going to move forward through these difficult times. Hopefully, the company will start by acknowledging them.