#2 Rickson Gracie vs. Yoji Anjo
Yoji Anjo isn’t really a name that current MMA fans would recognise, and for good reason really. He had a cup of coffee with the UFC in the SEG era, losing to Tank Abbott, Murilo Bustamante and Matt Lindland, and his last appearance in the MMA ring came against the late Ryan Gracie in PRIDE, back in 2004.
Of course, there’s a reason PRIDE booked him against a Gracie, and that’s the story that forms the basis for this myth.
Anjo had risen to fame in Japan in the early 1990’s through the world of pro-wrestling. Initially coming from a background in legitimate martial arts – judo, sumo and Muay Thai – Anjo wrestled in the UWF promotion, which was well-known for shoot-style pro wrestling.
It had in fact been born when founder Akira Maeda decided to shoot on Japanese legend Riki Choshu, breaking his orbital bone with a kick to the face.
The wrestlers there were billed as the toughest fighters in the world, something that was exposed as a bit of a fraud when the UFC, and then promotions like Shooto, Pancrase and Vale Tudo Japan came along and introduced MMA.
The afore-mentioned Rickson Gracie had fought and won a really violent tournament under the Vale Tudo Japan banner in 1994, and so in order to try to re-establish their legitimacy, UWF offered him a great sum of money to do a pro-wrestling match with Nobuhiko Takada. Rickson declined and so the UWF got desperate.
Booker Yuki Miyato convinced Anjo to fly to America – on the anniversary of the Pearl Harbor attack – and challenge Rickson to a fight in his Los Angeles dojo. The Japanese were so convinced that Anjo would win that they sent the Japanese media to film the whole deal.
The feeling was that confronted with the camera crews, as well as Anjo, Gracie would refuse to do the fight.
Unfortunately for the UWF, Rickson’s hunger for the fight had been sorely underestimated. Unfortunately for Anjo, so had his fighting skills. Reportedly, Anjo called Rickson a coward in front of his friends and family and asked him if he was ready. Rickson’s response? “I was born ready, motherf*****”.
The fight was naturally a squash, as Rickson took Anjo down, and as was customary for the Gracie champion, mounted him and beat the hell out of him with punches. Anjo refused to give up, so Rickson slapped on a rear naked choke and strangled him unconscious in the pool of his own blood.
Currently there seems to be no video footage of this confrontation but needless to say, if it had happened today it would’ve gone viral. Eventually, Takada did face off with Rickson – at the first PRIDE event – and the result was another Gracie win, but in terms of the myths of MMA, it’s the Anjo confrontation that resonates more.
