[DISCLAIMER] I'm going into this pretty well prepared having read through a ton of stuff from the past year, but this is still probably gonna take half my Saturday to write and I'm probably still gonna miss a ton of stuff. I also live in my own kickboxing bubble that consists of 50% K-1, 30% Glory and 20% of all the other stuff. I barely pay any attention to what happens in China and Thailand, but thanks to Shadess' and lero's efforts I at least have a semblance of an idea to what's going on there. Warman's kickfighting show also fills in a lot of blanks for me.[/DISCLAIMER]Before I actually get into it though, I thought it would be fun for you guys to read what our thoughts were in the same thread from last year:
kakutougi.proboards.com/thread/945/kakutougis-pick-best-2017-kickboxingI'm amazed at how much stuff I was able to forget within the timespan of one year.
Also, like last year, for the most part I'm not really going to rank my picks as I find it difficult to compare how exactly I felt about things when they were more fresh in my memory. I'd have to rewatch a lot more stuff than I have the time for, unfortunately.
Man, I always look forward to this, but dread it at the same time. I hope my picks are going to make some sense at least.
So without further ado, let's get this party started:
- Fight(s) Of The Year- Tenshin vs. Rodtang - Just an awesome war, both physically and mentally.
- Anpo Rukiya vs. Yamazaki Hideaki - I missed the best portions of the fight during the live broadcast, but boy was this satisfying to watch in full afterward.
- Takeru vs. Koji - While the matchup was built on the lie that Koji beat Stauros and the general consensus was that Koji would get obliterated, I loved this fight.
- Benjamin Adegbuyi vs. Jahfarr Wilnis III - One of the best things to come out of the Glory heavyweight tournament and Glory in general in the past year. The 2018 textbook example of a 'war of attrition'.
Honorable mentions:
- Tenshin vs. Suakim - A fight that may have gotten lost in the mix due to having happened somewhat earlier in the season. A very solid fight, though.
- Giorgio Petrosyan vs. Chingiz Allazov - Possibly overlooked due to not happening on the biggest stage, but this was a huge fight. Petro still has it.
- Badr Hari vs. Hesdy Gerges - A rematch that was a lot better than I expected, really.
- Upset(s) Of The Year- Urabe Koya knocking out Wei Rui - I did not expect Wei Rui to lost this fight, let alone him getting knocked out. A great upset as far as I'm concerned.
- Hiramoto Ren knocking out Kaew Weerasakreck - It wasn't so much that Ren defeated Kaew, but more in the way he did it. It blew me away.
- Harut Grigorian knocking out Murthel Groenhart - Having been on the receiving end of knockouts in both of their earlier meetings, this was quite the turnaround.
Honorable mentions:
- James McSweeney knocking out Danyo Ilunga - Ilunga has always been inconsistent, but by all accounts he should have won this fight without too much trouble.
- Fighter(s) Of The Year- Takeru - Another year where Takeru showed why he is considered the most exciting fighter by many.
- Sitthichai - 4 convincing title defenses against strong opposition in 2018. What more can I add?
- Tenshin - Disregarding the whole Mayweather circus, Tenshin has been in some great fights in 2018 and remains undefeated as a kickboxer.
- Petchpanomrung Kiatmookao - Finished Ezbiri as if he was nothing, took the 'interim title' from Kevin VanNostrand and took the real title from RvR.
- Jamal Ben Saddik - His great tournament performance is what put him here.
- Anissa Meksen - Meksen has had a solid 2018 and took back the belt that was unrightfully taken from her.
Honorable mentions:
- Benjamin Adegbuyi - Aside from his loss to Ben Saddik, Adegbuyi had a great 2018.
- Tyjani Beztati - Low key Beztati has been solid in 2018.
- Breakout Fighter(s) Of The Year- Dmitry Menshikov - This kid with awesome punching power came out of nowhere.
- Rodtang Jitmuangnon - Giving Tenshin the best fight he's had is what put Rodtang on the map.
- Roël Mannaart - Mannaart took the K-1 belt from Plazibat and won his first two fights in Glory. Things look promising.
- Asa Ten Pow - Upcoming young fighter, with a fun style and some good victories.
Honorable mentions:
- Elvis Gashi - I thought Gashi's victory over Jauncey was somewhat of a fluke, but he's looked pretty solid in 2018.
- Sofia Olofsson - Olofsson had a really close fight with VanSoest and ended the season with a nice win.
- Nordine Mahiedinne - Mahiedinne really put himself on the map in the WFL tournament and arguably won the fight against Aygün.
- Mohammed 'Hamicha' Mezouari - He would have been up there if he had more than one fight in Glory.
- Knockout(s) Of The Year- Urabe Koya over Wei Rui
- Hiramoto Ren over Kaew Weerasakreck
- Komiyama Kosuke over Suarek Rukkukamui
- Takeru over Daniel Puertas
- Takei Yoshiki over Akram Hamidi
- Noiri Masaaki over Vincent Foschiani
- Anpo Rukiya over Hayashi Kenta
- Anissa Meksen over Jady Menezes
- Anpo Rukiya over Yamazaki Hideaki
- Tyjani Beztati over Anil Cabri
- Zinedine Hameur-Lain over Michael Duut
- Petchpanomrung Kiatmookao over Abdellah Ezbiri
- Cédric Doumbé over Thongchai Sitsongpeenong
www.facebook.com/uniladfootball/videos/glory-53-cedric-doumbe-walk-off-ko-vs-thongchai/1691651827582844/- Alex Pereira over Yousri Belgaroui
- Itay Gershon over Trevor Ragin
www.mma-core.com/videos/Itay_Gershon_vs_Trevor_Ragin_GLORY_55_Super_Fight_Series_Full_Fight/10234380- Murthel Groenhart over Mohammed Jaraya
- Michael Duut over Mourad Bouzidi
- Abdellah Ezbiri over Victor Pinto
- Mohammed 'Hamicha' Mezouari over over Miles Simson
Honorable mentions:
I guess every other legit KO not listed above could be considered an honorable mention.
Also I couldn't find some proper publically available video's of some of the knockouts that I wanted to share like Menshikov's knockouts over Samuel Dbili and Robbie Hageman.
- Comeback(s) Of The Year- Kaew Weerasakreck - From getting obliterated by Ren to winning the 65kg again all within the same year. Great stuff!
- Josh Jauncey - I may have been a bit unfair in my judgement of Jauncey, but he got some nice revenge victories and looked good in defeat against Sitthichai.
- Jamal Ben Saddik - Not only did JBS come back with a tournament win, he knocked out Adegbuyi with the use of just one hand!
Honorable mentions:
- Daniel Ghita - Had he put as much effort in actually fighting as he had in talking, he may have been more than just a mention. Nevertheless Ghita came back after a long absense and defeated Poturak as expected.
- Controversy(s) Of The Year- Ilunga/Vakhitov - Ilunga defeated Vakhitov. It's a crime that he was not awarded the win here. And to add insult to injury Ilunga went on to get knocked out by McSweeney in a non-Glory fight that got him fired by Glory. Because apparently there is no limit to how eager promotions can be to screw fighters over.
- Menezes/Meksen - Part II of Glory shenanigans. Meksen won the first fight, but Glory felt it was necessary to fabricate rematch drama.
- Speaking of screwing fighters over: Koji vs. Stauros Exakoustidis comes to mind. I love K-1, but stop this bullshit already! They wanted to build Koji up for Takeru, I get it. And I love that we actually got Koji vs. Takeru, but I'd rather it'd happened without Stauros being a casualty of an agenda. I hope K-1 makes it up to him. This is also not the only bad decision we saw in K-1 in 2018 (Osawa Fumiya getting the decision over Liu Wei, anyone?)
- While I didn't hate the event nor all the decisions, it did feel like Murat Aygün was favored to at least some degree in the WFL tournament.
We see questionable decisions happen every year in every promotion and we always will, but that does not mean I'll stop calling this bullshit out.
(Dis)Honorable mentions:
- Glory fabricating this huge unsustained hype around signing Mohammed Jaraya and (re-signing) Luis Tavares and them utterly disappointing in their showings thus far. Looking back at the year, that hype should have gone to Mezouari.
- Event(s) Of The Year- K'Festa - The best event of the year! Crazy fights, knockouts and storylines coming to fruition in a 9 hour package that actually did not feel too long.
- K-1 WGP 2018 in JAPAN - TAKERU VS KOJI - The event that came closest to topping K'Festa.
- Glory 62 Rotterdam - An okay event on paper that really overdelivered for me.
Honorable mentions:
- Glory 59 Amsterdam - Quality fights start to finish.
- Glory 61 New York - A very fun and solid event overall.
I would have liked to mention something other than just K-1 and Glory events in my event of the year picks, but nothing from different promotions that I watched could hold a candle to the events I mentioned above.
Before it happened I had the WFL 8 man heavyweight tournament high on my list, but some of the fights just didn't deliver and overall that event left somewhat of a bad taste in my mouth.
You know what? I'm gonna say Rise 125, if only for giving us Tenshin vs. Rodtang which was one of the best fights of 2018.
- Story(s) Of The Year- We've lost two veterans of the sport in Koichi and Kid. It's gut-wrenching and puts a lot of things in perspective. RIP champs.
- Dave stopping with LiverKick. It's been foreshadowed, but still sucks. Things just don't feel the same in some respects.
- Veronica picking up Glory broadcasting rights in Holland and doing a decent job of promoting the sport. They also picked up the rights for the UFC recently.
- Tenshin vs. Mayweather - It was cool to read about Tenshin on mainstream news sites, but that is about the extent of good things I have to say about it. Due to how it went down I feel like it did more of a harm to (at least the perception of) the sport, the community, the promotion and Tenshin than it did good.
Honorable mentions:
- Taro-kun deflation gate. Nuff said.
- Glory starting to trade in lackluster tournaments for single fights.
- Le Banner and Abidi beef part II - After earlier talks of a rematch that went nowhere there was brief talk about a rekindled hatred between the two French heavyweight veterans, which again went nowhere..
Stuff that I couldn't really fit anywhere[ROMANIA]
- SuperKombat Dream - VIP Edition - SK actually held a
very last minute event early in the season after which Irimia went to Hollywood. The end result? SuperKombat logo's in and around the ring during the main fight in
Creed II. This sounded more impressive in my head.. still cool though!
- Dynamite Fighting Show, SuperKombat's spiritual successor, making its debut in Romania. Unfortunately, the events resemble the later days of SK more so than their early days. Having said that, it's only been three events so far. Maybe 2019 will be better.
- And last, but not least. Heavyweight beef in Romania between their top fighters. Mainly Ghita calling out Morosanu and Adegbuyi without actually doing anything noteworthy himself. It would be fun if they actually met in the ring, though.[/ROMANIA]
[J-KICK]
There's also been a lot of kickfighting drama in Japan that I just could not properly keep up with. Due to the somewhat clinical approach of this post, I probably also did a bad job of delivering a good overall feel of some of the storylines of fights and events in general, but oh well.[/J-KICK]
In conclusion, as expected, it took me half a day to write this and while it's far from perfect it does feel good to finally have put some time and effort into getting something done.
