JIHAD IN JAPAN: MNL Revisits Frye vs. Takayama

On June 23^rd 2002, PRIDE held its 21^st edition appropriately called “Demolition”.  The first seven fights had yielded 4 uninspiring decisions and the event was getting precariously close to becoming just another event.  Until Don Frye and Yoshihiro Takayama decided to give fans one of the most spectacularly violent matches in the history of mixed martial arts.

Frye, and his straight outta Deadwood moustache, had made his name fighting in those tortuous, tournament style UFCs against behemoths like Gary Goodridge, Mark Coleman, and Tank Abbott among others.  Frye was touted as a wrestler/boxer and had done some amateur wrestling, but was really nothing more than an impossibly tough firefighter with better than average athletic ability and hands.

Takayama was making his third appearance in PRIDE after going 0-2 against Semmy Schilt and Kazuyuki Fujita, two relatively good heavyweights.  Takayama was sporting a dyed blonde, boy band look that was a little out of character for his 6’5” 260 lb. size.  While Takayama’s striking wasn’t going make anyone mistake him for K1 destroyer Jerome Le Banner, he was very game and could absorb massive amounts of punishment.  However, Yoshihiro Takayama had no idea the level of punishment he was getting ready to endure as strode towards the ring that night.

In the UFC, Don Frye was a well-built fighter weighing somewhere in the 205-210 lb range but somewhere, somehow between his UFC and PRIDE days, Frye had dieseled his body. Frye had gone from well-built to Peterbilt .  He looked as if he had put on 25 lbs. of pure lean muscle and in the process removed any bodyfat he had left and now resembled an NFL linebacker with traps reaching up almost to his ears and softball-like deltoids.

Frye was one of the originators of the menacing staredown and laid his customary “gon’ kick your ass” look on the towering Takayama during the staredown but was giving up almost 5 inches in height.

Frye and Takayama returned to their corners and when the bell rang, the pier 6 brawl at the Saitama Super Arena was officially on.

Frye waded in and immediately landed a board-stiff jab followed by a monster right hook that landed flush on the side of Takayama’s face.  Frye then proceeded to launch hook after hook after hook, all of which landed.  Takayama was able to land a couple shots himself but eventually tied up the American with a thai clinch and attempted to throw some knees.

After eating a couple straights, Takayama gave up the thai clinch in favor of the dirty boxing clinch Frye was using.  Then it got fun.

You had both guys with a single collar tie up, throwing and landing every…single…straight right they threw.   And not just two or three.  Or five or six.  At one point I counted 17 straight punches thrown, 17 straight punches landed for Don “The Predator” Frye.  There’s dirty boxing and then there’s downright filthy boxing.  In the same sequence, Takayama threw 15 straight rights and landed 14 of them.  This was an exchange the sport of MMA had never seen before, nor will it ever be seen again.

The amount of brutality squeezed into 6:10 would have made Vlad the Impaler turn away.   The referee eventually stepped in and called off the dog after Frye had taken the full mount and was landing more punches.

In one of those immeasurably cool MMA moments, before Frye got up off Takayama he reached down and oh so gently patted Takayama’s heaving chest in a sign of ultimate respect.

While this fight wasn’t memorable for any other reason than the sheer carnage it produced, it goes down as the greatest MMA fight I have ever seen.