Yeah, a real breath of fresh air to send bums and amateurs out to collect brain damage from the champs with nothing to gain, and nothing says "we care about our fighters" like sending 170 lb Sakuraba out to get KO'd 3 times in like a year and a half by the same roided up champ with a 50 lb weight advantage, and also getting KO'd by Cro Cop and getting KO'd another time in that same period.
Calm down, Wandy was 200 lbs soaking wet in his early run, but yeah, always thought Takada hated Saku's guts...
Many of the crazy shit PRIDE pulled on their early days looks even worse in hindshight. But back in the day all the Japanese public was shocked when Saku lost to Wandy (They hadn't brought any belt back then) and though it was a fluke, hence the second fight. They've seen Saku pull it off against Vitor, Conan, Guy and Tiger, Rampage .. Then Tamura, the guy that allegedly had beaten Saku in shot catch matches behind cameras would avenge Japan...
As everybody believed that Fujita would send Mirko, a mere kickboxer, back to K1 signalling the superiority of Kakutogi, as Randy did to Toney... and if he'd faliled the fist time, he'd do it the second... (Most people here believed that the inexperienced Kharitonov was a sacrificial lamb in the hands of Ninja, so don't not roll your eyes...)
But we're not talking about that. The non-title fights (Once they have established the belts), and in order to be fair, not counting tournaments, were you can fight really hard non-title fights. And excluding co-promotions (Shockwave 2002)
Wandy's non title bouts:
- Minowaman: Iffy, but fared better than Tanner...
- Kondo: Yuki got a titleshot in the same division in the UFC, not in PRIDE
- Hunt: On a three days notice. No picnic.
Fedor's non title bouts:
-Goodridge: On a 5 bouts winning strike, and only losing against Minotauro in his last nine. Waay better than Eilers or Buentello, but still no belt in the line.
-Fujita: Put the newly crowned and still not that highly regarded champ on wobbly kness... Would be a TS in the Eilers-Buentello era in the UFC.
-TK: Same story that Horn, but still no belt in the line.
-Zuluzinho: Ok, that was fucked up.
-Coleman: No one wanted to fight Fedor in the dying promotion. Barnett said loudly "I only accept gimme fights" (And got Natsula, six months before Sakakibara would cut him). Mark needed the money. The UFC would make this a Titlefight.