Five Reasons to Watch One Fighting Championship 'War of the Lions' Next Weekend

If you are one of the many people on BR who think that MMA = UFC, then this article is for you! Next weekend is the fourth event by One Fighting Championship, and it might well be the best non-UFC card of the year.

There are 11 fights on the card and some of the most exciting fighters around are fighting. If you don't know who Melvin Manhoef, Eduard Folayang or Tatsuya Kawajiri are, then you should because anyone who knows MMA, and not just UFC, will know all about them.

The first two MMA shows had a couple of fights that were not so good, either because they were not well-matched or the fighters were not too good. The person making the matches has learned his lesson, and the card for ONE FC 'War of the Lions' is good from top to bottom.

If you don't know who the fighters involved are or why you should watch this particular show, then read on...

Yodsanan Sityodtong has 47 KOs in his boxing career and was a world champion, so it's not like he was just crushing cans. 22 of Melvin Manhoef's 23 wins in MMA have been either KOs or TKOs, and he has fought at the K-1 Grand Prix, which is like the world cup of kickboxing.

These are fighters who hit hard! They don't bounce around landing the occasional shot and making sure they stay far enough away for their opponent not to be able to counter; they sit down on their shots and look to land knockouts.

Yodsanan's up against Jian Long Yun, a Chinese fighter who might just be crazy enough to try and stand with him. Manhoef's taking on Yoshiyuki Nakanishi, who has a few KOs to his name too. Both fights should be fast and furious.

If you are the sort of fan who tunes into MMA because you like to see fighters KTFO, Manhoef and Yodsanan are for you. 

Japan and Korea are the main countries in Asia when it comes to finding really good fighters for MMA, but the Philippines is catching up quickly.

Eduard Folayang is already a pretty big deal there and a lot of people are calling him MMA's answer to Manny Pacquiao. Belingon might be better; he has never been beaten but just has not been given the same opportunities as Folayang. Until now.

At One FC 'War of the Lions', Belingon is taking on Japanese MMA legend Masakazu Imanari (more on him later..), and if he wins, his record will be 10-0 and Dana White will be wishing that he had him on his roster.

Belingon is not expected to beat Imanari, but if he does it will be great for MMA in the Philippines. Folayang is already doing great things and is expected to beat Ole Laursen, who was born in Manila, but I believe this will be the fight of the night.

MMA in the Philippines is getting bigger every day, and this is your chance to see the two best fighters from there fight.

MMA is such a young sport that the best coaches are not experts in MMA but are experts in all the different fields that make up MMA, like boxing, grappling and wrestling. I think Evolve MMA is the best place in the world for a fighter to train because Evolve MMA doesn't employ coaches who have had 30 MMA fights—instead they employ coaches who have had over 500 Muay Thai or BJJ matches.

The best fighters on the team are Shinya Aoki, Zorobabel Moreira and Eddie Ng.  Eddie and Zorobabel have big fights at One FC 'War of the Lions'. Moreira is a black belt from Brazil and is fighting Felipe Enomoto in the main event. His teammate Ng is the hope of Hong Kong, and he is fighting Jian Kai Chee.

If you are looking for fighters who might be good enough to get in the UFC soon, then these two should be on your list. Moreira has a lot of height and has never been beaten at lightweight, and Ng is young and expected to become a world beater one day. 

You don't know who Tatsuya Kawajiri and Masakazu Imanari are? Let me enlighten you.

Kawajiri's record is 30-7-2, and he has fought for both the Strikeforce title and the Dream title. His only losses are to top fighters like Shinya Aoki and Gilbert Melendez.

They call Imanari 'the master of leg locks,' and he has been on the scene for a long time. He first started wrenching fighter's limbs off back in 2000, when most of us didn't even know MMA existed and some BR readers might not even have been born.

Imanari has held the Deep bantamweight and featherweight titles (more on Deep later..), and if you want to know what to expect from him, you should browse the Wikipedia info about his 2005 fight with UFC vet Mike Brown: 'Dislocated Brown's leg to the point that his leg was pulled out and to the side of his knee joint.'

Brown won his next 10 fights, including two victories over Urijah Faber to win the WEC featherweight title, and the next fighter to beat him was Jose Aldo, which should give you a pretty good indication of how Imanari might have done had he signed with with the UFC.

Kawajiri and Imanari are easily good enough to be able to compete with and probably beat the UFC's top fighters at their weight, and it is a treat for the fans to see these two Japanese MMA legends fight.

You mean you don't know what Deep is? Well it has been around for way longer than Dream and puts on ten times as many shows. If they weren't both basically owned by the same people, Deep would probably go around telling people it was the number one promotion in Japan—and it would have a point.

Deep has been putting on shows for over a decade, and they don't give out belts to just anyone, so fans should be happy to see two of their champions at One FC 'War of the Lions'. Yuya Shirai is a veteran who has been fighting for ten years and made his Deep debut in 2003.

Nakanishi is a young fighter who is 26 and has a really good record of 11-2. He could be the next big thing in Japanese MMA because he can wrestle and knock people out—he has got plenty of KOs and TKOs on his record.

The big three countries for MMA are the US, Brazil, and Japan. Japanese fighters might get overlooked because not so many of them sign with the UFC, but these two Deep champions should show just how many really good fighters there are fighting MMA in Japan.