After much speculation on the part of fans, Pride FC has released an official list of participants for the New Year’s Eve 2006 Shockwave event in Tokyo. The list is impressive and includes the best of the best.
No official matchups have been revealed, but Dream Stage Entertainment (pridefc.com) says that participants include:
Fedor Emelianenko
Wanderlei Silva
Mirko Crocop
Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira
Dan Henderson
Takanori Gomi
Mauricio “Shogun” Rua
Mark Hunt
Josh Barnett
Hidehiko Yoshida
Kazuyuki “Ironhead” Fujita
This is all kind of special to me, you guys, because the Man Festival (that’s Shockwave in Japanland) was the first Pride PPV I watched sort-of-live. Isn’t that sweet? It’s like my Prideiversary.
I think I’m one of five people in the world who wouldn’t mind seeing Nogueira/Fedor again, because I think Nogueira can BEAT HIM. I believe! I also think that bout would never happen on this show. Cro Cop deserves the shot, but not yet, as he needs to recover some more, and they’re not going to (and shouldn’t) let Fedor fight Nogueira in that interim.
I’m interested to see what Silva and Shogun are doing this time around. I, personally, want Silva to face Rogerio Nogueira. Silva and Nogueira echo my sentiments. But we’ll see. It’s all “we’ll see” until something gets announced. Here’s to all of you waiting just as anxiously as I am for matchups to be announced. And here’s hoping that it’s not a bunch of can fights.
Make sure and tell me your most-anticipated match-ups for Shockwave 2006 over in the forum thread.
