Monday, December 6, 2010

Rambaa Somdet vs Yamaguchi Genki 1999

Many MMA fans will be familiar with Rambaa Somdet after his conversion to MMA. He fights at at 125 lb in Japan because of a lack of opponents at his optimal 115 lb. For a fighter in his 30s, (he fought in Lumpini nearly 2 decades ago), he has been doing very well on the MMA circuit.

This is a Japanese Kickboxing bout allowing all the weapons of Muay Thai, though they don't all come into play. Rambaa is a small, explosive fighter who fights with an entertaining flair that endears him to audiences. His flamboyance in the ring seems particularly popular in Japan, though I don't doubt that it would export well to the U.S. or other markets, provided he backs it up with wins. While his popularity in Japan is quite explicable, his fighting style is something of an anomaly. He abandons the conservative Thai style and sticks to powerful punch and kick combinations at the middle range. It certainly reflects the strength of his hand techniques, but could also be intelligent gameplanning on his camp's part, compensating for his reach and height disadvantage.

Yamaguchi Genki is relatively unknown to me. His kickboxing career does not seem to have taken off since this bout. His techniques have decent power, but lack the finesse seen in more experienced fighters.

Ramba is in black shorts, Yamaguchi white.



This video comes to us from tru3f4n. Yamaguchi offers very little offense in this bout and seems to lose heart when Rambaa shrugs off what little he does get through. Yamaguchi does not necessarily seem like a bad fighter, but rather was out of his depth against a more powerful and experienced Rambaa. When the punching combinations begain flowing in, Yamaguchi turtled with no movement. When he was in a position to exchange, he failed to use his height to his advantage.

Rambaa was absolutely lethal in this bout, pouring on damage at multiple points and levels. His speed is quite remarkable and he throws with a lot of power for a 115 lb fighter. I'm not sure what weight this fight is at, but Yamaguchi looked to be a weight class larger at most. Notice the Japanese crowd really seems to get behind Rambaa, despite him working over their hometown boy. It is hard to dislike Ramba's flowing, aggressive style, and his obvious counter-punching skill. Combined with his ring antics, he has the ingredients to be a wildly popular fighter. I'd like to reiterate that whoever brought him over to Japan made a good choice.

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