Dana White leaves the team
#UFC310 With RIZIN President Nobuyuki Sakakibara pic.twitter.com/GFvOvfiDsT
— Nolan King (@mma_kings)
December 8, 2024
While UFC 310 wasn’t a cross-promotional event, there were some elements that gave Saturday’s card a slightly different feel.
It started with the main event, as former RIZIN Fighting Federation bantamweight champion Kai Asakura took on Alexandre Pantoja for the flyweight title in his Octagon debut. Asakura showed some good chances early on, but ultimately succumbed to a rear-naked choke from his Brazilian opponent at 2:05 of the second round. There’s no shame in falling short against Pantoja, who is currently one of the top pound-for-pound fighters in the sport. UFC CEO Dana White came away impressed after seeing the Japan Top Team representative compete in limited action.
“There are two sides to this story. You take a guy like Asakura, who came to the UFC for the first time. We talk about the nerves and everything that happened, fighting inside the cage for the first time, etc. But he came right out with a flying knee,” White said in Saturday’s postgame press conference. “So Pantoja, how did he put the pressure back on himself – who in this room didn’t want to see three more rounds of that?” That would have been amazing. It was a great battle and Pantoja was victorious. …He’s amazing. He was incredible tonight. ”
Meanwhile, RIZIN Chairman Nobuyuki Sakakibara was a notable presence in the crowd at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas on Saturday night. Sakakibara met with White before the event and also spoke with the UFC boss that night.
White seemed optimistic about building a relationship with Sakakibara and RIZIN to bring more Japanese fighters to the UFC.
“We did it tonight,” White said. “he [Asakura] He showed a good performance. I would love to try it. We were just talking in my room because there are these up-and-coming Japanese fighters. He says all the young fighters in Japan now want to win their first world title in the UFC. That’s exciting.
“Japan has a rich history of MMA. Some of the best days of my life were in the rivalry with PRIDE. It was a really fun time in my life and in his life. We’ve been talking about it, so the answer is yes. I’d love to do a fight night there too.”
The Las Vegas-based promotion has since Ovince Saint Preux submitted Yushin Okami in the main event of the night at UFC Fight 117 on September 22, 2017 at the Saitama Super Arena in Saitama, Japan. , has not held any events in Japan.
I met with UFC boss Dana ahead of tomorrow’s Umi match!
Dana was also looking forward to tomorrow’s sea game.
Today, ahead of tomorrow’s match with Kai Asakura, we met with UFC representative Dana White! He is also very excited about Kai’s match tomorrow.#RIZIN#UFC
pic.twitter.com/7JPRd8YaOd
— Sakaki☺Nobuyuki Hara Nobuyuki Sakakibara (@Nobu_Sakakibara)
December 7, 2024
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