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Photo by Roger Williams
If you’ve watched an MMA event in the last decade, chances are you’ve seen Jacob “Stitch” Duran doing his thing — patching up fighters’ faces to give them one more round. The legendary cutman — who has worked thousands of fights in boxing, kickboxing, and mixed martial arts — recently took some time to chat with us about blood, living the cutman life, the worst gash he’s seen, and stitching Dana White’s mouth shut.
CagePotato: When did you decide you wanted to rub vaseline on guys’ faces and fix gashes for a living?
Jacob “Stitch” Duran: Well, it was actually when I saw my first pint of blood coming off of one of my kickboxers. I kinda’ smiled and said, “You know what, man, this is kinda’ freaky, not everybody does this.” I got hooked on it right from the get-go and that was about 1988.
Who taught you the trade?
I studied some of the legendary cutmen that were in the game — in boxing at that point — and tried to emulate some of the techniques they did. Really, I had no pattern. I didn’t know whether what they were doing was right or was wrong. I tried to ask some of the cutmen as I was up-and-coming and for the most part they kinda’ blew me off, “Hey, fuck you. You’ve got to learn just like me. I learned off my master. I’m taking this to my grave.” So I kind of studied on my own, I started asking a lot of questions to the ringside doctors, I read manuals on blood and arteries. For the most part it was on-the-job training.
Because of those things that happened to me, it’s important for those things not to happen to other people. I’m in the process right now of producing a DVD called “Cuts, Cornermen, and Confidence: Giving the Fighter One More Round”. It’s real important. I was going to do it when I was in boxing years ago and when I got mixed up with the UFC, I realized their are so many trainers that want to learn how to properly take care of the fighters. Wrapping their hands, working corners. And I think, as an instructor, I’m qualified to do it. I figured I might as well pass on some of the ideas and work experiences that I’ve gone through, so that these guys don’t have to go through what I went through. For the game to get better, we have to teach the trainers how to take care of the fighters — and give them that one more round.
An instructional DVD is great, because no one can just go to school and get a cutman degree, right?
Exactly. It’s going to be for the layman. It’s designed for the trainers, the fighter, the armchair quarterback — or the weekend warrior, we call them in this sport. Even if you train yourself, at least you can learn how to properly wrap your hands for training. My wife’s birthday is July 7th and I’m committed for it to come out before that, if not on that date.
Who gave you your nickname?
That came from my early years in kickboxing. I worked with this one fighter that got cut. I knew nothing. Really, that was my first experience working on a cut — I had no medications, so I just applied direct pressure on him and covered it up with vaseline. After the fight, I did what every other cutman would do: I put a butterfly on the guy to close up the cut. And he goes, “Hey, you saved me some stitches. Stitch.” So that’s where the name came from. You know what? That’s a pretty nice name. I was coming home from San Jose today and I was at the San Jose Airport, and this young kid was coming by in a TapouT shirt and he said, “Hey, Stitch!” So the name has penetrated to the fans. A lot of people don’t even know my real name!
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Written by admin on March 26th, 2008 with comments disabled.
Read more articles on Gonzaga and "Stitch" and cutman and Jacob Duran and Interview and cro cop and UFC and Forrest Griffin and Marvin Eastman and MMA.
The eight greatest MMA fighters who have never won a championship or major tournament…
8. Gilbert Yvel (32-12-1)
There are two reasons “The Hurricane” hasn’t risen to the lofty heights of champion: his lackluster ground game and his ridiculous temper. Yvel has undeniable knockout power, particularly in his kicks and flying knees, and 28 of his 32 wins have come via KO/TKO. On the other hand, a quarter of his 12 losses came from well-deserved DQ’s. If he could have gotten out of his own way, this guy could have been on top of the world.
7. Yushin Okami (22-4)
Okami had a good shot to win Rumble on the Rock’s 175-pound tourney in 2006. As you’ll recall, he was staggered by an illegal kick from Anderson Silva in the first round, picking up a DQ win that allowed him to continue on to fight Jake Shields. But Shields beat Thunder in a decision (and ended up winning the whole thing), and Okami’s title hope disappeared. Now in the UFC, Okami is a top contender for the middleweight title — but good luck getting past the division’s undisputed ruler.
6. Jeremy “Gumby” Horn (79-17-5)
Although he has logged an impressive record in over 100 pro fights — beating guys like Chuck Liddell, Forrest Griffin, Josh Burkman, Dean Lister, “The Hurricane,” David Loiseau, and Vernon White — “Gumby” has never won the big one. He had two chances to pick up a title (UFC 17 vs. Frank Shamrock for the middleweight crown and UFC 54 in a rematch with Liddell for the light heavy belt), but was stopped both times.
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Written by admin on March 21st, 2008 with comments disabled.
Read more articles on General and Shinya Aoki and Shogun and List and Features and Royce Gracie and Ben Rothwell and cro cop and MMA.
(Just hangin’ around the house on a lazy Saturday.)
There’s been more than one message board in the MMA cyber world with posts claiming some pretty disappointing news. The rumor - and it is just that right now - is that DREAM officials are talking about Cro Cop fighting at DREAM 3…against Hong-Man Choi. The posters have been saying that the press in Japan are backing up these claims. Shit. That would suck more than enough ass.
If this shit happens, it won’t go to the mat unless HMC falls on top of Cro Cop like he did against Fedor. Neither guy has much by way of a ground game, so it’d probably amount to some low kicks to the Techno Goliath’s legs until he toppled. DREAM could certainly do better than this, but the Japanese seem insistant on making Hong-Man Choi an MMA star. Sure, it’s business and you need viewers. The ratings for DREAM 1 reportedly blew and HMC versus Crop Cop could bring in the Japanese viewers. Good for DREAM, bad for us.
Ratings aside, let’s hope this one doesn’t materialize and Cro Cop gets a solid test for his next fight. But if this is to be believed, I’m going to go drink myself into a coma. It is St. Patty’s Day afterall.
Written by admin on March 17th, 2008 with comments disabled.
Read more articles on DREAM and Japan and DREAM 3 and Rumors and cro cop and News and Hong Man Choi and MMA.
(Aoki’s magic tights couldn’t protect him from a fight-ending elbow strike. Photo courtesy of MMAWeekly.)
Dream’s debut event went down earlier today in Japan and showcased some soild action and an annoying “no contest.” To the surprise of no one, Cro Cop rocked Tatsuya Mizuno, ending the fight by a KO just 56 ticks into the match. Mizuno was drilled repeatedly by Cro Cop’s punches and couldn’t recover to survive the onslaught.
MMA Weekly has a choice quote from Cro Cop:
“A lot of fighters refuse to fight me these days, but he had courage and he accepted,” said Filipovic afterward from center ring. “For my next fight, I will need a stronger opponent, so anyone is welcome.”
Well, if you need a stronger opponent, anyone is not welcome. Let’s just get him a worthy adversary next time.
In the Lightweight Grand Prix fight many of us were eyeing, Gesias “J.Z.” Calvancante and Shinya Aoki’s fight was ruled a “no contest” which always blows. J.Z. caught Aoki with an elbow to the back - which is illegal - and the ref stopped the action. Aoki was given ample time to recover, but couldn’t continue. “J.Z.” reportedly did some weird arm-raising prayer routine in his corner while waiting for Aoki to bounce back. When the fight was called by the ringside doc, both fighters apologized to the fans.
In other notable fights, Mitsuhiro Ishida beat Jung Kyung by decision in a fight that had many complaining for lack of actual fighting. “Dida” Amade and mouthy Eddie Alvarez saw Alvarez overpower and pound away, giving the Philly native the win.
Tatsuya Kawajiri outagressed Kultar “The Black Mamba” Gill for a decision win, and Ikuhisa “Minowaman” Minowa kneebarred Lee Gwan into a submission at 1:25 of the first. The tournament winners will fight in May to see who goes to the finials in July.
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Written by admin on March 15th, 2008 with comments disabled.
Read more articles on Minowaman and Aoki and JZ and Dream 1 and Recap and News and Eddie Alvarez and cro cop and MMA.
(A Dreamy Fighter: ex-pro baseballer, Gwan Lee.)
Nothing like waiting until the last minute to name an opponent for Ikuhisa “Minowaman” Minowa at tomorrow’s DREAM 1. And with all that extra time, you’d think they would have gotten a better opponent. Instead, Minowaman will be fighting a former Korean professional baseball player. Actually, he’s still Korean to our knowledge, but no longer a baseball player. His name is Gwan Lee and he owns an MMA record of…who knows? His middle name is also reportably “Bun”, which kind of makes me smile.
Look, we know Minowaman is on a two fight losing slide and needs a win. DREAM wants him to win, but can’t we find some tomato can who has somewhat of an MMA career going? I’m just saying. As we’ve stated, this is a rockin’ card with some great match-ups, but this one is even more weak than the Cro Cop versus Tatsuya Mizuno fight. Oh well, suppose you can’t win them all.
Here’s the final, final card for DREAM’s debut show, set to go tomorrow in Japan. The tournament fights will be broken up by the non-tournament fights.
Non-Tournament Fights:
Ikuhisa “Minowaman” Minowa vs. Gwan Lee
Hayato Sakurai vs. Hidetaka Monma
Mirko Cro Cop Filipovic vs. Tatsuya Mizuno
Tournament Fights:
Joachim Hansen vs. Koutetsu Boku
Kazuyuki Miyata vs. Luis Buscape
Katsuhiko Nagata vs. Artur Umakhanov
Mitsuhiro Ishida vs. Bukyung Jung
Andre “Dida” Amade vs. Eddie Alvarez
Tatsuya Kawajiri vs. Kultar “Black Mamba” Gill
Gesias “JZ Calvan” Calvancante vs. Shinya Aoki
(Props to MMA Japan for the assist.)
Written by admin on March 14th, 2008 with comments disabled.
Read more articles on Minowaman and Lee Gwan and Dream 1 and cro cop and News and MMA.
…and not because he tried to kiss Heath Herring again. Rumor has it that the Yakuza has beef with Nakao facing Mirko “Cro Cop” Filipovic at next week’s DREAM show. According a recent blog entry by Takumi “The Oriental Mystery” Yano (Nakao’s submission trainer, who took the #3 spot in our Sickest Submissions Ever list):
YAKUZA (japanese maffia)is terrible!!
I hear that If NAKAO fight Mirko, YAKUZA will kidnap nakao and abandon him in Tokyo Sea…..
So if the Fightin’ Smoocher mysteriously disappears after DREAM 1, you know where to find him.
The idea of the Yakuza trying to exert control over the new DREAM promotion is plausible to say the least — their alleged involvement in PRIDE is part of what sunk the defunct organization, and when ex-PRIDE staffers and K-1 execs came together to launch DREAM, criminal elements may have remained. (Read this for a surface-scratching recent history.) But who knows why they’d want to block Nakao from fighting Cro Cop. Could it have more to do with Mirko than Nakao?
(Props: FightOpinion)
Written by admin on March 7th, 2008 with comments disabled.
Read more articles on Takumi Yano and Yakuza and Yoshihiro Nakao and Mirko Filipovic and DREAM and cro cop and mirko and Rumors and MMA.
(Mach Sakurai works over Mac Danzig at PRIDE 33.)
A lot of news coming from Japan in the wake of Sengoku’s first show and the run-up to next week’s DREAM debut…
— Nokaut.com reports that Mirko “Cro Cop” Filipovic has finally gotten an opponent for the first DREAM show, with only nine days to spare. As Mirko wrote on his official blog: “A little over an hour ago I was contacted by DREAM officials. They informed me that my opponent on March 15 will be Yoshihiro Nakao from Japan. It was very important for me to fight as soon as possible and I’m happy that DREAM was able to find the opponent for me.” You may remember Nakao as the dude Heath Herring knocked out after a tender expression of affection was misinterpreted as an insult; hopefully Nakao won’t make that mistake again. DREAM1 goes down next Saturday at the Saitama Super Arena in Japan.
— Hayato “Mach” Sakurai has also locked down an opponent for the DREAM show. As SukiMMA translates from his blog: “I fight Hidetaka Monma from Keisyukai. One foreign fighter and one Japanese fighter canceled and finally I got an opponent!” Monma has a 14-7-3 record, with notable wins over…well, basically nobody. The Sakurai/Monma fight doesn’t seem to be a part of the lightweight Grand Prix that’s also going down at DREAM1, but it should be an ugly rout just like the Cro Cop/Nakao feature.
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Written by admin on March 6th, 2008 with comments disabled.
Read more articles on Mirko Filipovic and "Sengoku" and Japan and Mach and DREAM and cro cop and News and Hayato Sakurai and Takanori Gomi and MMA.
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