Watch Shinya Aoki Defeat Sakuraba During Day 1 of Rizin

Japan's newest MMA promotion, Rizin Fighting Federation, had its first event today. Run by former PRIDE executive Nobuyuki Sakakibara, Rizin aims to capitalize on the nostalgia of the old days when wild matchups and tournament-fights were commonplace.

Today's event included the first round of the heavyweight tournament set to conclude on New Years Eve, as well as a catch-weight bout between Japanese MMA legend Kazushi Sakuraba and submission-ace Shinya Aoki

The match included a lot less of the grappling chess match everyone expected, as Shinya came out looking super serious and dismantled the old guard with vicious ground-and-pound. And if this fight doesn't get your JMMA juices flowing, just wait until the 31st, when Fedor steps into the ring again for the first time since he knocked out Pedro Rizzo in 2012.

Watch Saku-Shinya match below, and check out the full results of Day 1.

Heavyweight Tournament Round 1:

Jiri Prochazka def. Satoshi Ishii via KO (strikes), Round 1
Vadim Nemkov def. Goran Reljic via KO (strikes), Round 1
Teodoras Aukstuolis def. Bruno Cappelozza via KO (punches), Round 1
Muhammed Lawal def. Brett McDermott via KO (punch), Round 1

Other bouts:

Shinya Aoki def. Kazushi Sakuraba via TKO (strikes), Round 1
Valentin Moldavsky def. Yuta Uchida via Submission (RNC), Round 1
Hiroyuki Takaya def. Daiki Hata via Unanimous Decision
Hideo Tokoro def. Kizaemon Saiga via Submission (armbar), Round 1
Anatoly Tokov def. A.J. Matthews via KO (punch), Round 1
Felipe Efrain def. Yuki Motoya via TKO (strikes), Round 1 (Match deemed No Contest due to Efrain missing weight)
Kirill Sidelnikov def. Carlos Toyota via TKO (strikes), Round 1
Tsuyoshi Kohsaka def. James Thompson via TKO (strikes), Round 2