Bob Sapp
Bob Sapp is a tall and well built American kickboxer. Sapp is a professional mixed martial arts (MMA) fighter. Bob Sapp is also a former world championship professional wrestler. He also played professional American Football. Bob Sapp has a good MMA record with a total of 8 wins, 2 losses and a draw. Sapp mainly fights in Korea and Japan. He is a very popular figure in Japan. He has appeared in television programmes, commercials and has even released a music CD by the name “It’s Sapp Time”. Bob Sapp also made an appearance in Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel on HBO.
Bob Sapp is popularly known as the Beast due to his huge size and frame. Bob Sapp started his career playing football at the University of Washington as the offensive lineman. He won the Morris Award during this time. Bob first came to notice when he fought and defeated William “The Refrigerator” Perry in a boxing special by Toughman promoted by the FX channel. Japanese MMA organization PRIDE then recruited Bob Sapp seeing his potential. He became a hot favourite with the people in a very short time due to his enormous size and aggression.
After being very successful in PRIDE, Bob Sapp was invited by Kazuyoshi Ishii to the K-1. The inventor of K-1, Ishii believed that Sapp had great potential both in terms of fighting abilities and marketability.
Bob Sapp started his professional wrestling career in the NWA Wildside in the year 2001. He was also contacted by the World Championship Wrestling as a developmental wrestler. Despite of losing his first fight in the K-1, Bob Sapp was fairly successful during his initial days at the K-1. He had defeated Ernesto Hoost, the four time K-1 champion by a technical knockout Initially Sapp’s technique got him some wins but soon he was being disqualified for bullrushing and punching the opponents even after the referee breaks. Also, the experienced fighters soon figured out Bob Sapp’s weaknesses i.e. his chin and legs. In 2003, Sapp was knocked out by the Cration champion Mirko “Cro Cop” Filipovic in just 86 seconds. In 2004, Sapp was defeated by Kazuyuki Fujita by tapping out.
In the year 2005, Bob Sapp won the K-1 Japan Grand Prix and became one of the 16 fighters to qualify for the 2005 K-1 World GP. In 2007, Bob Sapp will fight in the cage Rage 21 event in April, one of UK”s most popular events.
By Sherdog.com Staff
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