10 MMA-Inspired Wrestling Matches

6. Everything UWF

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CuMyEmZ8l5M In 1984, a group of wrestlers led by Akira Maeda left New Japan and formed the Universal Wrestling Federation, the world's first shoot-style wrestling promotion. Though in-fighting between wrestlers and disagreements over fighting styles led to exoduses and the league's demise, its legacy as a home for competition featuring realistic holds and hard strikes ensured that the promotion would be reborn. In 1988, many of the men who had formed the original UWF (and has since returned to New Japan for a huge invasion angle) came together once more to form the Newborn UWF. Maeda, Yoshiaki Fujiwara, and future legends Minoru Suzuki and Masakatsu Funaki were part of the new promotion, which featured rules stating matches could only end by submission or knockout. Again, the league was popular, but economic problems forced a close in 1990. The UWF was reborn once more in 1991 as the Union of Wrestling Forces International, or UWFi. This time, former IWGP Junior Heavyweight Champion Nobuhiko Takada was the top star and competition involved a point-based system of scoring. Vader came in to feud with Takada, resulting in huge business. By the mid-'90s, the UWFi was once again floundering, and so they ran one more interpromotional feud with New Japan, which still stands as the most profitable storyline in Japanese wrestling history.