Badr Hari

At K-1's "Final 16" event yesterday in Seoul, South Korea, Alistair Overeem once again proved his status as one of the world's elite heavyweight strikers, easily defeating three-time K-1 World Grand Prix champion Peter Aerts via unanimous decision. With his win, Overeem advances to the eight-man bracket at the K-1 World Grand Prix Final in Yokohama on December 5th. He'll face Ewerton Teixeira in the quarterfinals, and could potentially face rematches with Badr Hari and Remy Bonjasky in the same night; Hari knocked out Zabit Samedov at yesterday's event to qualify for the Final 8, while defending Grand Prix champion Bonjasky scored a unanimous decision over Melvin Manhoef.

Full results of the Final 16, and videos of the Hari/Samedov and Bonjasky/Manhoef scraps are after the jump...

(Props: FightOpinion)

In the above excerpt from the UFC's next Countdown show (which premieres Thursday at 11 p.m. on Spike TV), we get a closer look at Lyoto Machida's crazy father Yoshizo, and the grueling karate training he put his sons through. Am I the only one who wants to see how Yoshizo would do in a Seniors' MMA league? Maybe throw him in the cage against Frank Mir's dad...

After the jump: Video of the main event bout between former K-1 heavyweight champ Badr Hari and current K-1 super-heavyweight champ Semmy Schilt at Saturday's "It's Showtime 2009" kickboxing event in Amsterdam.

Though he’s being courted by both the UFC and Strikeforce, where he is the reigning heavyweight champ, Alistair Overeem will likely have his next fight back in the K-1 ring.  A report on MixFight.nl, translated by our trusty friend Robert at Free Fight Videos, says Overeem has accepted an offer to fight 2008 K-1 Grand Prix winner Remy Bonjasky at the end of March.

There’s no word yet on whether Bonjasky has officially agreed to the fight, and after seeing what Overeem did to the dude who stomped his head in the finals of the Grand Prix he might be having some doubts.  If he does take the fight he might want to try and bulk up first, considering what a monster Overeem has become.

The bad news for us MMA types is that this further delays Overeem’s return to the land of little gloves.  His recent fights have made me all the more eager to see him in against big time MMA heavyweights, either in the UFC or somewhere else, to see if he can keep up these performances against top-notch opponents in places where there are commissions and – I’ll just say it – drug tests.   Looks like the wait continues.

Just for shits and giggles, rewatch Overeem's destruction of Badr Hari after the jump.  'Cause what else you got to do?

I don’t want to speculate as to what kind of diet Alistair Overeem has been on, but as Robert from Free Fight Videos points out with this helpful timeline, dude has gotten progressively bigger over the last few years.  He dwarfed Badr Hari when they squared off at Fields Dynamite, weighing in at 254.3 lbs for the fight.  This is a guy who used to be tall and lanky.  Now he’s a mountain of muscle, with a noticeably bulkier face, and the transformation has happened mostly while fighting in Japan.  There, I said it.

Just take a look at this video of Overeem’s fight with Chuck Liddell back in 2003.  He looks like a beanpole compared with the monster who knocked out Hari.  They must have some really excellent weight-gainer shakes in Holland...

Wow.  Who would have thought that a) we'd ever see Mark Hunt get knocked out by something as simple as a left hook-straight right combo, b) in the opening seconds of a fight, and c) by a middleweight.  This is the guy who walked right through a Cro Cop high kick.  Hats off to Melvin Manhoef.  Maybe now he'll get that fight with Kimbo Slice that he wants. 

More videos from Fields Dynamite 2008 after the jump.