We tend to look back at MMA’s early days as a volatile, unpredictable and borderline unhinged collection of bizarro pugilism loosely defining the “era.”

Japan’s all-women fight promotion Smackgirl, founded in 2001, couldn’t have matched that description any better during its eight-year existence. As its principals will tell you now, few of them had any clue what they were doing — whether it was the fighters or the people running the company. Those who did made the most of their experiences, but they still hold obscured spots in the MMA history books.

There’s no telling when I first heard about Smackgirl. Realistically, there shouldn’t be a time when someone should hear about it, especially if you were a young teenager during its boom. Smackgirl was dead and dusted by the time my MMA fandom fully developed. The more I analyzed over time, digging into the history of women’s MMA, the more I realized that some of the accomplishments and streaks produced by its most notable fighters were fascinating on paper and carried over to other promotions. The roots ran too deep not to treasure hunt. But where does one even start looking?

Women in MMA badly needed time and opportunity. America was slow to get on board with the idea despite great efforts from U.S.-based products like early MMA pioneer HOOKnSHOOT and Strikeforce. So, what was Smackgirl? Simply the Japanese version of HOOKnSHOOT? Was it even real fighting?

That depends on who you ask.

If MMA was the Wild West entering the new millennium, it was like visiting a new planet on the women’s side. Signs of life were extremely limited, and what existed was unlike its counterpart for various reasons. But any experience was better than nothing, which is what led Kinya Hashimoto, a blue-belt jiu-jitsu player, into the fold. Smackgirl needed help to get off the ground, and Hashimoto became a key anchor thanks to the slight connections he had with only two years of training at Japan’s famed Paraestra gym.

Kinya Hashimoto, Smackgirl matchmaker: “The fighters were all former pro wrestlers. Megumi Yabushita, Yoko Takahashi, Arya — they were all former pro wrestlers putting on a real fight. When I got involved, I started to [introduce] the new generation from different backgrounds. I’d bring in all these female athletes and give them the basics for martial arts [at Paraestra], and then send them over to Smackgirl.

“I brought in [western MMA pioneer] Erica Montoya through my friend, Kyle Takao, and I’m bringing over my friends to fight these Japanese fighters and all the friends are getting beat up. It’s memorable in kind of a bad way, or in a guilty way. I always can’t [shake] the feeling of guilt of bringing in my friends, talking my friends into taking the fights and getting beat up.”

Emi Fujino (went 5-0 in Smackgirl): “Back then they didn’t have any ground-and-pound [in Japanese women’s MMA]. They only had 30-second ground rules. It was definitely differentiated between men’s rules. I think when the [Smackgirl] promoters decided to have women fight the same rules as men, that was a big turning point for us and our sport. Obviously, there is still that prejudice that remains where people don’t want to see girls punch each other in the face on the ground, but that stereotype and that angle [of the rules changing] sort of led to that prejudice disappearing.

Hisae Watanabe (went 11-4 in Smackgirl): “Back in the day, Smackgirl knew how to entertain the people, and they knew how to deliver their content more. They tried to reach out more.

“For instance, they used to hand out teddy bears for winners’ prizes instead of trophies. That in itself is just fun. I have two of them at home.”

Fujino: “I remember my debut fight was at the Gold’s Gym in Omori. It’s a very small location. I also remember when Smackgirl had their first event at the Korakuen Hall [in Toyko], which is a very historical arena where all combat sports began. At the time, I remember Smackgirl was just doing events at very small venues, very small amount of spectators — and I realized that even an all-women’s fight organization can put on a big event at a prestigious hall like Korakuen Hall. I think they were doing the tournament at the time, [and Megumi] Fujii-san was the headliner.”

Seo Hee Ham, UFC veteran (went 2-2 in Smackgirl): “When signing with Smackgirl [in 2007], it wasn’t for a one-fight deal, it was for a tournament. When the tournament was still ongoing, in the middle of the tournament, the organization ended [in 2008]. They closed down, so I was never able to finish that tournament. Even until now, I sometimes wonder and think to myself, ‘What if I was able to finish it? Was I going to win? What if Smackgirl was still here and ongoing?'”

Tracking down Hashimoto, the Smackgirl promoter, felt like dusting off a relic from another dimension. He comes off as a man who is incapable of telling anything but the truth — or at least his truth. His voice is rugged, bitter and passionate all at once. It’s hard to blame him, considering the tall task he was given back then.

Ultimately, Hashimoto and Smackgirl did their jobs and added to the legacies of numerous unheralded legends of Eastern women’s MMA like Ham, Watanabe and Fujino. They all look back on that time differently. But, for the most part, they also appreciate its purpose.

A mention of Smackgirl to anyone involved prompts interesting reactions. There was nothing taboo or controversial about it on a surface level, but some fighters are generally surprised at again hearing a name that was once so important to their lives. Is the surprise good? Most of the time.

Hashimoto was a character, and finding him took some particular connections. An individual like the cheetah-print slugger Watanabe, however, took years to pinpoint. The atomweight veteran fell off the face of the planet in 2016, before she reemerged out of nowhere in 2021 at age 41.

A person can create an element of intimidation by avoiding the world, so I wasn’t sure what to expect, and was nervous it could be a bumpy road down memory lane. I couldn’t have been more wrong. Watanabe was as glowing as ever when we spoke, smiling through her protective mask as the pandemic was still fading from Japanese society at the time of our conversation.

Vicious in the ring, Watanabe flourished under the banner more than almost anyone else. Her talent led her to become a staple of the promotion, a fan-favorite for good reason from 2002-06, with eight of her 12 career knockouts coming during her Smackgirl tenure.

Building stars takes time, though. Just like pro wrestling, which was in many ways built into Smackgirl’s foundation, MMA also benefits significantly from rivalries and drama.

Hashimoto was mostly an advocate upon his arrival in Smackgirl at its official launch in 2001, working in his role as a matchmaker more out of passion than anything else. Three years later, he fully invested, mostly because no one else with MMA experience ever found their way into the regime. Even then, Hashimoto was only paid per event until 2007, when he finally restructured a deal for a monthly salary.

The promotion, with Hashimoto’s aid, went as far as to create a gym for non-associated fighters, with the goal of helping them become “real” athletes in MMA as a whole. That wasn’t needed for names like Watanabe — or her greatest rival, Satoko Shinashi.

Shinashi (went 12-0 in Smackgirl): “I remember when I first started back then, the women’s MMA competition level was not high. I do feel that there were a lot of weird competitors. It just wasn’t competitive. But as it continued to grow, the level of competition would slowly start to rise, and there would be more competitive athletes that would join and mature the sport.

“Back then, when I started, Smackgirl was the only promotion around. So I just kind of felt that I needed to become No. 1 in this promotion and continue to be that in order for other doors to open.”

Watanabe: “Back at the time, Smackgirl was the only women’s MMA organization. That’s the only platform where women could perform. Pancrase was this full-on guys, straight-up men fighting men, right? It was just a crazy idea [to propose], ‘Wouldn’t it be fun if we could just go in there and put on a women’s fight under a brand that just represents men?’ It was just that crazy idea that got everything started — and I do believe that Smackgirl was the promotion that tried taking on many challenges.

“The prejudice was still there. There were some men who refused to fight on the same card as women.”

Hashimoto: “When I got involved, the level for Smackgirl was just so low. The reason was because the promoter for Smackgirl, Mr. [Motoki] Shino, he was a pro wrestling promoter. He had his own women’s pro wrestling promotion called Neo Wrestling, and after that went bad, he started Smackgirl and kind of women’s fighting [in Japan]. Mr. Shino had no experience in actual martial arts, and he didn’t think of women’s fighting as an actual sport. He thought it would be like a spinoff from pro wrestling.

“The fights that he had were very low level; these women didn’t know how to strike, they couldn’t do the proper jiu-jitsu, they didn’t have the correct skill sets to call them an MMA fighter. Being from the Paraestra network, they are very hardcore with Shooto. I have a background in Brazilian jiu-jitsu. We had more of a martial arts mentality, and when we looked at [the beginning of] Smackgirl, it was just catfights going on. We looked at [early era] Smackgirl as a disgrace to the sport: ‘Don’t call this MMA.’”

Shigeru Saeki, Deep founder: “Women were frowned upon at the gym with grappling and everything that comes with MMA. The rise of popularity and the rise of the population of the sport has made other women accessing MMA much easier. Especially, I see amateur athletes with solid backgrounds such as Judo and wrestling getting into MMA, but on the flip side, anybody can now become a professional fighter so the contrast between amateur athletes and regular people is big.”

Promoters can be tricky to tackle in conversation thanks to the various hats they wear. Shigeru Saeki, the founder of Japan-based MMA promotion Deep, has as unique of a personality that a frontman could have, using event promo packages that involve everything from physical comedy to footage of him eating. In one vignette, he’s seen casually walking until his pants suddenly fall to his ankles.

Imagine if UFC CEO Dana White did that.

Saeki effectively became the one to keep Smackgirl’s legacy alive to this day.

“I started off as a fan watching pay-per-view, I started promoting pro wrestling events and made connections with Pancrase,” Saeki said. “I was more fascinated with the show aspect than the sport itself. My connections through the BJJ gym helped out with contacts.”

Like the early UFC, MMA tournaments existed in Japan, but structure and expansion developed quickly. Unlike in America, everyone got on board. In the words of White, it took a reality show to “save” the UFC early on. The Eastern part of the world just needed passion and a little bit of pro wrestling influence for sanctioned violence to evolve by any means — and anyone — necessary.

“I started Deep in 2001, and Smackgirl started their own promotion,” Saeki said. “At the time, I didn’t have any interest in women’s MMA.”

Women entered the picture after their version of UFC 1 — the openweight ReMix 2000 World Cup. That event captivated the Japanese MMA scene so much that Smackgirl was birthed one week later, thanks to founder Koichiro Kimura and president Motoki Shino. It then relaunched in May the following year, and brought Hashimoto into the fold.

Everything was experimental. Combat sports blueprints existed like boxing and pro wrestling, but where was the common ground? How could this new sport maximize interest with so many possibilities in a single competition? These were the questions many promoters faced, regardless of their knowledge levels — or lack thereof.

As it often is, winning was the cure. The eventual — and continued — breakthrough success of Shinashi helped build not only herself, but also Smackgirl as a brand. Shinashi was a finishing machine, scoring nine submissions in her 12 Smackgirl appearances. It led Shinashi to believe she was an outcast in a way, because even as the sport itself was just beginning to find a foothold in Japan, criticism of Smackgirl and women’s fighting remained commonplace.

An abundance of “non-fighters” still filled the roster as well, which was part of Hashimoto’s challenge, if not his most prominent.

“My goal was to draw the line between pro wrestling and actual fighting,” said Hashimoto. “So I focused on selecting and bringing in the quality fighters to raise the value and show the promoter and people who watch Smackgirl the legitimacy of this actual sport.”

In a way, Hashimoto faked it until he made it, and he had mixed feelings about that.

Under a bigger spotlight, Shinashi also felt the heat from peers. She hated always seeing women on the prelims outside of Smackgirl. Actually being able to land a fight in those days, in general, was a positive every time. But headlining over men? That was the ultimate goal.

At the very least, a main card slot was something to be proud of.

“I would like to hope that people give credit to the Japanese women’s scene and what we’ve accomplished that led to the popularity of where the sport is now,” Shinashi said. “But that really doesn’t matter, because I think that the fact that the current times, where the [old] prejudices toward women — the discrimination, the labeling — it’s all kind of become equal, and it’s [become] time for all humans to be all equal. So I think it would be nice for everybody to give credit to Japanese women’s MMA in history, but I think it was just meant to be — and we were all just a part of what was destined to be.”

If breaking ground and refusing “no” for an answer embodied any fighter who went through Smackgirl, one in particular stood out above than the rest.

Fujino: “When I fought Megumi Fujii, it was a very last-minute fight. She was supposed to fight somebody else and I guess that opponent fell off and the offer came to me. At the time, I fought Fujii-san in December, but I also fought in October and November [before that]. I got this very short-notice fight against Fujii-san and everybody around me told me not to take the fight. Once a month was just way too much against the best pound-for-pound at the time. But for me, I didn’t want to miss this opportunity to fight the best pound-for-pound woman in the world.

“So obviously, I fought her. I went in there with a lack of preparation, but my mindset was that I was going to fight as myself. No game plans, I was just going to bring myself and see how I would be able to hang against the world’s best. I just wanted to know how I would perform against the best in the world. And it was just out of curiosity.”

Jessica-Rose Clark, UFC veteran: “My very, very first coach, he loved Megumi Fujii. Like, loved her. He used to make me watch her all the time, and then I f***ing loved her. I thought she was amazing.

“I don’t think anyone [else] will be able to take that GOAT mantle.”

Jessica Aguilar, UFC veteran who fought Fujii twice: “That was my toughest opponent skill-wise. Like, you look at all of my opponents — tough opponents. But skill-wise, Megumi Fuji is the cream of the crop.

“She was huge. She was a big part of the MMA world because of who she was, all her accomplishments. She was a black belt in Judo, a black belt in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, wrestler, ADCC champ. She was just so many things; she had accomplished so much. So much that not another female had her accomplishments. She was the only one that had those accomplishments. So she was a big part of that, her legacy. She’s still huge. That’s what kind of upsets me — that she doesn’t get the recognition that she should. Easy, easy Hall of Famer.”

Do you ever just feel when someone is wise? Those people who make you feel smarter through a simple conversation. That’s Megumi Fujii, MMA’s wise sage, the arguable grandmother of the sport who’s still as respected as ever throughout the inner workings of Japanese MMA.

Fujii made her professional debut at Smackgirl: Holy Land Triumphal Return in 2004. A pioneer and future legend, she chased supremacy in scattered North American appearances and jumped around the Japanese circuit. Despite being undersized in most matchups, Fujii set herself apart with an even more violent and dominant game than some of her star contemporaries.

To put it bluntly, Fujii was too good for her time — and was too good for what Smackgirl or Hashimoto had to offer, which made business difficult behind the scenes.

“I was very frustrated that Megumi had no opponents,” Hashimoto said. “There just weren’t enough competitors for her. My job was to find her opponents. I would randomly go on MySpace and I would contact people who looked like they were involved with martial arts judging by their profile pictures. That’s how I was desperately scraping from the bottom of the barrel. I would talk them into coming to Japan to get destroyed by Megumi Fujii.”

Social media, still in its infancy, made Hashimoto’s task more manageable. His job, by his own description, was to find sacrificial “tomato cans.” It didn’t sound like the worst offer for the women — until they stepped in the ring or cage with an all-time great.

The offer was simple: Travel overseas, get destroyed and go home. All for a meager $500.

“I built Megumi’s record,” Hashimoto said. “It was me who built her and her reputation. I was behind everything because there weren’t many [competitive opponents] left in Japan.

“There were times where I’d bring a karate girl who doesn’t know crap about the ground game, but Megumi is so intense, she’s stoic. She would go full force against anybody, which would result in my fighter being destroyed or a limb torn off. Broken ankles and what not. I was like, ‘Come on. Take it easy. These guys don’t know how to fight.’

“Part of my job was to take care of fighters I brought in to get destroyed by Megumi,” he continued. “Take them around Tokyo, show them a good time, and make sure that they’re not going to go back all beat up and feeling miserable.”

Fujii’s historic run superseded that of her old teammate Shinashi with a 22-fight undefeated streak from 2004-10 — a record for women’s MMA. Smackgirl played a large part in “Mega Megu’s” run, hosting six of her fights.

Fujii speaks humbly, even dismissively, about her legacy. She’s just glad to have made any impact at all. For her, it was about leading a charge for women and proving women had as much talent as men — even if that meant taking a MySpace girl’s arm home with her.

Is Hashimoto’s perspective wrong? Not necessarily, but there’s more to the story than a mad scientist creating his version of Frankenstein’s monster.

Josh Barnett, Fujii’s coach: “You have to understand what that means when you say ‘pro wrestlers in Japan,’ and we’ll even distill it to women’s pro wrestlers in Japan.

“Pretty much all the women’s pro wrestlers in Japan are trained like fighters to a degree. Also, pretty much all the girls that used to be in pro wrestling would come from a background of karate or judo or whatever. There was a lot of martial arts that you would pick up as a kid — boy or girl — in middle school or high school. It’s quite possible that you could get in the ring with a ‘pro wrestler,’ and this girl’s a judo black belt as well. Like Megumi Yabushita, who competed internationally in judo and is a pro wrestler who went into those early ReMix tournaments. Shinobu Kandori is a ‘wrestler,’ but she has a fight background, so it’s just the nature of where this stuff comes from. I mean, hell, early mixed martial arts in Japan was from pro wrestling. Japan was the place where fights were happening.”

Fujii (went 6-0 in Smackgirl): “Back when I started getting involved in MMA, I always had the desire where I wanted to fight abroad. I wanted to fight international competition, and luckily, for my second fight, I was able to fight in the States. I got my second fight in the U.S., but the main reason is because women’s MMA didn’t have [a place in Japan] back in the day. I wanted to prove a point where I’m such a small fighter, a small athlete, and have such a small figure, but even I can go jump outside of Japan and accomplish things and achieve things internationally as a Japanese woman. I wanted to bring back those achievements to Japan so that it would help us get our presence in the Japanese society.

“So that was the main reason why I really was upset with fighting abroad and even fighting in Japan. I wanted to fight international fighters to prove a point that Japanese women could take on the world. So, that concept is something that I always had. It was an obsession that I always had, and I think in that sense, Hashimoto-san did a really great job of booking these international fighters and bringing them over to Japan. So I’m very grateful for that.

“The reason why I was obsessed with fighting international fighters is because if I continued to beat international fighters, it would eventually lead me to the best fighter in the world.”

Ultimately, Fujii’s intentions played out to near-perfection in the latter stages of her career, but Japanese MMA still missed out on some explosive collisions between the stars of that early time.

Yuka Tsuji had her success in the unheralded tier of MMA pioneers involved in Smackgirl. Watanabe and Shinashi made magic when they battled twice, proving that it never fails to have the best fighting the best. There was the potential for alternatives — streak vs. streak, Fujii vs. Shinashi — but none materialized.

These names, built through Smackgirl, garnered so much attention that more significant ideas arose. Fights between big names were worth seeing on a big stage. With PRIDE FC as the force it was — arguably the No. 1 MMA promotion on the planet for a time — Barnett pushed to get his pupil in front of that audience, and later again for the short-lived Affliction brand, both unsuccessfully.

PRIDE founder Nobuyuki Sakakibara explained to me in 2020 how, if his promotion had brought women into the mix, Fujii vs. Shinashi would have been the fight. The concept had a myriad of positives, but as someone who worked with both, Barnett would have expected more of the same.

Barnett: “Megumi would have annihilated Shinashi. But it also, in a way, would have been kind of cool — not to see Shinashi lose at all because Shinsashi’s awesome — but Shinashi was Megumi’s student, so [we were] watching Megumi in the room tap Shinashi and beat her all the time. It would have been a good fight just to see, one, two really skilled athletes go at it, and two, to see the teacher and the student get in the ring and do it and see how it goes.

“It would have been a big fight for Japan, for Japanese MMA, and that would have been great in and of itself.”

Hashimoto: “Shinashi’s much smaller. They used to train together. Unfortunately, they split up because of some egos and jealousy, but Megumi was bigger. She had more opponents to fight. She didn’t have to struggle with any opponents. For Shinashi, it was hard. She was much smaller, and it was hard to find and bring in international fighters her size. Fujii was getting more of the attention; she was the one in the spotlight, and I’m sure there were some personal emotions that led to that split.

“Tsuji and Fujii were the queenpins of Smackgirl at that time for that weight class. The contrast was very interesting. Tsuji in Osaka in the West with wrestling, and Fujii with the Sambo in Tokyo. It was a battle of styles, a battle of regions. There was so much contrast in interest to put that fight together. I think that was the dream fight. Smackgirl tried to book that fight, and at a certain point, they did come to an agreement. But at the same time, there was an offer from Bodog for Fujii. They took that offer instead of fighting Tsuji.”

The end came in late 2008, when Saeki acquired Smackgirl and rebranded it into Jewels before eventually integrating it into his original brand. This is how Deep Jewels was created, as an all-female version of Deep.

“It just made sense for me,” Saeki said.

The promotion remains strong today, as Saeki hit 47 events with Deep Jewels to close out 2024.

MMA’s polarization in those dark ages couldn’t be any more different than the modern day. There wasn’t an exorbitant amount of money or a career to be had solely by competing in this sport. Structural issues remain in 2025, but it was a wholly different beast 20 years ago — especially for women.

The legacies and stories that were crafted during that era helped to build the women’s side of MMA today. Smackgirl’s existence — and, in a strange way yet just as importantly, its end — may have been the best outcome for women.

“I feel that the defining moment for women in MMA history is when Smackgirl no longer existed,” Watanabe said. “Back in the day, Smackgirl was the only promotion that had women’s fights. I do believe that once the other promoters saw Smackgirl’s success, they knew that women’s MMA could be something, and that’s when they all started.”

Watanabe points to the fall of PRIDE FC in 2007 as an example, and the vacuum it created that’s since been filled by other promotions. Even the juggernaut that is the UFC was only born after its initial ownership group had floundered long enough that it was forced to sell.

“When you think about new promotions and how things happen,” Watanabe said, “it’s when something dies.”