Kotari and Urakawa – Two Fatalities on the Same Card in Japan: Boxing’s Darkest Day

The worldwide boxing community and especially the Japanese community has been roiled by two ring fatalities that sprung from the same event. Super featherweight Shigetoshi Kotari, 28, and lightweight Hiromasa Urakawa, also 28, passed away on Aug. 8 and Aug. 9, respectively, from head injuries suffered in their bouts last weekend (Aug. 2) at Tokyo’s Korakuen Hall.

Kotari fell ill and collapsed following his 12-round match with Yamato Hata. They fought for the OPBF (Oriental and Pacific Boxing Federation) title and the match was ruled a draw. Heading in, the Nagoya native was 8-2-1 (5 KOs) and had never fought in a match scheduled for more than 8 rounds.

Urakawa appeared on the undercard in an 8-rounder against fellow Tokyo campaigner Yoji Saito. Heading into the final round, Urakawa was ahead on all three cards but Saito pulled the match out of the fire, stopping Urakawa with 48 seconds remaining in the contest.

Earlier this year, on May 24, there was a near-fatality on a card in Osaka and the victim, former IBF minimum weight champion Ginjiro Shigeoka, isn’t out of the woods yet.

Shigeoka collapsed in the ring and was stretchered out of the arena after losing a split decision in his 12-round rematch with Pedro Taduran of the Philippines. Doctors performed an emergency craniotomy and, at last report, Shigeoka remained hospitalized.

Taduran vs. Shigeoka was the co-feature to IBF world featherweight champion Angelo Leo’s title defense against Tomoki Kameda and aired in the U.S. on ESPN+.

To make matters potentially worse, if that were possible, Shigetoshi Kotari’s opponent on Aug. 2, Yamato Hata, was also taken to the hospital after their 12-round stalemate and there are unconfirmed reports that he has been placed in a coma.

According to Tris Dixon, the Japan Boxing Commission and the Japan Professional Boxing Association will have an emergency meeting on Tuesday to discuss ways to reduce the incidence of boxing fatalities. One change has already been effectuated. In the future, all OPBF title fights will be scheduled for 10 rounds, rather than 12. (This reaction was mindful of the WBC’s decision to reduce all title fights from 15 to 12 rounds after Ray “Boom Boom” Mancini stopped Duk Koo Kim in the 14^th stanza of their 1982 fight in Las Vegas, a match that proved fatal for the Korean. Within a few years, the other sanctioning bodies followed suit and to the consternation of many old-time fight fans, 15-round title fights became a thing of the past.)

Korakuen Hall

Korakuen Hall opened in 1962 on the fifth floor of a building that sits in the shadow of the newer Tokyo Dome where Buster Douglas famously upset Mike Tyson in 1990.

An intimate facility often compared to London’s venerable York Hall, it is the busiest boxing arena in the world. According to research by Masahiro Miyazaki, in an average year, slightly more than half of all the matches in Japan are staged at Korakuen Hall. Among the greats that have appeared here is Manny Pacquiao who was 19 years old when he defended his OPBF 115-pound title at Korakuen with a first-round stoppage of his Japanese opponent.

Despite the great number of fights there, ring fatalities have been relatively rare. Prior to this month, the last fatal fight at Korakuen was staged on Dec. 20, 2013. Tesshin Okada, a 21-year-old junior bantamweight, suffered a head injury in a 4-round contest and died 17 days later. It was the pro debut for both Okada and his opponent.

Per boxrec, there are 11 boxing shows on the Korakuen Hall docket between this coming Tuesday, Aug. 12, and the end of September. The main event of Tuesday’s card is a 10-round contest in the super flyweight division between Ryusei Kawaura (13-2) and Joe Shiraishi (12-1-1).

In the early days of Queensberry boxing in the United States, protocol dictated that a prizefight organizer lay low after a fatal fight and there was usually a long pause before his next promotion. It will be interesting to see if Tuesday’s fights go on as scheduled.

We here at TSS join our brethren around the world in sending our condolences to the families and loved ones of Shigetoshi Kotari and Hiromasa Urakawa and in wishing Yamato Hata a speedy recovery.

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