MMA legend Shinya Aoki just caused chaos at the ONE 173 weigh-ins by hitting a textbook Sasae Tsurikomi Ashi on his opponent and sending him crashing down to the floor. Aoki is scheduled to face Hiroyuki Tetsuka at the event and both men had already made the lightweight limit for the fight; all that was left to do was the ceremonial weigh-ins. Tetsuka did his part and stood to the side waiting for Aoki to do his, and he immediately started trying to intimidate Aoki when their face-off began. Tetsuka moved forward and was pressuring Aoki into stepping backwards, but it really didn’t pay off for him.
Aoki looked calm and collected at first, but he burst into action after just a few steps. He grabbed hold of Tetsuka and used his forward momentum to hit a perfectly-timed throw. It’s no surprise that he’s capable of doing that of course, as Judo was the first combat sport that Aoki fell in love with. He’s been doing it since he was just a child and has been able to make a number of Judo techniques work in both no gi grappling and MMA during his career. Tetsuka immediately popped back up after the throw and started to advance towards Aoki again, while Aoki barely even looked at him.
Security intervened and Aoki offered a handshake to Tetsuka to help calm the tension, but it’s hard to imagine that Tetsuka is taking this lightly. He’ll get his chance for revenge soon enough though, as the two men will be meeting at ONE 173 on November 16th, 2025. Both men are ONE Championship veterans but Aoki has a significant advantage in experience, being 7 years older than Tetsuka with more than three times as many professional fights under his belt. Aoki is also riding a two-fight winning streak and despite being in his 40s, he’s almost certainly going to be the favorite coming into this.
Nick Atkin shared the footage of Shinya Aoki hitting Hiroyuki Tetsuka with a Sasae at the ONE 173 weigh-ins in a recent post to his official Twitter account:
