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By: Jamie Penick, MMATorch Editor-in-Chief
When Kevin "Kimbo Slice" Ferguson was released from the UFC in 2010, he initially set his sights on a career on boxing. However, it's looking more and more like that will not become a reality, and Slice will actually be take part in a new endeavor: pro wrestling.
The Inoki Genome Federation, Antonio Inoki's pro wrestling organization in Japan, announced this week that Slice will take part in their eight man tournament on February 5. He will be taking on former Sumo wrestler Shinichi "Wakakirin" Suzukawa, who was supposed to face Bob Sapp on New Year's Eve before Sapp pulled out the day of the show.
But when he's done with that, don't expect a return to combat sports from the 36-year-old Slice. In an interview with Ariel Helwani at MMAFighting.com, Slice's former promoter Jared Shaw explained that Slice had already put his boxing pursuit aside, and didn't expect to see him fight.
"[Slice left the boxing training camp] due to some various injuries and to go film The Scorpion King," Shaw explained. "Upon his return, he didn't show me any interest in boxing, so we just decided for right now to put it to the side."
"In boxing, in order to be amongst the best in the world, he was going to have to put in double the work he was accustomed to. Due to the wear and tear on his body, he wasn't able to perform up to the standard we wanted him to... I think Kimbo Slice's days as a fighter are close to an end"
Penick's Analysis: It's not really all that surprising to see this move for Slice. His knees were messed up on The Ultimate Fighter, and after his two fights and subsequent release from the UFC, boxing made sense only to use his striking. But he still needed to put in a lot of work to have any success in that field, and that clearly wasn't going to come together in the time he wanted it to. Heading to Japan for a pro wrestling gig works as a spectacle and a pay day, but I don't know what his next pursuit will be in that area. He could continue to be an attraction in Japan, he could attempt to move to pro wrestling in the U.S., or he could simply call it quits on those endeavors and move on to something else.
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Jamie Penick, editor-in-chief
(mmatorcheditor@gmail.com)
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