The Official MMA Discussion Thread

[LoNdOn]

Not that I ever watch it on Bravo (as you say, they shows are never on live, if they're even on at all) but we can probably kiss Strikeforce goodbye now that Bravo is going (gone?). I can't see Sky picking it up to be honest, unless they were getting decent ratings, which I doubt.

 

Hopefully they can do a deal with one of the smaller digital channels and get some live/next-day-delay thing going on.

 

You're right. Forgot about Bravo being gone. So we don't get Strikeforce anymore either. Hopefully one day we will get an MMA dedicated channel. Until then I will have to watch most of my MMA online.

 

I forgot to mention in my first list that we did get to watch an M1 Global tournament on Extreme Sports, but it was always the same events and now that has disappeared and we have something called World Combat League. Pretty funny because I saw Cecil Peoples on ref duty and he nearly went arse-over-tea kettle when he tried to seperate two fighters.

[brashleyholland]

 

I forgot to mention in my first list that we did get to watch an M1 Global tournament on Extreme Sports, but it was always the same events and now that has disappeared and we have something called World Combat League. Pretty funny because I saw Cecil Peoples on ref duty and he nearly went arse-over-tea kettle when he tried to seperate two fighters.

 

The Chuck Norris thing? Haha, quality! Might have to flick over to Extreme Sports once in a while then!

[Daffanka]

It's Showtime have great iPPVs for £10. Their last one had this tremendous fight as its main event and the one before that was supposed to feature the greatest kickboxer on earth, Giorgio Petrosyan, but he got injured and we instead got one of the greatest kickboxers on earth, Andy Souwer. Unfortunately that fight kinda sucked because Pajonsuk, the nak muay he fought, just kept clinching up.

[EddieFnG]

I wish we had HD Net in the UK. We get UFC and Strikeforce (at seemingly random times for the latter) and some UCMMA. We also get an old ocassional Cage Rage show but no Bellator, no Japanese stuff. I wish we had more.

 

Who shows UCMMA?

[LoNdOn]

Who shows UCMMA?

 

Sky Sports. At least that's where I watched it.

[The Bus]

It's Showtime have great iPPVs for £10. Their last one had this tremendous fight as its main event and the one before that was supposed to feature the greatest kickboxer on earth, Giorgio Petrosyan, but he got injured and we instead got one of the greatest kickboxers on earth, Andy Souwer. Unfortunately that fight kinda sucked because Pajonsuk, the nak muay he fought, just kept clinching up.

 

That was a great match and some nice fights also in the undercard, if my memory serves me right. Didn't they put a title fight as co-me and this "battle of Amsterdam" (or something like that) as me? Luckily It's Showtime events are shown live in Finland on cable via MTV3 MAX in addition to UFC PPV's.

[LoNdOn]

Just watched Aoki get starched by that second round knee. Not gonna lie, I basically peed my pants laughing.

[brashleyholland]

Just watched Aoki get starched by that second round knee. Not gonna lie, I basically peed my pants laughing.

 

You're not alone there mate, you're not alone. Nothing funnier than seeing a 'badass' get sparked out by a transvestite :-p

[jesterx7769]

Him being such a douche in round one made it that much better. Although the drop kick while holding onto the top rope was...well as interesting as Nagashima's transvestite cosplay.

[LoNdOn]

Him being such a douche in round one made it that much better. Although the drop kick while holding onto the top rope was...well as interesting as Nagashima's transvestite cosplay.

 

What is brilliant to me is that effectively in an MMA fight in 4 seconds of round 1, Aoki got sparked by a guy who is a 500 fighter.

[The Shape]

Lesnar/JDS on TUF. Oh my.

[jesterx7769]

talk about trumping Strikeforce's HW news. However I am impartial on it. Why? Because the winner gets a shot a Cain. Umm didn't Brock just get demolished by Cain? Guess this shows how short they are on immediate contenders since no one really has the momentum besides JDS. This should give them the ratings they need and with all of Lesnar's press they can plug the hell out of him and it.

 

In other news, Pettis and Guida are in the works, which I LOVE? Why you ask? Because is the fight I said should happen with Maynard/Edgar 2, and hey, who doesn't love being right for once?

[Gabbo]

Isn't JDS the current #1 contender? So what? He has to win another match before he get's his title shot?

 

I guess it's just a way of crowbarring Lesnar back into a title fight since he's the main man and if he beats the #1 contender he technically deserves it.

[jesterx7769]

Honestly as much as I did not want to see Mir/Lesnar III (for lots of reasons) if they were going to put Lesnar as an TUF coach for business (and it is a good business decision) they should have put him against Mir. It would have been like Tito/Ken or Rampage/Rashad with their legitimate hatred coming through.

 

I was also really really looking forward to JDS vs. Cain as it would most likely be an awesome display of striking. Now we are either going to see Brock get blitzed by punches for a third straight time (Carwin and Cain) or witness his uber excited GnP (sarcasm)

 

What other combination of coaches would you guys have wanted to see as I am struggling to find other good combos now that so much has changed this past month. I saw before Maynard vs. Edgar was a possibility (and a good one)

[Dublin Sky]

Lesner vs JDS on Tuf will be entertaining but who cares? I know i'm not going to. I don't want to see JDS fight Brock it's a waste of time and we all know it. JDS hits hard like Cain and Shane, we all know what Brocks gonna do once he gets hit run away. Strikeforce is bringing to the table something that we should all as MMA fans drool over. Strikeforce is giving what the fans want, we want to see great fights and the HW tournament promises that from Fedor and Silva to Rogers and Barnett i know i can't wait....this is a great time to be a fan of MMA guys.

[brashleyholland]

Isn't JDS the current #1 contender? So what? He has to win another match before he get's his title shot?

 

 

He doesn't *have* to, he could have very easily just waited until August/September when Velasquez came back. It's all about the $$$ though - JDS hasn't exactly made his fortune and a year off between fights was apparently an untenable situation for him.

 

TUF is a very decent wedge for a few weeks work, he'll earn more money from a PPV bout with Lesnar than he would with Cain and assuming he can stay on his toes, he'll steamroll the big fella in June and be ready for Velasquez in September.

[brashleyholland]

Strikeforce is giving what the fans want, we want to see great fights and the HW tournament promises that from Fedor and Silva to Rogers and Barnett i know i can't wait....this is a great time to be a fan of MMA guys.

 

It's not that great. You basically have a monopoly in the US, the British and European scenes have gone into regression, one reasonably-sized promotion in Canada ran by a man with a worse ego problem than Dana White and a Japanese scene that is both dying and largely irrelevant.

 

2000-2006/7 will always be the golden years of MMA, at least until the Japanese scene picks up again (if it does at all). The UFC has very cleverly saturated the market in the US; I'm guessing we're at least 5-10 years away from the sport being 'accepted' enough in the states that big TV money will back a number of viable alternatives to the UFC to have anything even remotely resembling a level playing field.

 

It's an easy time to be an MMA fan right now - but not a great one.

 

As for the Strikeforce tourney - I dunno....it's very much like my microsoft paint blueprint for a helicopter backpack - on paper it looks great, but that doesn't mean it's going to work and a lot of people will probably get hurt in the process.

[ampulator]

It's not that great. You basically have a monopoly in the US, the British and European scenes have gone into regression, one reasonably-sized promotion in Canada ran by a man with a worse ego problem than Dana White and a Japanese scene that is both dying and largely irrelevant.

 

2000-2006/7 will always be the golden years of MMA, at least until the Japanese scene picks up again (if it does at all). The UFC has very cleverly saturated the market in the US; I'm guessing we're at least 5-10 years away from the sport being 'accepted' enough in the states that big TV money will back a number of viable alternatives to the UFC to have anything even remotely resembling a level playing field.

 

It's an easy time to be an MMA fan right now - but not a great one.

 

As for the Strikeforce tourney - I dunno....it's very much like my microsoft paint blueprint for a helicopter backpack - on paper it looks great, but that doesn't mean it's going to work and a lot of people will probably get hurt in the process.

I honestly have no idea how MMA is going get big in Japan again. Japan's such a... I don't how to put it, wonky market. Heck, the UFC thinks it will be easier to get into China or even India. Doesn't that tell us something? Dana, the supercompetitive that almost never gives up, is saying, "Aw, screw it" and not even bothering to enter the Japanese market.

[Daffanka]

I honestly have no idea how MMA is going get big in Japan again. Japan's such a... I don't how to put it, wonky market. Heck, the UFC thinks it will be easier to get into China or even India. Doesn't that tell us something? Dana, the supercompetitive that almost never gives up, is saying, "Aw, screw it" and not even bothering to enter the Japanese market.

 

Japanese MMA is a very cyclical business with strict bust and boom periods, eventually you'll see some mega star resurrect Japanese MMA the way Sakuraba, Rickson and Takada brought it to life. I mean the situation certainly wasn't helped by incompetent booking, awful handling of prospects, over saturation of freak show fights, money grubbing leeching managers only looking out for themselves and several pretty unlucky coincidences such as Ishii being a socially inept goof ball with no charisma or WARRIOR SPIRIT and Kid being caught with weed. At its peak Japanese MMA drew something mental like 60 million viewers. Those viewers haven't gone away, they're just not interested in MMA right now because there's no magnetizing figures like Yoshida, Sapp etc. for them to support and have genuine interest in. And it's not like Japanese MMA will ever really die. There's a hardcore fanbase that'll keep small organizations like Shooto, DEEP or Pancrase running indefinitely, but it's going to take a while before the grand spectacle of PRIDE returns in any fashion.

 

This is a lot of words about something that isn't TUF. I like the coaching choice - it's going to help make a real star out of JDS if he can keep working on his English. He seems like a swell dude and I'm sure he'll be able to play off Lesnar ranting and raving pretty well.

 

I like the fight too. We know for a fact that if JDS gets a good flurry of hard offense in Lesnar's probably done for, but we don't know if he can replicate the success Cain had with defending takedowns or getting back to his feet.

[brashleyholland]

Japanese MMA is a very cyclical business with strict bust and boom periods.

 

At its peak Japanese MMA drew something mental like 60 million viewers. Those viewers haven't gone away, they're just not interested in MMA right now.

 

That's exactly it. You can't fight apathy. People aren't watching so TV aren't interested. I know very little about wrestling in Japan, aside from that it's popularity and MMA's are intrinsically linked. Once the rasslin' picks up again, so will MMA.

 

There's a hardcore fanbase that'll keep small organizations like Shooto, DEEP or Pancrase running indefinitely.

 

For me, it's the Shooto network that is going to keep MMA in Japan alive. A lot of people don't realise this, but Shooto isn't a promotion, it's a governing body. The 'Shooto' shows you hear about are promoted by various promoters across Japan and the world (a couple of major ones and a spiderweb of small shows)...there is a full amateur and pro ranking system, different levels of pro licence that you have to fight to earn...it's amazing and unlike boxing, it works. As long as Shooto keeps going, there will always be an undercurrent of MMA in Japan, and as long as their network is so vast, there will always be talented foreigners on tap. When the bust cycle ends, there fighters will be there to bolster whatever it is that sparks the MMA craze off again.

 

This is a lot of words about something that isn't TUF. I like the coaching choice - it's going to help make a real star out of JDS if he can keep working on his English. He seems like a swell dude and I'm sure he'll be able to play off Lesnar ranting and raving pretty well.

 

I think (and hope) they play up the 'Rocky' angle with him - dude comes out of nowhere to run train on the heavyweight division - it's a great story if people can get past the language barrier. My only fear is that this will end up being 'The Lesnar Show' at JDS's expense. Ok, it obviously *is* 'The Lesnar Show', but I see no reason why they can't have Brock as the surly bad guy to JDS fairytale hero...I just worry that it'll end up being a 12-week infomercial for Lesnar and his book.

 

...Although, if we assume that Brock will get a spanking in the fight and possibly call it quits, maybe they'll 'do a Rampage' on him, and paint him in a bad light.

 

I like the fight too. We know for a fact that if JDS gets a good flurry of hard offense in Lesnar's probably done for, but we don't know if he can replicate the success Cain had with defending takedowns or getting back to his feet.

 

It'll be a good question answerer for JDS, that's for sure. We've seen him handle strikers and grapplers, but what's he going to do when a stud wrestler puts him on his back? I actually hope that Dos Santos doesn't cream Lesnar with the first flurry, just so we can see what he can do from the bottom.

[Daffanka]

That's exactly it. You can't fight apathy. People aren't watching so TV aren't interested. I know very little about wrestling in Japan, aside from that it's popularity and MMA's are intrinsically linked. Once the rasslin' picks up again, so will MMA.

 

I'm not at all as familiar with Puro as I was in the '90s but I believe it's picking up slightly.

 

For me, it's the Shooto network that is going to keep MMA in Japan alive. A lot of people don't realise this, but Shooto isn't a promotion, it's a governing body. The 'Shooto' shows you hear about are promoted by various promoters across Japan and the world (a couple of major ones and a spiderweb of small shows)...there is a full amateur and pro ranking system, different levels of pro licence that you have to fight to earn...it's amazing and unlike boxing, it works. As long as Shooto keeps going, there will always be an undercurrent of MMA in Japan, and as long as their network is so vast, there will always be talented foreigners on tap. When the bust cycle ends, there fighters will be there to bolster whatever it is that sparks the MMA craze off again.

 

Shooto is tremendous. The best Japanese fighters always came from the Shooto system which I still think is the best way to handle an up and coming prospect. Gomi, Uno, Mach, Hioki, Kawajiri, Hirota, Takaya and Aoki to some extent. Imagine if Miyata had gone through it instead of being thrown to the wolves.

 

I think (and hope) they play up the 'Rocky' angle with him - dude comes out of nowhere to run train on the heavyweight division - it's a great story if people can get past the language barrier. My only fear is that this will end up being 'The Lesnar Show' at JDS's expense. Ok, it obviously *is* 'The Lesnar Show', but I see no reason why they can't have Brock as the surly bad guy to JDS fairytale hero...I just worry that it'll end up being a 12-week infomercial for Lesnar and his book.

 

...Although, if we assume that Brock will get a spanking in the fight and possibly call it quits, maybe they'll 'do a Rampage' on him, and paint him in a bad light.

 

Lesnar's going to try his hardest to become super relevant again, he'll heel it up like crazy and make it really easy for dos Santos I think.

 

It'll be a good question answerer for JDS, that's for sure. We've seen him handle strikers and grapplers, but what's he going to do when a stud wrestler puts him on his back? I actually hope that Dos Santos doesn't cream Lesnar with the first flurry, just so we can see what he can do from the bottom.

 

I can't wait for the multi page essays that MMA journalists are going to write on the subject based on a few seconds of video where dos Santos didn't get tripped by Nelson and got back from under Gonzaga.

 

Gonzaga took down dos Santos and Carwin but both immediately got back up. Lesnar couldn't take down Carwin with his first takedown. However Carwin was punched by Gonzaga before being taken down so:

 

Gonzaga + punch > Lesnar

dos Santos > Gonzaga

dos Santos + punch > Lesnar

dos Santos - punch ? Lesnar

Lesnar + punch ? dos Santos

 

dos Santos > Gonzaga +/- punch <> Lesnar

 

The math doesn't lie.

[The Shape]

It is the right short term solution, although it kinda feels like they're trying to milk Lesnar for all he's worth before he jacks it in. You know, TUF ratings, help make JDS a star, take a beating then leave. Who knows, maybe he'll surprise us, and he certainly has more of a chance than against Cain. Just don't see what he personally will gain ability-wise from doing this in the build up to the fight. Perhaps he overpowers JDS then heads into a Cain rematch like a man on a mission, works his striking like a maniac, lets people punch him in the face for fun, and we see a different fight. That would be pretty cool. Was shocked when I saw his UFC striking accuracy was 77%, though presumably that's mostly comprised of ground and pound.

 

Either way, glad JDS took the fight, in fact, I think anyone in his position should be obliged to. Title shots are earned on a circumstantial basis, and if circumstances change, they shouldn't be able to just sit out for a year and further weaken a division lacking a champion. The route Rashad Evans has taken really irks me. If they lose, they lose out big, but that just would prove that going into the title match when it was now able to take place, somebody else was a more deserving challenger.

[Bigpapa42]

From what I know of puroseau, the problems there are not that different from what Japanese MMA is dealing with - a lack of stars. Not lack of talent, but lack of big names that draw in the fans.

[brashleyholland]

Was shocked when I saw his UFC striking accuracy was 77%, though presumably that's mostly comprised of ground and pound.

 

Could be, I'm not sure how they work it out...I guess also he's only had six fights and not thrown a whole lot of punches in comparison to the average fighter, which could skew it.

 

Either way, glad JDS took the fight, in fact, I think anyone in his position should be obliged to. Title shots are earned on a circumstantial basis, and if circumstances change, they shouldn't be able to just sit out for a year and further weaken a division lacking a champion. The route Rashad Evans has taken really irks me. If they lose, they lose out big, but that just would prove that going into the title match when it was now able to take place, somebody else was a more deserving challenger.

 

I see what you mean, and you make a fair point...but from a fighter's point of view there is a big sense of 'moving the goalposts', so to speak. You fight your ass off to earn a spot, then have to take another fight through no fault of your own for less money, less reward etc, and if you lose, bye bye title shot.

 

It's a tough one, there's plenty of 'for and against'. In fairness to Rashad, he did publicly state that he wouldn't wait for Shogun until May/June when they originally thought he'd be back...seems he got corralled into hanging on.

[ampulator]

From what I know of puroseau, the problems there are not that different from what Japanese MMA is dealing with - a lack of stars. Not lack of talent, but lack of big names that draw in the fans.

The problem with building stars, though, at least with MMA, is that, there's a chance that a big or rising star can lose one match and cost his momentum. The same can't happen with wrestling, because the results are... well, you know, for wrestling.