Commentary
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(At least some people still do work for their half a mill, son.)
Before his bout with Andrei Arlovski on Saturday night, Roy Nelson said he wasn’t completely sure who was signing his check. Now we not only know it was Affliction, but we also know that “Big Country” and Arlovski made a combined $580,000 to represent the clotheir-turned-promoter on CBS. The bulk of that money — $500,000 with no win bonus — went to Arlovski for his impressive knockout victory. Even for Affliction, who likes throwing around money almost as much as they love skulls and chains, that’s a hefty price to pay to put one fight on someone else’s show. So was it worth it?
Aside from the exposure for their fighters, Affliction got their ban lifted long enough to throw their logos on the cage and get a few commercials in during the broadcast. As MMA Payout pointed out, that might say more about CBS’ ad sales for this show than it does for Affliction’s arrangement with Elite XC, but either way now there are a few million more people in the world who know about the Andrei Arlovski signature t-shirt line, and every little bit helps.
There’s also the matter of the aggressively vague “Fedor Will Return” ads (was anyone else reminded of the “Gabbo is coming!” ads from The Simpsons?). Beyond heaping more indignity on Tim Sylvia’s loss by pointing out that almost the entire fight can fit in one network TV spot, it does help get the word out to casual fight fans. The only problem is that when you don’t have a date or event to hype, you have to wonder what that’s really worth.
Affliction had a great opportunity with those ads to really advance public knowledge of their MMA organization. Instead they hyped their shirts and failed to tell us when and how we could pay them money to see their marquee fighter perform. I suppose you have to know that information yourself before you can pass it on to others, but isn’t that just one more reason for them to get moving on this January event?
Affliction VP Tom Atencio said before this event that one of his primary motivations was using the Elite XC CBS broadcast as an opportunity to showcase Andrei Arlovski. Hopefully he was happy with what he saw, since that was half a million dollars worth of showcasing. But I have to wonder if it’s going to have the desired effect.
To hardcore MMA fans, the Arlovski-Nelson fight proved two things: 1) Arlovski is still vulnerable on the ground (if not for an odd stand-up he might have found his way into a kimura in the first round), and 2) Arlovski’s striking is every bit as dangerous as it has looked in his last few fights. In other words, we learned nothing new. He beat someone he was supposed to beat. He looked good doing it, and you might even say he made his case as the most talented and explosive fighter on the card, but a knockout win over Nelson wasn’t exactly shocking.
Casual fans — who may know Arlovski from his UFC days and may not — probably didn’t know enough about Roy Nelson to know that Arlovski’s win was still significant. To them, it most likely looked like a muscular werewolf beating up on a fat guy. A knockout always gets people’s attention no matter what, but will they remember that moment in January, when Affliction finally gets a card together?
You have to admire Affliction’s willingness to lend their fighters out, and I’m sure Arlovski and Nelson both appreciated the opportunity to make some cash after the October 11 event was “rescheduled.” But you have to wonder how long Affliction can spend this kind of money without seeing much in return. With economists talking recession, you also have to wonder whether $50 t-shirts won’t be the first thing to get cut from the average person’s budget.
Written by admin on October 6th, 2008 with comments disabled.
Read more articles on fight and Affliction and Roy Nelson and General and fedor and Andrei Arlovski and Commentary and MMA.
(Just another day in the organization for Jared Shaw.)
The Kimbo Slice fairy tale is over now. At least it ought to be. The “street certified” brawler got himself knocked out in fourteen seconds by a guy who calls himself a “part-time fighter.” A guy who isn’t in the same weight class and isn’t thought of as anything more than a mediocre also-ran in the weight class he normally calls home. To call this a worst case scenario for Elite XC is putting it too mildly. This is an absolute disaster. Which means, of course, that they will now try to convince us that it is not.
Announcer Mauro Ranallo got that ball rolling almost immediately after the fight by suggesting that this should be considered a “mulligan” for Kimbo, since he didn’t plan on fighting Petruzelli. Do we dare mention that Petruzelli also didn’t plan on fighting Kimbo, a heavyweight, in the main event? Apparently not. Instead we start playing up the predictable Rocky Balboa angle, forgetting for the moment that Rocky fought Apollo Creed, the world champion. Unlike Kimbo, the fictional Apollo was both style and substance, and he didn’t go down to a tentative jab.
This is the point where Elite XC makes excuses for Kimbo and tells us that a star is born in Petruzelli. Just watch Jared Shaw working from this script in his interview with Ariel Helwani and see if you don’t find yourself feeling a little sorry for him. His cringe-worthy performance includes transparent lies such as, “it’s just another day in the organization,” and “(Pertruzelli) is a very promotable guy; everybody in this sport is promotable,” and my personal favorite, “we’re gathering all our other nuts.”
This, from the same guy who could be seen having a total meltdown at cageside while Kimbo was getting pounded out on live network TV.
The person who seemed least bothered by last night’s events was Kimbo Slice himself. He hyped his after-party in the post-fight interview and showed up forty-five minutes late to the press conference, where he interrupted Elite XC Head of Operations Jeremy Lappen and made a very brief statement, laughing about his swollen eye, and then disappeared again.
Lappen came to his defense, saying,
“I think Kimbo’s a huge star. Again he’s been thrust onto the scene. People are interested in watching him. And I think people will continue to be interested in watching him. …He showed heart. And stepped up on an hour notice and backed up anyone, anyplace, anytime.”
It’s interesting that Lappen uses the passive voice there. Kimbo has “been thrust onto the scene.” That’s true. Lappen conveniently ignores who did the thrusting, though.
As for the “anyone, anytime” rhetoric, it flies in the face of rumors that Elite XC had to sweeten the financial pot just to get a reluctant Kimbo to accept the fight against the 205-pounder Petruzelli. The backstage CBS interview alone revealed a very unhappy fighter who exuded anything but confidence and enthusiasm before the fight.
Kimbo was exposed on Saturday night, sure. But he wasn’t exposed as anything other than what most of us already thought he was: an amateur fighter rushed into the spotlight by desperate, unscrupulous promoters. It was Elite XC who was truly exposed. They built their reputation on Kimbo’s curious brand of celebrity, and fate conspired to grind their cash cow into hamburger.
Their strategy was to only make fights that Kimbo could win, then shout his name from the rooftops when he did. Last night they got a lesson in the unpredictability of MMA. Now they’re left shouting excuses. They found out the hard way that you can only play the squash match shell game for so long before a former karate champ comes along and ruins it.
They can call it a mulligan for Kimbo and they can try and turn it into a big push for the very average Petruzelli. But the best thing they can do is learn from this catastrophe. Where they go from here, with respect to both Kimbo and Petruzelli, should tell us whether they have.
(-Ben Fowlkes)
Written by admin on October 5th, 2008 with comments disabled.
Read more articles on CBS and Interview and Jared Shaw and Jeremy Lappen and Seth Petruzelli and Elite XC and fight and Kimbo Slice and Commentary and knockout and press conference and MMA.
I don’t know why I was so discouraged to hear that Elite XC had decided to match Kimbo Slice against Ken Shamrock, with a Brett Rogers option reserved for some possible version of the future. I should have expected this. I guess I’m just too much of an optimist. I thought Elite XC might try for a competitive, somewhat meaningful fight instead. I’ll never learn.
It’s not that I don’t understand what Elite XC is thinking. If anything, that part is all too obvious. They want a name to put on the marquee next to Kimbo’s. Someone with drawing power, yes, but not someone who stands a good chance of winning. Preferably, they’d also like the next Kimbo victim to be susceptible to knockout. So they called on Shamrock, an over-the-hill legend who has been getting KO’d by a list of fighters that starts out fairly impressive and then gets less and less so as we near the present. He’s perfect, given their priorities, but that only tells us how screwed up their priorities are.
But it’s not just Shamrock-Slice. Look at another high profile Elite XC fighter, Gina Carano. Instead of matching her up against “Cyborg” Santos — a fight they were already hyping by the end of Santos’ victory at “Unfinished Business” — they’ve decided to put Carano up against Kelly Kobald, who’s coming off two straight losses. They’re not even bothering to try and come up with a compelling explanation for it, just ask Pro Elite CEO Chuck Champion:
“It’s giving both an opportunity to further develop their fan bases and develop further excitement around the potential of them coming together,” Chuck Champion, CEO of ProElite, which runs the EliteXC brand, told MMAjunkie.com (www.mmajunkie.com). “If Chris destroys another opponent, people are really going to be clamoring, especially if Gina gets in and clobbers hers. It’s just really about letting the fighters develop, letting them grow in their skills and their character development in order for them to eventually meet one another.”
In other words, they’d rather string us along with a few squash matches first. The fact that they aren’t even intended to be competitive, that doesn’t seem to bother Elite XC. And that’s what’s really disappointing.
This begs the question, what are we watching for? Is it to see a good fight, or just a good beating? Is it because we want to know who wins, or because we want to know how bad it can get?
The worst of it is that Elite XC is squandering a great opportunity. They think that people will tune in to CBS, see Kimbo beat down Shamrock and Carano demolish Kobald, and then we’ll all be foaming at the mouth to see a pay-per-view where they actually make legitimate fights for a change. But what they’re really doing is intentionally putting an inferior product on live network TV. Someone please tell me, how does that help them build a fan base?
Maybe it wouldn’t be so irritating if they weren’t so glib about it. Elite XC has got to be the only MMA promotion in the world where being a talented fighter can keep you out of the main event. The sole reason Brett Rogers isn’t getting his shot at Kimbo on CBS is because he might win. You can’t even argue that it has to do with his lack of name recognition among casual fans, not after they put Kimbo against James Thompson in their first CBS offering.
It’s not that Shamrock can’t win, either. Any guy who knows his way around a submission the way he does always has a chance. But we all know who Elite XC wants to see come out on top, and that’s not how a fight promotion is supposed to work. Not if it wants to be taken seriously, anyway.
They know what they’re doing with these purposely one-sided fights, and they know that we know. Either they think it’s what we want, or they don’t care. Neither option is very encouraging.
(-Ben Fowlkes)
Written by admin on August 25th, 2008 with comments disabled.
Read more articles on Elite XC and fight and CBS and Chuck Champion and Gina Carano Cyborg Santos and Brett Rogers and Pro Elite and UFC and Kimbo Slice and Ken Shamrock and Commentary and MMA.
With the WEC’s next event just around the corner, media coverage has started to ramp up this week. As it does, the one thing that becomes increasingly clear is that the organization’s top fighters are mostly just pissed off that they aren’t in the UFC. USA Today wrote about the UFC’s uncertain attitude regarding the future of the promotion, including a quote from Marc Ratner that reflects what seems to the consensus opinion over at Zuffa:
“There is talk about having the heavier guys come on over (to UFC), and maybe anything under 145 (pounds, the featherweight limit) would be WEC and above 145 would be UFC,” says UFC vice president Marc Ratner. “It hasn’t been put into place yet.”
In the same article, Carlos Condit describes the UFC as “the big show” and says he hopes to move on up. Jamie Varner made similar comments to Sherdog, saying:
“I still got all the doubters out there, and that’s motivation to me,” Varner said. “All the people out there saying this guy in the UFC would beat you or this guy in Dream would kill you. I want to beat everyone that Zuffa puts in front of me and hopefully one day get my opportunity to fight a B.J. Penn and show the world what I’m made of.”
Ordinarily it would be a bad thing to have all your top fighters publicly stating their desire to go and fight somewhere else, but this only reinforces how smart it was of Zuffa to purchase the WEC and use them as a sort of minor league, as well as how dumb it would be to turn it into nothing but featherweights and bantamweights.
What I like about the WEC is that Zuffa has them available for free on a small cable station (Versus), but they still put on great fights between quality competitors. It’s a given that no one wants to stick around, much like minor league baseball. And just as there’s a very different, but still very real pleasure to watching minor league baseball, the same can be said of the WEC.
That’s why it would be a shame to see them turn it into nothing more than their repository for the lighter weight classes. That just privileges the larger fighters who would get to go to the big time simply because of their weight — Brian Stann, for example — while ignoring supremely talented guys like Urijah Faber.
I’d really like to see Zuffa go all the way with the minor-league format for the WEC. Keep all the weight classes, bring at least the top featherweights to the UFC, and make it a little more equitable across the board. That way people will really know what to think of the WEC. Instead of it being home to really great featherweights and lower, along with heavier guys who aren’t ready for the UFC, it could be all guys who aren’t ready for the UFC.
Imagine how much more fun it would be to watch guys mature in the WEC and then get called up to the UFC for their big chance. Not to mention, it’s much easier to promote them when you already own footage of their previous fights.
While they’re at it, maybe add a wacky mascot and some special theme events like “nickel beer night.” Just saying. It couldn’t hurt (yes it could).
Written by admin on July 31st, 2008 with comments disabled.
Read more articles on Versus and Jamie Varner and Brian Stann and Marc Ratner and fight and Urijah Faber and Carlos Condit and UFC and WEC and Zuffa and Commentary and MMA.
As you may or may not know, Americans are freaking out about the state of the economy right now. Something about gas prices and houses and the value of the dollar, I don’t really pay attention. I leave most of my financial planning to this really nice homeless guy I met a while back. We just diversified my portfolio to include both kinds of vodka: flavored and unflavored. Things are looking up.
Jerry Magee of the San Diego Union-Tribune (via MMA Payout) has an interesting article linking the rough economic times with a booming combat sports environment. Just as boxing thrived during the Great Depression, he says, MMA is experiencing a similar boost these days:
In periods when Americans are up against it, they crave distractions. Boxing and MMA are among them, as Armando Garcia is aware. At Pechanga, Garcia, executive officer of the California Athletic Commission, said he was rummaging around his Sacramento office and he came across a report for the fiscal year 1925 that showed the commission’s revenues for that year (from licensing fees and the commission’s share of gates) had come to just more than $100,000.
In 2004-2005, the commission’s revenues, according to Garcia, totaled $441,000. For 2005-2006, Garcia’s first in office, they reached $1.1 million. They hit $1.6 by the next reporting date. For the fiscal year just concluding, they are at $2.136 million, with boxing and MMA each having generated more than a half-million at the gates.
It’s an interesting theory. Quoting statistics on live event gates doesn’t necessarily prove it, especially since MMA has only recently come into its own as a mainstream sport with widespread appeal and acceptance, but it’s still worth thinking about. Magee’s thesis about hard times leading to a strong desire for distractions makes you wonder, what does he think Americans are doing when times are good? Staying home and staring at their bank statements?
Okay, so maybe when times are good they’re taking vacations and buying boats and taking their mistresses out to fancy dinners — all the stuff I imagine rich people do. But entertainment is popular pretty much all the time, and it would seem that the entertainment industry does better when people can afford the cost and the leisure time to enjoy it.
Just recently MMA super-agent and Adrenaline MMA promoter Monte Cox blamed the slow economy and high gas prices on the poor attendance to his organization’s inaugural event, and that reasoning also seemed sound. So which is it?
Is there something about the desperate struggle of fighting that attracts desperate poor people? Or are poor people more likely to stay home and fight their family members over the last can of beans? Either way, as long as they keep buying that vodka my future is secure. See you at the yacht club, suckers.
Written by admin on July 23rd, 2008 with comments disabled.
Read more articles on hobos and gas prices and poor people and rich people and vodka and economy and Adrenaline MMA and Commentary and UFC and Monte Cox and General and fight and MMA.
The official judges’ tallies, from Dave Meltzer via Fightlinker:
Adalaide Byrd
Round 1: 10-9 Griffin
Round 2: 10-8 Griffin
Round 3: 10-9 Griffin
Round 4: 10-9 Jackson
Round 5: 10-9 Jackson
Nelson Hamilton
Round 1: 10-9 Jackson
Round 2: 10-8 Griffin
Round 3: 10-9 Griffin
Round 4: 10-9 Jackson
Round 5: 10-9 Griffin
Roy Silbert
Round 1: 10-9 Griffin
Round 2: 10-9 Griffin
Round 3: 10-9 Griffin
Round 4: 10-9 Jackson
Round 5: 10-9 Griffin
Personally, I don’t agree that Rampage was “robbed” in this decision whatsoever — I think Griffin clearly controlled rounds 1, 2, and 5 — but for all three judges to give round 3 to the challenger is very questionable; Rampage found his distance in that round and started landing his lead-fisted punch combos. But then again, all three judges gave round 4 to Jackson, which I saw as a very close frame that could have been scored for Griffin due to his triangle attempt, which came within a ball-hair of finishing the fight. I’m sure the argument will rage on, but there’s one thing we can all agree on: These judges are totally incompetent. Where’s Cecil Peoples when you need him?
As if there was any doubt, Rampage vs. Forrest won UFC 86’s Fight of the Night bonus, with both headliners picking up $60,000 for their event-saving performance. As mentioned earlier, Knockout of the Night went to Melvin Guillard for his 36-second destruction of Dennis Siver, and Submission of the Night went to Cole Miller for choking out Jorge Gurgel; those bonuses were also worth $60k. Full payout info to come as soon as we have it…
Written by admin on July 6th, 2008 with comments disabled.
Read more articles on UFC 86 and Melvin Guillard and decision and Rampage and scorecards and judges and Commentary and Dennis Siver and Quinton Jackson and UFC and Cole Miller and Forrest Griffin and News and Jorge Gurgel and MMA.
(Quit staring, sicko. Photo courtesy of Combat Lifestyle.)
Steve Cofield has an interesting piece on Yahoo! wherein he lambasts the “sickos in the blogosphere” for reveling in Kim Couture’s pain after her fight in Las Vegas on Friday night. The main thrust of the article is Cofield trying to figure out what went wrong that allowed Couture to suffer a broken jaw, among other injuries, and still fight for three rounds. Cofield describes Couture as “ill-equipped to defend herself” and says that many fans left the arena that night “sickened” by what they saw.
This argument raises an obvious double standard regarding men’s and women’s MMA. Kim Couture isn’t the first fighter to suffer a broken jaw. She’s not the first to keep fighting with one either. The fact that she did so speaks to her toughness, and if she were a man we probably wouldn’t feel the need to say anything more about it than that.
But that’s not what’s happening, simply because she’s a woman. Suddenly, what would have been gutsy becomes sickening. We start looking around for someone to blame, rather than reminding ourselves that this is a tough business where people routinely get hurt and fight hurt.
It’s especially interesting that while Cofield’s show of indignation has him questioning Randy Couture’s decision not to throw in the towel, the promoter’s decision to have the women fight three five-minute rounds (normally reserved for men), and the commission’s decision to allow her to fight at all, he never even mentions that on the same card John Alessio broke his arm and then continued on to win the fight.
This makes me wonder what we’re really talking about here. It can’t be just broken bones. Not unless you believe in a hierarchy of broken bones that places more importance on the jaw than the forearm or nose or hand or any of the other bones that are occasionally broken in MMA fights.
If you go to enough live events, you’re eventually going to see someone get their jaw broken. You know why? Because MMA is a sport that involves people punching and kicking one another, often in the face. Broken bones are inevitable from time to time. Is it dangerous to keep fighting with a broken jaw? Probably. But fighting is inherently dangerous. This is nothing new.
What this is about is a visceral reaction, not an intellectual one. I think Cofield — who knows his stuff regarding MMA — is really objecting to seeing a woman hurt, which means he’s essentially objecting to seeing them fight.
It isn’t as if Kim Couture was matched up with someone out of her league. According to Sherdog, that was Kim Rose’s first pro fight, just as it was Couture’s. And it isn’t about the fact that she continued after being hurt, either.
Couture put forth a valiant effort even after being drilled early on. She even dished out some punishment of her own, despite Cofield’s characterization of the fight as egregiously one-sided. If she was unable to continue, she could have quit. She had a cornerman with plenty of experience in this business, so one has to assume that he knew what he was looking at.
It’s also not about how long the rounds lasted. If we grant that women can fight, there’s no sense in saying they can’t fight for as long as men can. Couture’s injury likely happened from the very first punch of the fight, so making the rounds two minutes shorter wouldn’t have made a significant difference.
If we take away all those red herrings, what we’re left with is an objection to seeing women engaged in violent pursuits. To some extent, I can understand that. As much as I believe that men and women are equals, it’s still more difficult for me to see a woman get hurt than a man. But you know something? That’s my problem, not theirs.
It’s my problem the same way it’s the problem of the people who object to MMA in general. To a certain kind of person, anything that results in people getting hurt, risking death, or shortening life is something to be feared and abhorred. But we recognize that while those people have a right to that viewpoint, they don’t have the right to inflict it on others who would rather get hurt, risk death, and shorten their lives than be forced to live without it.
This is the argument we make in favor of MMA. Why wouldn’t we make it in favor of women’s MMA?
Those women who choose to become MMA fighters are doing it because they want to. They’re doing it for the same reasons male fighters do it. We should at least extend them the same courtesy, whether we like it or not.
(-Ben Fowlkes)
Written by admin on June 24th, 2008 with comments disabled.
Read more articles on General and fight and Kim Couture and Commentary and Randy Couture and MMA.
(Silva, Machida, & Silva: Attorneys at Brawl)
Via FiveOunces:
According to the June 23 print edition of the Wrestling Observer, [Wanderlei] Silva’s likely next opponent is undefeated light heavyweight prospect Thiago Silva. The bout could take place in October despite the fact that Wanderlei Silva has reportedly asked not to be scheduled to fight again until December.
The Observer indicated that Wanderlei Silva was given a choice of facing either Thiago Silva or Lyoto Machida. A specific reason for why Thiago Silva is considered the more likely option than Machida was not given, although Dave Meltzer indicated that the UFC is having trouble finding willing opponents for Machida.
Damn son, this Machida got everyone shook! But I ain’t mad: With their similarly aggressive styles, Wandy vs. Thiago has the potential to be a fantastic fight. Still, the UFC will eventually have to throw one of the Silvas at Machida, because it seems that only a hyper-aggro fighter who’d be willing to literally chase Machida around the cage (and absorb some damage in the process) would stand a chance of beating him. In the meantime, the UFC needs to go to their hungry/struggling 205-pounders and demand that they fight Machida; preferably, their LHWs who are sloppy enough for Machida to submit or knock out (lookin’ at you, Lambert). The Dragon will almost surely be fighting for UFC’s light-heavyweight title one day — it’s time to start getting him over with fans, and he’ll need to finish some fights before that happens.
Written by admin on June 24th, 2008 with comments disabled.
Read more articles on General and Rumors and light-heavyweights and Commentary and Thiago Silva and UFC and Wanderlei Silva and Lyoto Machida and MMA.
(’Oh bicep, you’re the only one I can truly depend on.’)
Watching Dana White drop the hammer on Jesse Taylor during last night’s super-shocking episode of “The Ultimate Fighter”, I have to say I was filled with mixed emotions.
On one hand, everything White said to him seemed justified. He can’t have someone representing the UFC who is incapable of controlling himself after downing a few drinks. Not only does it create a bad image, but as White pointed out, this is what Jesse is like after merely fighting his way into the finals. If he’s out of control without really even winning anything yet, what’s he going to be like in six months?
Aside from Dana’s assertion that Las Vegas is “his town”, his admonition of Jesse and the punishment he handed down seemed completely appropriate.
But then I had a flashback to earlier episodes. I recalled images of Jesse drinking and breaking things, peeing his pants, and generally acting up. That’s when I had to wonder, what’s the fundamental difference between destroying a house that doesn’t belong to you and kicking out a limousine window? Hadn’t they been content to show Jesse’s antics — which you could also argue reflect poorly on the UFC and its fighters — for weeks?
This is what’s difficult for me to grasp. What, exactly, is so unforgivable about Jesse’s Las Vegas rampage that differentiates it from what he did in the house? Is it because he did it in public? Was it the fact that he “terrorized the female guests”? My point is there seems to be a very hazy line being drawn here. No one knows exactly where it is until they cross it.
I’m not saying that Jesse should be given a free pass just because the UFC allowed him to do plenty of other dumb things before this. But this is a good opportunity for the UFC to reflect on what they expect out of their fighters all the time.
There’s something hypocritical about encouraging this type of behavior when you think it makes for good TV, and then suddenly taking the high ground when it happens after the show. After we all watched Jesse Taylor piss his pants for the second time, how surprised can we be that he went crazy out on the town in Las Vegas? Where I come from, urinating on yourself is a pretty clear warning sign that maybe you have trouble controlling yourself when you drink. After that, property damage and the terrorization of female guests is right around the corner.
I understand why they want the guys to drink and get crazy in the house. It alleviates some of the monotony of the show, and it’s entertaining in a cathartic/idiotic way. I also understand why they don’t want their fighters acting like that once they’re off the show. But those are two incongruent goals, and the UFC knows it. Sooner or later, they’re going to have choose between them.
(-Ben Fowlkes)
Written by admin on June 19th, 2008 with comments disabled.
Read more articles on Commentary and Jesse Taylor and Dana White and UFC and The Ultimate Fighter and MMA.
I don’t believe in telling fighters they should retire. Not really. When fans and writers insist that a legend of the sport should give it up it always seems so hollow. What do we know about what someone like that should do with their lives?
But even I have to admit that Kazushi Sakuraba’s beating at the hands of Melvin Manhoef in Dream.4 this weekend was difficult to watch. I’ve always had a soft spot for Sakuraba. He embodied so many of the best fighter attributes. He was tough and resilient, and at the same time he was also crafty and dangerous. He always seemed like he was having fun, even on his worst nights.
That’s why it’s so hard to see him continue past his prime. He’s obviously not having fun these days. His efforts are joyless and perfunctory, like a man waiting on his pension. And yet, for some reason, he can’t seem to walk away.
I used to wonder what it was that made pro athletes hold on too long. Almost everyone does it. The difference is that a baseball player who’s too old and too slow gets sent to the minors. A basketball player who can’t keep up gets cut.
But with fighters it’s a different story. They either step down significantly in competition, or they start taking some bad beatings. Sakuraba has done both. The former may harm his legacy somewhat, but it’s nothing compared to what the latter will do to you.
Once I got the chance to interview Ken Shamrock and I asked him why it was so difficult to retire from pro fighting. He had recently lost yet another fight to Tito Ortiz, and though neither of us knew it at the time he had still worse moments left in him.
What he said made a lot of sense to me. He said that in order to be a high-level fighter in the first place you have to be the kind of guy who can keep pushing though anything. You have to be able to break your hand in the middle of a fight and still keep punching. You have to believe that you can walk through fire.
The problem, he said, is that as you get older your physical gifts atrophy much faster than the mental ones. You’re still as tough and determined, but not as quick or as strong. You get hurt and you think it’s just another injury, like the ones you’ve overcome before, only it never heals quite right. That’s when the fighter’s mind — once among his greatest assets — becomes a detriment. His virtues are also his faults.
This is exactly what’s happening to Sakuraba. A normal man would have retired by now. But a normal man never could have taken those knees from Ricardo Arona. Sakuraba is not a normal man. This much is clear. Quitting is such a foreign concept to him. How can a guy like that retire?
But if he doesn’t retire you have to wonder where this path will lead him. The beatings he takes now could stay with him the rest of his life. Much like Larry Holmes said he hated having to pound Muhammad Ali, who had been his idol, Manhoef also expressed regret for what he did to Sakuraba. There may be no sadder scenario in the world of professional fighting than that one.
Sakuraba’s future is his decision. If he’s earned anything in his illustrious career, it’s the right to go on too long if that’s what he wants. I just hope he knows that he doesn’t have to.
(-Ben Fowlkes)
Written by admin on June 16th, 2008 with comments disabled.
Read more articles on fight and DREAM and Melvin Manhoef and General and sakuraba and Ken Shamrock and Commentary and MMA.
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