MMA needs more coverage on ESPN.

[MaineDolFan]

I agree with you.  Kimbo is unpolished, but if he gets the training, he can put his physical talents to good use.  ...that's all I'm saying.

(and I think he's a better stand-up striker than either of you are giving him credit for.  ....but we'll see.)

I think the guy has a lot of power.  I don't think he's a bad striker.

[bsmooth]

^^I agree 100%.  Strength, of course, plays a lot into how effective your strikes are.  But so much more of that is form and training.  The hardest punches I've ever taken were from guys that were 50-60 pounds lighter than I am but they have amazing form and knew where to draw their strength.

That said - you put Slice into the ring with someone like Brock Lesner and it wouldn't be pretty.  Lesner would end that fight in under one minute.

Exactly. It takes years of practice to become a great striker. He has been compensating with his strength for years, and now has to be retaught. He is not a spring chicken anymore as he is approaching his 36th birthday too. This guy is no Randy Couture who can define mother nature. I think there are too many younger, and more talented heavyweights coming down the pipeline to waste bouts on a brawler who is rapidly approching his experation date for the sport.

[MaineDolFan]

As a person who has studied the arts for 30+ years and has been involved in MMA fighting on a local level for a long time...I was very upset by Lesner's actions. 

This is a brutal sport.  It's BRUTAL and violent.  You HAVE to maintain a level of humanity about yourself or someone could literally get killed.  It's one thing to "go" until the ref gets in the middle.  That's your job.  You finish it.  But Lesner's opponent was clearly hurt and to mock him after was shocking.  Mir was respectful in a loss.

The guy needs to get his ass whipped.  I don't care whether he loses or not, but someone needs to put a hurting on the guy for three rounds. 

I actually think Fedor Emelianenko might be the guy that could put a hurting on Lesner.  Fedor's training will make it hard for Lesner to get him on the ground and force him to fight from his feet.  That would be the great equalizer.  Tsuyoshi Kohsaka might be someone that could go into the third with Lesner as well.

An interesting name to put into the ring with Lesner would be Bobby Lashley.  His is actually bigger than Lesner, which is amazing in itself.  His amateur wrestling back ground would somewhat offset Lesner's ground attack. 

Fight fans that aren't familiar with Lashley yet...here is what the dude looks like:

[BigDaddyFin]

Lashley used to wrestle but I haven't watched WWE in about 3 years so who knows anymore. 

Also the whole Brock Lesnar incident got it plenty of coverage, it's been all over yahoo but the fight highlights were on ESPN and ESPN News.

[bsmooth]

As a person who has studied the arts for 30+ years and has been involved in MMA fighting on a local level for a long time...I was very upset by Lesner's actions. 

This is a brutal sport.  It's BRUTAL and violent.  You HAVE to maintain a level of humanity about yourself or someone could literally get killed.  It's one thing to "go" until the ref gets in the middle.  That's your job.  You finish it.  But Lesner's opponent was clearly hurt and to mock him after was shocking.  Mir was respectful in a loss.

The guy needs to get his ass whipped.  I don't care whether he loses or not, but someone needs to put a hurting on the guy for three rounds. 

I actually think Fedor Emelianenko might be the guy that could put a hurting on Lesner.  Fedor's training will make it hard for Lesner to get him on the ground and force him to fight from his feet.  That would be the great equalizer.  Tsuyoshi Kohsaka might be someone that could go into the third with Lesner as well.

An interesting name to put into the ring with Lesner would be Bobby Lashley.  His is actually bigger than Lesner, which is amazing in itself.  His amateur wrestling back ground would somewhat offset Lesner's ground attack. 

Fight fans that aren't familiar with Lashley yet...here is what the dude looks like:

This is what you get when you bring in people like Lesner or Kimbo. They are used to their whole carrers being based on a lot of hype.
I want to see a Fedor.Lesner match, and I think after the asinine behavior exhibited by Lesner and the backlash, White will work even harder to make it happen.
As too JTex uninformed ratnings. 1.5 million pay per views were bought for UFC 100, which is on par with some of the great boxing matches over the years, and much more than WWE.

[MaineDolFan]

I guess Lesner was pretty apologetic after he calmed down.  From what I understand he even went to Mir and the two of them talked for almost 90 minutes.  They got along so well that Mir gave Lesner tips of how he telegraphs some movement.  But, again, Mir is a class act.

I can certainly understand a heat of the moment thing.  I've actually heard that Lesner is a pretty decent guy away from the hype. 

I still think Lesner needs to be brought down a notch.

[Sunstroke]

I think it was a bit too over the top, but from a strictly-business perspective, you really can't argue with the strategy of setting yourself up as the bad-ass villain for this sort of thing...

[MaineDolFan]

^^To an extent.  The fringe audience for this sport already has too many perceptions between it and professional wrestling.  MOST of these guys are very classy before and after fights.  Flap your gums leading up to it but show some respect after the fight - at least to the guy you just beat.  His actions set the sport back a little.  "The Rock" would have laughed at "The Undertaker" after beating him during a WWE match.  After these matches the guys usually hug and congratulate each other on a hard fought battle.

[bsmooth]

While I do see how some uninformed or just ignorant people cannot see the difference between WWE and MMA, I would not call a sport that has grown to 1.5 million pay per view subscriptions as "fringe". That is serious numbers.
Man I wish they would get Fedor into the stable and get him fighting again.

[Phishfan]

I don't think he was calling it a fringe sport. He was referring to what most people would call the casual fan when he used the word fringe I think.

I don't put much into this 1.5M PPV audience though since the only real way to catch these big UFC fights is on PPV. Put any other sport in this situation for example football and see how many people pay for the Super Bowl. I guarantee it would be much larger.

[Fau Teixeira]

I don't think he was calling it a fringe sport. He was referring to what most people would call the casual fan when he used the word fringe I think.

I don't put much into this 1.5M PPV audience though since the only real way to catch these big UFC fights is on PPV. Put any other sport in this situation for example football and see how many people pay for the Super Bowl. I guarantee it would be much larger.

how many people pay for NFL sunday ticket .. that's PPV football if i've ever seen it

[Phishfan]

how many people pay for NFL sunday ticket .. that's PPV football if i've ever seen it

I'm not sure but I don't think that is an apples and apples comparison. The first reason is the Sunday Ticket is only available on one carrier. Another reason is because there are several other NFL games on during the same time. If you want live UFC fights you have to get PPV, you don't have to in order to watch several football games in a week. I think the only way to make it a more even comparison is to wait until a big event such as the playoffs and make them only available on PPV which isn't going to happen anytime soon.

[Sunstroke]

Most entities that resort to PPV as their primary media do so because the amount of money they are able to make through sponsorships and commercial ad revenue on mainstream broadcast TV is too small for them to be profitable.  Whether or not MMA fits this mold or not is debatable, but that's generally been the case for PPV usage in the past.

Comparing MMA's appeal in any way to that of the NFL, NBA or MLB seems fairly ridiculous though. It'd be like a skateboard company comparing itself to Chevrolet because they both have wheels.

MMA is better than the totally staged wrestling crap that's out there, no doubt about it...but I'd much rather watch a good heavyweight boxing match (oh where, oh where have they gone?) than an MMA brawl any time.

[bsmooth]

I don't think he was calling it a fringe sport. He was referring to what most people would call the casual fan when he used the word fringe I think.

I don't put much into this 1.5M PPV audience though since the only real way to catch these big UFC fights is on PPV. Put any other sport in this situation for example football and see how many people pay for the Super Bowl. I guarantee it would be much larger.

This number is being compared to pvp sales for championship boxing matches, which you can only see by paying, so it is an apples to apples comparison.

[Tepop84]

So Fedor and his management are retarded and it looks like we will never see Fedor compete against the best in the world. Probably better for him, he built his record beating hacks in japan and UFC has beens and I think he will get torn apart in the UFC.  I don't really like Lesnar that much, but I think he would wipe the floor with Fedor.  He is just too strong. 

Look at Fedors highlights http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HXoOcP20hjU&feature=fvw all he does is fight fat fuckers or weak pussys.  They just lay on the ground and let fedor do whatever he wants to them.