Category: MMA Editorial

UFC 300: Edwards vs. Muhammad was never the plan | Love to see it

Posted on by Zane Simon in MMA Editorial, MMA News, UFC Editorial

Every week a different lesson. Some good, some bad. MMA is not just a sport of chaos, it seems to throw up odd results in all areas. Everything from politics, to corporate branding, to philosophy, mixed martial arts finds a way in and a way to make things weird.

This week, we’ve got Alexander Volkanovski farming a little free range humility, and the UFC finding something of interest for their blockbuster PPV. We’ve also got Ian Garry working outside the box, and Rampage Jackson chasing ghosts. Storm clouds and silver linings aplenty.

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Volk has no excuses for UFC 298 loss

If fighting is in our DNA, as Dana White likes to say, then excuse making is—at the very least—a well embraced tradition handed down from our ancestors. That’s especially true in the fight game, where maintaining an unbreakable confidence is every bit as important as reckoning with mistakes, learning, and improving. The fighter who steps into the cage thinking about how they might lose, often already has.

That said, it’s always nice to see a little public humility in the face of defeat, especially from an all time great like Alexander Volkanovski. So many people in combat sports can’t resist the urge to make their private thoughts about how they were done dirty, had a bad camp, were dealing with some injuries, or just plain ‘didn’t actually lose’ part of the public conversation.

Speaking to reporters after UFC 298, Volkanovski made his case for a rematch with Ilia Topuria. A fight he even believes he’ll win (really can’t beat fighters for self confidence). But he also made sure in that request to make it absolutely clear that when it came to his opponent’s work at UFC 298, the new champ earned every ounce of his victory.

“You can’t take anything away from Topuria,” Volkanovski admitted (transcript via MMA Fighting). “If he puts a hand on you like that, you’re going to go down. I don’t care, that’s just that.

“That was a clean right hand and I think no matter who you are, you let one of those land on your chin while you’re caught there, you’re probably going down. Don’t let him catch you, that’s what that was. He caught me, so I won’t take nothing away from him. I’m not going to sit there and say it was this or it was that. I felt great. Camp was great. I felt good in there.”

I’d argue that it’d be nice if Volkanovski’s coach could find a little of that energy too—Joe Lopez recently told the Daily Mail that all Topuria did was capitalize on a “puncher’s chance”—but then again part of his job is to keep his fighter pumped up and confident. Who wants to train under someone that firmly believes their upcoming opponent is going to beat their ass?

I hope Volk takes some time off after this loss, maybe even takes another fight before running back to a rematch. But, there’s no question he’s earned the right to get one. At least in the meantime he’s willing to give Topuria his moment in the sun. It truly was well earned.

Edwards vs. Muhammad never on the UFC 300 radar

I know this seems like it should be a ‘hate to see it’ post, since Belal Muhammad has unquestionably earned his UFC title shot. But I can’t pretend that I’m unhappy the UFC wasn’t trying to book this fight for the UFC 300 main event.

A co-main? Sure. A future PPV headliner? Absolutely. But the UFC is one of the most creativity and fun bereft fight promotions to ever grace God’s green earth. This company can barely put a 4-man tournament together without courting disaster. They’ve built their reputation on structure and dependability—as well as the biggest roster of fighting talent ever assembled under one roof—getting wild isn’t in their lexicon.

That said, the least fans should be able to expect is that for a few rare PPV cards, the world’s largest MMA promotion will do its best to go all out. UFC 100, UFC 200? These were cards where the UFC tried their best to pull out all the stops; to book the biggest, wildest, and most interesting fights they could. Sure UFC 200 hit some stumbling blocks, ultimately, but not for any lack of trying.

Otherwise, at least once a year, fans expect that the International Fight Week card will be a ‘can’t miss’ event. Now that the UFC is going to Madison Square Garden every fall as well, that seems like it’s becoming another major target. The rest of the schedule can be business as usual. But the big shows should feel big.

Say what you will about Leon Edwards vs. Belal Muhammad, but that is not one of the most exciting fights the UFC can make. It’s not even all the fault of ‘Remember the Name’ either. Edwards’ penchant for considered caution and patient outfighting has rarely made him a must-see action fighter. I can’t remember the last time I’ve been ‘hyped’ for a Leon Edwards fight, even if I was sure it would be interesting.

It’s under that frame that I’m happy to see a recent report from the Schmo—which was retweeted by Muhammad himself—confirming that while Edwards was offered multiple fights for the UFC 300 main event, none of them were against the longtime Roufusport product.

Is Jamahal Hill vs. Alex Pereira anywhere near the level of Brock Lesnar vs. Frank Mir, Jon Jones vs. Daniel Cormier 2, or Nate Diaz vs. Conor McGregor 2? Hell no, it absolutely is not. But Edwards vs. Muhammad 2 is the kind of main event that the promotion used to put on Fox. It’s almost an active detriment as a headliner for a card where the UFC is expected to actually try and deliver something more than just ‘guys fighting’. It’s honestly a relief they found something else after a 2023 where it often felt like they settled for less.

HATE TO SEE IT

Rampage Jackson has more big plans

A big portion of Rampage Jackson’s MMA career popularity was wrapped up in the juxtaposition between the violence he was capable of displaying in the cage, and the comedy he was capable of manufacturing outside of it. For a man best known for powerbombing an opponent into unconsciousness, he was a complete ham in press conferences and interviews.

If his late career was anything to judge from, however, the success he experienced as a competitor was a key component to making his personality work. Win a couple of major titles and most MMA fans were willing to excuse the repeated public groping or the energy drink fueled recklessness. By comparison his late career run in Bellator was mostly just boring, both in and out of fighting.

It was something of a surprise then, when Jackson emerged with a hit podcast last year in partnership with JAXXON.com (an apparently unaffiliated jewelry company). The company seems to be taking good advantage of the former fighter’s charismatic personality, which in turn seems to be stoking a return to the ring.

Jackson is all set to box Shannon Briggs on June 1st in Qatar. From the sound of things, however, that’s just the first in a number of old grudges the former UFC champion hopes to hash out.

“I can’t believe Wanderlei said that,” Rampage said, responding to some recent trash talk from Wanderlei Silva, where the recent UFC Hall of Fame inductee quipped that he would “hang [Jackson] on the ropes again” if they were to rematch (interview via MMA Mania). “I might have to talk to Rashad Evans. I might have to push Wanderlei’s ass whooping up some. I’mma beat his motherf—king ass for saying some s—t like that.

“That was totally disrespectful. When I called him out, I called him out very respectfully. I’m gonna talk to S.D.K. (Suleyman D. Khan) and Hossama [Khan] about getting the fight over in Qatar after I knock the s—t out of Shannon. I’m gonna ask them, ‘Can I beat the f—k out of Wanderlei next after I fulfill my fulfilments with ‘Titties’ (Schoonover)’? I want f—kin’ Wanderlei in Qatar.”

Shannon Briggs, Wanderlei Silva, Darrill Schoonover, Rashad Evans??? Does anyone want to see this 45-year-old man’s personal petty business tour? We saw Rampage vs. Wanderlei 4 six years ago at Bellator 206, and it sucked. Just 2 rounds of swing-n-cling from a couple dudes that looked like they’d only barely gotten back in shape to take the fight before Wanderlei got TKO’d.

I’m glad Rampage has found a spot, post-fighting, where he can make use of his voice and charisma. But for a guy who could barely find the motivation to compete into his late 30s, it’s really hard to get hyped to see him jump on the celebrity boxing circuit in his mid-40s. Especially not if it’s just to extend his media beefs from past glory days.

Ian Garry studying NFL footwork

Cross training has become something of a fad, not just in MMA, but across the sporting landscape. Tales of NBA players learning to kickbox, NFL players getting in some MMA rounds, all sorts of insanity. I suppose it makes sense, really. Few athletes grow up playing just one game, and all of them love to put their bodies on the line in physical competition.

Whether it actually does them any good or not? That’s a whole different question. One of the notable things about classic sports training is the focus on raw repetition and discipline. Want to learn how to dribble a basketball? Spend a whole hell of a lot of time dribbling. Want to learn how to throw punches in combination, get on that pad work. There’s no better way to learn than to learn by doing, and it has to be wondered how much outside influence just becomes distraction—even if it’s technically getting someone a good workout.

Which brings me to UFC 298 and Ian Garry’s recent reveal that one of the things he did in prep for fighting Geoff Neal was to study NFL footwork. I can’t help but wonder why.

“It’s like, I gotta keep moving and keep on my toes, because the minute he gets planted, he has so much power,” Garry told the MMA Hour in a recent interview (transcript via MMA Fighting). “So that movement has to be constant the entire fight, shifting from left to right, left to right. … I was studying a lot of NFL wide receivers, people like [Cincinnati Bengals wide receiver] Ja’marr Chase and [Minnesota Vikings wide receiver] Justin Jefferson, and the way they get off the line, and they throw off the corners, purely based on the ability of trying to trick the movement, or trick the eyes into which direction you’re going to move and you’re going to go, and I used that a lot in this fight of, just switching really quickly to make them think I’m going to go right, then go left.

“And next time I’ll change it up a little bit differently, maybe still go left, throw him a lot of feints. That was really important for me, to just keep that consistent, constant movement to unsettle Geoff and make it hard for him to have success.”

The goals of footwork off the line in the NFL (or downfield) and the goals of footwork in combat sports are entirely different. A wide receiver is all about creating as much space and time as possible to become and remain an open receiver or at least a solid decoy. Fighting is all about the maintenance of ideal range. It’s not enough just to get away from someone, a fighter has to stay close enough to hit their opponent as well.

On those terms, it has to be said that Garry’s fight against Neal hardly felt like a footwork masterclass. The back-and-forth movement he created did well to keep Neal from drawing an easy bead on him, but when Neal did rush in, Garry often retreated in a straight line before exiting late on an angle with his chin up and hands down. When Neal extended a combo, he tended to find the target.

I don’t think Neal won that fight at all, but it’s hard not to look at Stephen Thompson’s very sport specific footwork against ‘Handz of Steel’ back in 2020—which lead to Neal getting outlanded at a 2-1 clip—in comparison to Garry’s broad strokes, space-creating movement that led to him scraping out a split decision. Part of that difference was down to Neal’s ability to create more offensive angles on his entries than he did 4 years ago, but a lot of it was just Garry getting caught out of position.

MMA has a habit of leaping to creative problem solving when there are tried and true solutions already there. Fighting footwork has a long and storied history. It may take a little extra work to adapt it to takedown defense and the intricacies of MMA, but the answer for that probably isn’t coming from the Cincinnati Bengals.

Ex-UFC champ Henry Cejudo pranks himself? | Hate to see it

Posted on by Zane Simon in MMA Editorial, MMA News, UFC 298, UFC Editorial

A new week, a new batch of MMA headlines to warm your heart or make you palm your face. This time around we’ve got more good works from Jared Gordon and a little advocacy from Loma Lookboonmee. But, we’ve also got Max Griffin with MMA judging complaints and Henry Cejudo stealing the spotlight from everyone with a whole bunch of unnecessary drama.

As always, I’m doing my best to sort through it all and try to separate the wheat from the chaff, the gold from the fools.

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Jared Gordon stays on message

One of the things that MMA does like few other sports out there is to connect fans to real, honest to god hard luck stories. In a world where more and more athletes find themselves in private schools and top flight programs from an early age, preparing them for potential future stardom, Mixed Martial Arts remains a true home for misfits.

In point of fact, it’s nearly cliche at this juncture to turn on Dana White’s Contender Series and hear multiple tales of child abuse, neglect, crime, and addiction. The people that find their peace in cage fighting often come to it through fire and brimstone.

That said, it’s not every fighter that finds their way from a tragic past to advocacy for a positive future. For many, the mistakes they’ve made—the harm they’ve caused to themselves or others—are things they’d rather put firmly behind them. It’s can feel a lot easier to start a new chapter in life by severing all association to the person someone used to be.

I’d argue it takes a special kind of strength to make past mistakes as big a part of someone’s reformation as their current successes; to not forget who they used to be and what trials bought them here.

It’s great then to see the level of advocacy that Jared Gordon does regularly for drug addiction awareness and recovery. A self-described heroin user starting at age 19, Gordon was left legally dead from a drug overdose in 2015. An incident that pushed him to finally kick the habit and turn his life around.

Now 35 and with a 13-year MMA career under his belt, he’s still doing PSA work and public outreach to try and help others fight addiction.

There are plenty of fighters out there that get involved with charitable causes, but few seem to do so with the level of consistency and self reflection that Gordon shows. The man is setting a great example and his advocacy should be lauded at every turn.

Loma Lookboonmee campaigns for UFC atomweight division

It has to be said—despite Dana White’s past sexism—no promotion has done more to build the public perception of women’s combat sports than the UFC. The conversation around women’s MMA may have started with things like HOOKnSHOOT, JEWELS, EliteXC, and Strikeforce, but the UFC is what really brought it main stream. In a day and age where sports like boxing and kickboxing are still entirely struggling to create any amount of interest in their best and brightest performers, the UFC is an industry leader.

Currently, the Octagon is the only place where combat sports fans can routinely see women headlining not just smaller Fight Night events, but even PPVs. Nothing else out there compares.

That said, the promotion’s dedication to female athletes still often feels slipshod and halfhearted. Having once put all its eggs in the Ronda Rousey basket the UFC has struggled to bring forward a new generation of stars, especially in higher weight divisions.

But, if a venture into women’s featherweight has entirely failed to pay dividends, the women’s strawweight division has maintained a position of relative strength. Fighters like Joanna Jedrzejczyk, Rose Namajunas, and Weili Zhang may have never risen to superstar prominence, but have proven popular commodities capable of bringing high level MMA to the UFC’s biggest stages.

If it’s clear right now that there’s more talent to be found at 115 lbs than there is at 135, then shouldn’t the UFC be setting its sights lower rather than higher? That’s a question Thai UFC talent Loma Lookboonmee would like answered as well.

“The big surprise for me was just how big [Bruna Brasil] was,” Lookboonmee reporters after her latest victory (transcript via MMA Junkie). “She was so much taller than me. I really hope they open 105.”

“I think that if the UFC opens 105, No. 1, I’ll be the first fighter in there. No. 2, I think it would open up a lot of opportunities for Asian women—not just from Thailand, but from all over Asia. So I really hope they do it. People message me from time to time asking me if they’re going to do it, but obviously I don’t know.”

At 5′ 1″, competing in the strawweight division is always going to be a struggle for Lookboonmee. But with talents like Carla Esparza (5′ 1″), Tecia Torres (5′ 1″), Brianna Fortino (4′ 11″), and Tabatha Ricci (5′ 1″), it feels like the promotion already has a collection of athletes under contract to build from.

The UFC has found repeatedly over the years, that fighting is a great opportunity for smaller athletes. Despite their reluctance to open divisions downward, every time they’ve done so, the quality of their product increases.

There are many parts of the world, including those where the UFC would love to see more expansion, where women tend to be much more in line with a potential atomweight division. It’s not hard to think that Lookboonmee would be proven correct in pretty short order. The featherweight division has failed, but that doesn’t need to mean fewer spots on the roster. Time to try something new.

HATE TO SEE IT

Max Griffin picks the exact wrong time to complain about judging

At this point, complaints about MMA scoring feel nearly as old as MMA itself. Whether it’s the idea that a takedown steals the round, or that guard work is underappreciated, or Dominick Cruz insisting that there’s no more decisive sign of damage than a cut on the eyebrow, it feels like no fight card goes by without some level of controversy.

This past weekend was no exception. We had Bolaji Oki experiencing the dread of a mysterious split score for what should have been a reasonably clear victory over Timothy Cuamba and, earlier in the evening, we had Max Griffin’s fight against Jeremiah Wells.

After his bout, Griffin sat down with reporters to lodge a complaint against one judge in particular, noted longtime MMA official Sal D’Amato. Only, given the fact that Griffin won a fight most observers felt he should have lost, it’s very difficult to figure out exactly what is the man’s damage?

“I cannot stand Sal D’Amato,” Griffin told reporters at his post-fight presser (transcript MMA Junkie). “He has me on Neil Magny losing, he has me on numerous fights. … He picks against me every single time. I don’t know if I did something in a past life to him, if I did something to him, but Sal D’Amato hates me.”

Of course, faced with a claim like that, pundits were quick to fact check Griffin, finding that—far from being a victim of systemic abuse—the longtime welterweight has had exactly four fights judged by D’Amato in his career. Of those four, D’Amato scored two for Griffin and two against him.

I get it, it’s MMA—thin skinned-ness is practically a packaged deal for athletes, along with bad knees and staph infection. At some point, though, I have to wonder if it’s all performative. Ever fighter can’t just be picking the weirdest reasons to get mad all the time can they?

I like Max Griffin, he’s a solid, nose-to-the-grindstone kind of talent who has made a lot of consistent small improvements in his game over the years. But he’s also a decision machine who goes nip-tuck with everyone. He has no one to blame but himself for a lack of clear and easy victories. Especially not a judge that happened to get the last one right.

Henry Cejudo pranks himself?

Unexpectedly, one of the biggest topics in MMA news this past week has been around Henry Cejudo. But rather than a focus on his potential future retirement plans—or on the difficulty of facing Merab Dvalishvili at UFC 298 after losing to Serra-Longo teammate Aljamain Sterling—fighters, fans, and pundits have found themselves faced with an odd bit of UFC shoulder programming.

UFC 298 Countdown cameras appeared to capture what should have been a private moment from Cejudo’s fight camp. In it the former Olympic gold medalist and two division champion dismissed his longtime coach Eric Albarracin.

“I’m getting rid of specific coaches, man, and that’s you included, dude,” Cejudo said, clearly playing the moment for the cameras before explaining that he knew he could publicly strip Albarracin of his duties like that because of the man’s natural humility.

The video led to a hilarious exchange between Dvalishvili and the Fight Ready captain just a couple days later, with the Georgian fighter joking that he had swiped Cejudo’s coach for himself. But it also led to a lot of obvious backlash.

Not because getting some new coaches might not be the right move for Cejudo. Fighters, after all, need to be selfish to a pretty high degree. They take the risk, they take the loss. If ‘Triple C’ felt he needed a new camp to win his next fight, he’s well within his rights to make that move. But to make it a public spectacle the way he did just smacked of unnecessary tactlessness—an unfortunate byproduct of a man often called the ‘King of Cringe.’

With blowback from the video seemingly unabating, Cejudo took to Instagram on Tuesday to announce that the initial video of him firing his coach was, in fact, just a prank for the cameras.

//www.instagram.com/embed.js

If that whole thing really was a joke (and this isn’t just some attempt to save face), then Cejudo has to know that the joke was on him, right?

People don’t care if he’s working with Albarracin or not, that’s his business. Some fighters trade coaches like Dana White changes P4P GOAT proclamations, a new one every week. Nobody cares. All Cejudo did was make himself look like an jackass in public for nobody’s gain. The whole discussion will be forgotten in a couple months time to no result beyond the fact that for a few days people thought, “Wow, that guy’s a jerk.”

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Isn’t MMA supposed to be fun?

Posted on by Zane Simon in MMA Editorial, MMA News, UFC Editorial

This column originally appeared on the Bloody Elbow Substack on Sunday, February 11th. Become a paid Subscriber to get more work like this straight to your inbox.

The UFC’s run to regulation has become a cornerstone of the Zuffa story. It’s probably less spin than Dana White gives most of his memory when he talks about how the Fertittas bought a promotion not just one the brink of collapse, but one that could barely find a state that would sanction their brand of ‘no holds barred’ violence.

Truthfully, of course, the UFC had started running toward regulation well before White & Co. stepped in. It didn’t take many events for the SEG owned version of the company to realize that their dojo-heavy tournament style wasn’t going to last. The increasing number of wrestlers and professionally trained athletes opened up the likelihood that some member of the strip mall Karate black belt contingent would get seriously hurt in a no-rules tournament format.

As such, figures like ‘Big’ John McCarthy and Jeff Blatnick and Joe Silva started putting together rules and regulations for the Octagon in conjuction with the ABC and State Athletic Commissions. No Groin strikes, no headbutts, no fish hooking. Gloves became more the norm, etc. etc.

The Zuffa era of MMA

What Zuffa brought, more than anything, was an understanding of the politics of regulation. An ability to lobby. The right money, connections, and a set of new rules already in place paved the way for MMA to become an officially recognized sport and eventually a normal part of the American sporting landscape (if still something of a niche interest).

Along the way, however, there was another, less celebratory outcome from the UFC’s success and eventual market dominance. Namely, the blanding of mixed martial arts. NHB, for all its faults, really was the true sandbox of combat sports. Fighters with limited understandings of the potential for true fighting given room to test themselves with few limitations. Can the TaeKwonDo guy really stay off the ground? Can the BJJ guy force someone to grapple? Can the ninjitsu guy actually disappear?

Insistance on gloves and wraps, credit for top control, and a flat playing surface with cage walls all helped emphasize a wrestle-boxing archetype. Nevermind that wrestlers were also training at a much higher level than most traditional martial arts.

I don’t want to say that the MMA meta would have looked dramatically different had the UFC taken a different path—or not have become the market dominating juggernaut that they ended up as—but it’s hard not to feel a bit like we’re in the most McDonalds version of MMA possible today.

Dogfight Wild Tournament

That’s what made Dogfight Wild Tournament such an amazing breath of fresh air this week. If you haven’t already seen it, you can watch the whole thing for free, right here. A once-annual fight promotion from Spain that ran their second ever grand night of wild action riffing on an MMA theme. In a lot of ways, it feels like a Fight Circus sister, but where the Thailand-based organization really goes off the deep end using combat sports as inspiration for wacky fun & games, Dogfight is built on much more simple lines.

However it might be categorized, it ran on one important ideology: What if fights were unpredictable and fun?

Of course, it goes without saying that a big part of what allowed the promotion to get as weird as they did this past Friday was Spain’s lack of regulation. We got a 1 vs. 5 ‘survival mode’ fight where one trained fighter had to take on five opponents one at a time. There was a 3-on-1 fight that just might go down as the most fun fight of 2024. We had 2 vs. 2 action, and a ‘Bloodsport’ tournament, complete with curved fighting platform. The kind of stuff that state regulations would almost certainly put the kibosh on if this card had been in the US.

Did all of it come off perfectly? Absolutely not. One of the opening round winners got hurt and the Bloodsport finale had to be cancelled. The no-rules MMA fight ended with a bevvy of unanswered blows to the back of the head and an insistance from the loser that he get an immediate rematch (which the winner totally should have taken, but wussed out on). And there were some pacing and production issues standard to a company only barely getting off the ground.

MMA needs to be fun

But, the important thing was that it felt like an experiment. It felt like an attempt to do something new and fun with fights again. A big part of what made MMA the thrill it used to be was its circus aspect. Modified rules fights, combat sports legends from other disciplines trying their hand against seasoned MMA pros. Shootboxing, combat jiu jitsu, Senegalese wrestling, hand-to-hand combatives? The world is full of creative opportunities that create entertaining chaos.

This isn’t an argument against plain old MMA. I still like what the sport is as it exists now plenty. It’s been codified enough to start growing some real high level technique all its own and a meta that’s unique to MMA. But moments like these are something of a wakeup call. A reminder that there’s a whole other reason I got into this stuff and it’s one I’d almost entirely forgotten.

I’m not just here for the power or the violence or the beatiful expression of form. I’m also here for the hijinks and the fun. Boxing has been owning that lately with their celebrity fight cards and the MMA/boxing crossover bareknuckle arena (which I have other problems with). It was hard not to think, when Jake Paul and Nate Diaz fought in 2023, that 15 or 20 years ago MMA would have gotten that fight, but it doesn’t have the cajones for that kind of fun anymore and it shows.

I don’t need it every day, but it’d be awfully nice to see a little more weird come back to this sport. Dogfight Wild Tournament was exactly the right cure for what ails my MMA soul.

A one-legged UFC title contender? | Hate to see it

Posted on by Zane Simon in MMA Editorial, MMA News, UFC Editorial, UFC News

For those who missed out on last week’s edition, I have a somewhat sheepish revelation. Far from cancelling the column, cutting back on my workload, or just feeling like I couldn’t find the right stories, I simply forgot about the damn thing until it was too late.

I won’t be doing anything to make it up to anyone, sometimes that’s just the way it is. But I hope everyone enjoys this week’s column nonetheless. We’ve got Dustin Poirier giving back to the lightweight community, Weili Zhang and Joanna Jedrzejczyk palling around, as well as a Matt Brown revelation and a Colby Covington update. So, let’s dig in…

LOVE TO SEE IT

Dustin Poirier giving back with Benoit Saint Denis fight

Over the many years since its inception it’s become clear that the UFC created something of a monster with their in-house rankings system. A panel composed almost entirely of fringe media figures has, over the past decade, turned itself into a key element of both the matchmaking and negotiating process. Once something that fighters openly derided and rejected as a useless gimmick, today few cards pass by without multiple calls for a ‘top 15 opponent’ after an especially thrilling victory.

But it’s not just a goal to aim for that’s reshaped the UFC’s weight classes, it’s also a recognition that as a fighter rises in the rankings, their position as a future title contender becomes more and more undeniable. The UFC may not want Belal Muhammad in a title fight, they may not be interested in letting Curtis Blaydes fight for gold. But if these men simply refuse to go away, sooner or later they’ll get their chance. The UFC’s own system demands it.

The fallout of that logic is that, once a UFC talent reaches top 5 status, much of their priority turns away from getting to fight as often as possible, and turns toward getting just the right fight to compete for a belt. More and more, fans see elite MMA talents who are loath to fight anyone who isn’t already in title contention. After all, what’s the point of taking on someone down in the rankings if a loss means exiting ‘the mix’ and a win means nothing more than treading water.

Despite the fact that it may have taken a little extra negotiating to get there, that makes Dustin Poirier’s recent statements on his upcoming bout against #12 ranked Benoit Saint Denis something entirely refreshing. With a only a little tread left on the tires, and with a firm grip on the #3 spot in the lightweight division, the ‘Diamond’ had every reason not to want to fight the former French paratrooper. As he revealed in a recent MMA Hour interview, however, Poirier wanted to give Saint Denis the same chance he got earlier in his career.

“I thought the offer in the UFC would be something more like that,” Poirier said, revealing that he had been looking for something like a ‘legacy’ fight against RDA (transcript via MMA Junkie). “I needed something to get me up in the morning. I respect this sport, and I honor this sport, and I’m 35 years old now. This guy is a young, hungry lion who is on a streak. I think he finished five fights in a row. Somebody gave me my shot to crack in, so I respect the game. That’s what I’m doing. Let’s see if I still (can do it). March 9, buy the pay-per-view and we’ll see. We’ll find out.”

Indeed, go back to 2017, and Dustin Poirier was sitting at the #9 spot in the lightweight division coming off a majority decision win over Jim Miller. Just a few months prior, he had been cold-cocked by Michael Johnson in the first round for a knockout loss. That fact didn’t stop #3 ranked former champion Eddie Alvarez from giving Poirier a chance to secure the biggest win of his career to date.

An illegal knee turned that bout into a no contest, unfortunately. But Poirier’s action forward style and thrilling exchanges up until that moment put him firmly into the elite from that moment forward. Fights with Anthony Pettis and Justin Gaethje followed, as well as the Alvarez rematch. Long story short, the Louisiana native has been a top attraction ever since.

Maybe he can pass on the same kind of shine to Saint Denis? Maybe he’ll slam the door on a next-gen talent looking to use the ATT fighter as a stepping stone. Either way, it should be a hell of a lot of fun. Credit to Poirier for taking a cool fight that he absolutely did not need.

Joanna Jedrzejczyk and Weili Zhang share some quality time

Such is the way of Google these days, and perhaps also of my increasingly foggy memory, that I can only half remember the anecdote I’m about to relay—and can see no easy way to track it down. If that sounds like something your dad would do to drive you crazy, please note that I have no children, so the best I can do is inflict myself up on my readers.

Anyway, years ago now, I recall some fighter who was asked one of the more banal kind of media questions our industry tends to feed fighters when we have nothing more topical on which to latch on. The question went, approximately, ‘What advice would you give to other young fighters?’

I may not remember whether it was MMA or boxing, but the answer always stuck with me. The advice was simple enough: Don’t be afraid to make friends with your competition.

Combat sports, as a rule, tend to run on aggression and isolationism. The person you trained with yesterday might be your opponent tomorrow. For many, the desire to fight breeds its own hostility just for the sake of maintenance.

But the point this old guy had to make was a great one. Essentially, that this kind of lifestyle is lonely. Most other people won’t get it and can’t relate to it. But your opponents can and will. These are the people that will understand what you’ve been through and who can share your experiences. Don’t push them away.

That said, it’s cool to see now-retired former UFC strawweight champion Joanna Jedrzejczyk hanging out with current champion Weili Zhang. The two women put on an all time classic war in 2020. Even if their 2022 rematch didn’t live up to that level, they created a piece of MMA history together. A couple years later they’re on social media chumming it up, and the vibes couldn’t be more positive.

Maybe one of these days we’ll get to see Colby Covington and Jorge Masvidal out to dinner together at Papi Steak. Wouldn’t that be a beautiful thing?

HATE TO SEE IT

Matt Brown reveals career disinterest in negotiating with the UFC

I guess I’ll start this out with a pretty simple statement. If any pro fighter is happy with their fighting career, I’m happy for them. I’m especially always happy for a guy like Matt Brown, who has made his reputation by being an action-first badass, even if it never brought him particularly close to title contention.

Matt Brown sounds like someone pretty content with what their time in the UFC and MMA in general has brought them, so I can’t knock that. All that said, however, I really do hate to see that that satisfaction has come with little to no pushback against UFC brass and the contracts he’s had from them over the years.

In a recent interview with MMA Fighting, Brown gave his insight on the recent kerfuffle between Dustin Poirier and Dana White. Mostly noting that he doesn’t really understand the idea of negotiating contract terms from one bout to the next. As far as he’s concerned, the UFC gave him a fight, he took it. Negotiations over.

“They ask me if I want to fight this guy and I say OK. I’ve never really negotiated or asked for a different guy, it’s not really been my style. For me, it’s been pretty simple. I’ve always been happy with the way they treated me and the pay they give me and everything. I don’t really know what they mean when they say they didn’t come to terms. The terms are, you’re going to fight a guy on this date, go do it.”

“I probably should have negotiated more than I have,” Brown said with a laugh. “I can only speak to my own personal experience here. When they have offered me a new contract, I said, ‘Thank you, let’s go. Who am I going to fight?’ I never really negotiated that either. Maybe I should have. Maybe in retrospect I should have, but I never did. I’ve always just been happy to fight.”

There was a point in the interview where Brown does admit that he once negotiated one contract with Dana White directly. Saying that the process more or less involved he and White having a friendly chat, White asking him to throw out a number, and immediately agreeing to that number. “I probably should have asked for more,” Brown recalled, “but I thought I got my worth and it was pretty simple.”

I don’t want anyone to think that I’m lamenting this position just for the sake of spiting the UFC. As much as I may think they take advantage of the fact that most talent seems happy just to be there, the truth is that sports in general (but fighting in particular) are one of the few professions out there where the longevity of the most necessary talent is most severely capped.

With a nearly 20 year career under his belt (17 of which have been spent with the UFC), Brown is one of a very rare few who get to make up for a lack of short term earnings with long term staying power. For so many others, they Octagon will chew them up and spit them out, leaving their time as athletes over before they know it. Sometimes even leaving them unable to even take part in that which they’ve built their whole lives around.

For every Matt Brown or Andrei Arlovski there’s a TJ Grant, Alex Reyes, or Chris Holdsworth. Which is to say that, whether it’s the UFC or Bellator or PFL or RIZIN, I want to see fighters squeeze every penny they can out of their time as fighters. Once they’re done fighting, who knows what work will be left for them. Coaches, managers, and promoters can all move on to the next hot talent. Fighters can’t. I’m glad Matt Brown is happy, I just hope other fighters don’t follow that lead.

One legged Colby Covington

There’s no way to sugarcoat this. Colby Covington’s performance against Leon Edwards at UFC 296 was no good. It was butt, plain and simple. Already a two time title contender, Covington looked edgy from the moment go, and it was only after several rounds that he found his way into the contest, securing the final frame on every judges scorecard.

That was close to two months ago. Plenty of time for ‘Chaos’ to synthesize the loss and figure out what his next move was going to be. Only, this is MMA, and like most other high level combat sports, the most important part comes not from learning or correcting, but from the maintenance of the ego. Covington couldn’t have lost to Leon Edwards because Edwards was just a better fighter on the night, more prepared and more ready to perform. There must be another reason. Something that guarantees if they ran back the fight, Covington would win.

“I couldn’t plant or explode off it to use the wrestling and pressure I planned to use,” Covington said in a recent interview with Submission Radio (transcript via MMA Fighting), in which he disclosed an injury to his left foot. “I didn’t want to disclose this information until I had the X-rays back home, but here they are.

“I knew straight away it was bad. It was the first kick I threw, it landed right on his elbow. He was in orthodox so I kind of got a little overzealous and I wanted to rip a high kick to his orthodox side because I didn’t know if he’d be defensively sound from southpaw. So, the first kick I threw, a high kick, it was kind of like a middle kick, it landed on his elbow.”

“Haters will still find a way to hate on me for fighting 25 minutes on one leg while landing over 100 more strikes than Leon,” Covington added. “But you know what, my haters are so broke they can’t even pay attention so f*** them.”

For the record, Covington got out-landed 57 to 44 by Edwards over 5 rounds. Although he did hold a 44 strike advantage (109 to 65) in total strikes, almost all of which came from round 5, where Covington secured three full minutes of top control against the champion.

I don’t want to come off overly harsh on Covington (I already got a chance to take my shots in the immediate aftermath of his loss), but sooner or later fighters gotta realize that this kind of disclosure doesn’t help them much at all. Fighting is dangerous, and people get injured all the time. MMA history is writ large with tales of top talent fighting through gruesome pain to seal a victory. Say what you will about Jon Jones, but his toe was basically falling off when he beat Chael Sonnen to defend his light heavyweight title.

If Covington wants to believe that his injury is the only reason Leon Edwards beat him back in December, that’s his business. But trying to sell it to everyone else more than a month later, after well all watched that fight? No sir, I can’t buy it.

No UFC title shot? Khamzat Chimaev betrayed by Dana White? | Hate to see it

Posted on by Zane Simon in MMA Editorial, MMA News, UFC Editorial

Hitting the news this week, we’ve got a couple of comments for the commentary booths from both the UFC and Bellator/PFL. Plus we’re diving in on Khamzat Chimaev’s new trust issues, and Miesha Tate giving fans the hard sell on UFC 297.

The combat sports world is a constant circus of good news and bad. I’m just here trying to sort through it all to find those items that spark something a little more than ‘okay, that’s good to know.’ Join me for the latest Love/Hate to See It column…

LOVE TO SEE IT

Chris Curtis takes a shot at Dominick Cruz

Maybe time has dulled my memory, after all I’ve always felt that nostalgia is the most toxic of all emotions. It pulls us not to enjoy (or simply cope with) the world around us as it is, but to try and recapture some imagined past. Usually an era where we either weren’t even alive to experience it, or had no real sense of the multitude of problems surrounding us even then.

Did things really used to be better, or were we just younger and more foolish and free of woes?

What I’m trying to say is, that Dominick Cruz might be the worst regular UFC commentary booth member since Zuffa took ownership of the company back in 2001. Yes, even including Mike Goldberg.

Known for his long running Team Alpha Male feud during the height of his championship reign/injury epidemic, it turns out that the very feistiness that fueled his trash talk (and very likely his fighting career) is a personality trait that he can never turn off. When in the booth, calling that action, that often surfaces as a tendency for petty bickering, and an inability to let a singular observation go once it’s crept into his mind.

Lately, Cruz’s biggest fixation has been on the idea of ‘damage’ as a principal scoring criteria. Namely, in his mind, that the clearest (and perhaps only) signifier of damage in a fight are cuts. Every time a fighter gets cut, Cruz goes on a mini-rant about how they’ve now lost the fight because they’ve suffered the most damage. Never mind that it’s supposed to be an indicator of impact more than anything else.

Did a fighter get knocked down? Dazed? Wobbled? Were they slammed hard? Did the shots they took look heavier? Those are all measurements of damage too. Cuts and bruising are certainly a secondary or tertiary part of that scale, but to hear Cruz tell it, you’d think they made up the entire rubric.

It seems like fighters are getting tired of Cruz’s fixations as well. In a recent interview following his UFC 297 win, middleweight Chris Curtis took the ‘Dominator’ to task.

“I get s—t on by ‘DC’ and Dominick Cruz every time I fight,” Curtis said on The MMA Hour (transcript via MMA Fighting). “No matter what’s happening. DC was kinder than before, but Dominick Cruz is just like, ‘It looks like he’s sparring,’ and blah blah blah. Bro, [Barriault is] a solid man. He’s been knocked out once, I have been knocked out once. It’s not going to be easy to knock the other down, it’s just not.

“I hit him with some s—t that I’ve dropped people with, and he just kind of looked at it. I elbowed him a few times, I went to move in, he’s just staring at me like he’s back there. I hear Dominick Cruz say, ‘It’s just like a sparring match,’ and then, not to be a dick, but people are going to latch on to what the commentary says, and now I hear, ‘He didn’t even fight hard. It was a low-energy sparring match.’ Stand in front of me and let me hit you the same way.”

“Dominick Cruz, stand here Dominick Cruz, and let me hit you the way I was hitting him and see if it’s just sparring. No, we’re two large, solid men. I promise you guys, I was hitting him f hard, he was hitting me hard, I feel it since the fight. [Cruz] is like, ‘It looks like sparring.’ I’m just like, ‘Oh my God, the narrative is glorious.’ So I’m proud of myself, I’m very proud of myself.”

Here’s the thing. As he’s shown in several incidents over his UFC career, Chris Curtis can be a pretty sensitive guy. He seems to take criticism to heart, and doesn’t let go of it easily. To the point that we’ve even seen him get frustrated with opponents in the cage, when they don’t give him the fight he wants.

And, to be fair to Cruz, much like his teammate Sean Strickland, the ‘Action Man’ has a style that seems like it’s been born out of a ton of hard sparring. Where Strickland chooses a volume jab style, meant to score points and stay safe, Curtis chooses a back-foot, selective counter-striking style.

But I can’t help it, maybe I’m just petty too. Cruz’s work in the commentary booth is a continual drag. If the result of that is that he’s gonna catch a few strays, even when he might not be wrong, I’m here for it. Go off Curtis.

Big John McCarthy exits the booth

Probably one of the most surprising and strangest idiosyncrasies to pop up in the MMA world has been the commentary work of legendary MMA referee John McCarthy. A co-author (and sometimes outright creator) of many of the rules that define modern mixed martial arts, McCarthy has been a fixture in the North American MMA world essentially since day 1.

I’ve spoken to ‘Big’ John a couple times in my time working for Bloody Elbow. He’s a gregarious, generous speaker who will always give straight answers to questions, can fill in details whenever needed, and has a fantastic memory for the history of the sport.

He’s also just absolutely no fun as a play-by-play/color commentary figure in a broadcast booth. I don’t know why it is, I don’t know how it is, but the work just doesn’t seem to fit his style. His time with Bellator has come off as a mix of unfocused and low energy, seemingly often downplaying major swings in action, or simply missing key moments with off topic stories.

It has to be said, as well, that it feels like he’s had enough of a runway at this point that if he were going to improve a lot in the roll, he already would have. I’m not surprised Bellator kept him on in the position as long as they did. Like I said before, my experience of the guy is that he’s wonderfully easy to work with. But over time it felt like a marked downgrade of the product from its glory days with Jimmy Smith and Sean Wheelock calling the action.

Which brings me to this piece of good news from a recent interview McCarthy did with MMA Junkie.

“I am going to be staying with the PFL because I had a contract with Bellator, and it still has a year on it, so the PFL picked that up,” McCarthy explained. “Will my role be the same? I don’t think it’s going to be the same.

“I think it’s going to be more towards rules and regulations, scoring the fights and doing those things – making sure everyone understands what’s being done, if it’s being done in the correct way and what options do the officials have.”

McCarthy is definitely an asset that PFL would do well to keep. But if they can find a role for him that’s not one where he’s constantly on the mic, calling the fights? That seems like it’s the best idea for everyone involved.

HATE TO SEE IT

Khamzat Chimaev learns not to trust the UFC

It’s one of the most enduring factors of the UFC’s business model. Ever since the promotion took its first steps away from the tournament model in the mid-90s, there are no guarantees in the Octagon. Yesterday’s promise is today’s maybe and tomorrow’s change of plans.

It’s a fact that has driven a whole generation of rival companies. From Bellator and PFL, to PRIDE and now RIZIN, other organizations look to lay down a path to contendership, a way to be Pepsi to the UFC’s Coke. It’s also a lament that fighters find themselves singing time and time again, ‘What do I have to do to get a title shot around here?’

At some point it really does feel like this lesson should get learned. There is no fight booking promise the UFC would make that they would feel honor bound to keep. Nonetheless, Khamzat Chimaev is still very disappointed to find out that he’s not in consideration for the middleweight title.

“I heard Dana White said that, ‘I don’t think Khamzat is next for the title,’ that’s the bulls—t, man,” Chimaev told ESPN in a recent interview (transcript via MMA Fighting), after Dana White told media he didn’t think the Chechen-born fighter would be healthy enough to compete at UFC 300.

“If you promised me something, you have to answer for your words, and I’m the guy who always answers for my words. I don’t care if it’s some president, or a king, if you give me [your] word, you have to answer for that.”

“I will be surprised if that happens—if somebody fights [for the title] next, and not me. We’ll see, I didn’t talk with Dana, and I don’t know what he’s thinking. He knows better than me.

“In my mind, it should be me,” Chimaev added. “I asked Hunter [Campbell] to let me fight at UFC 300, so we’ll see what they say.”

I honestly can’t believe I’m about to say this, but realistically, the UFC is right not to guarantee these kinds of bookings. Combat sports always has been and always will be just as much about the grandeur and sizzle as it is about finding out who’s the ‘baddest man on the planet’. These aren’t team events and they aren’t golf or tennis where impact is low enough and repetitions are high enough that you can more or less guarantee a certain number of stars will shine at every event.

Even at its best, fighting is wild and chaotic and filled with the possibility of upset and injury. Maybe three months ago Chimaev looked like a great title fight option. But now a possible Adesanya vs. du Plessis fight looks like a better one.

Hate to see another fighter learning this lesson the hard way, but anyone who wants to compete in the Octagon is going to find themselves rolling with the punches—whether they want to or not.

Miesha Tate makes case for ‘dynamic’ UFC 297 co-main event

I know women get a hard time of things from MMA fans. Far too many of their fights are dismissed out of hand as a ‘bathroom break’ and comments are filled with the listless braindead droning of men who don’t think women should be competing, no matter how competent or entertaining they are. I don’t want to add to that noise. So just to start off, I’ll go ahead and say that I don’t really think Raquel Pennington vs. Mayra Bueno Silva was any worse than Alexandre Pantoja vs. Brandon Royval.

That said, I also seem to be one of the only people out there who thinks that the most recent UFC flyweight title fight was more dud than dynamic. In both cases, the first time challenger looked dramatically unprepared for their first real taste of the big stage. In both cases one of the title competitors seemed to gas out horribly early, and in both cases the winning champ looked hardly a half-step better than their competition.

That said, let’s not try to sell the co-main event of UFC 297 as some kind of resounding piece of entertainment.

Truly no sport has trouble with numbers like MMA. Mayra Bueno Silva is 32. Miesha Tate is 37. Raquel Pennington is 35. Nobody here is ‘young.’ I’m sure ‘Sheetara’ will be back to the top of the mountain soon, but she’s been in this business for 9 years. Relative to her division, she’s a top tier athlete in her prime, and she absolutely was not prepared.

This isn’t me trying to talk up Strickland vs. du Plessis either, as a main event. It was a totally reasonable, solid title fight. Nothing electrifying. But at least both fighters looked prepared. Du Plessis is younger and has never fought five rounds either, he was still ready for the task at hand. There have been plenty of great fights from women in the Octagon, fights we can all laud as entertaining. This wasn’t one of them.

UFC 297: Sean Strickland sets off firestorm with homophobic remarks, attack on journalist

Posted on by Zane Simon in MMA Editorial, MMA News, UFC Editorial, UFC News

Sean Strickland triggers huge backlash with pre-fight remarks

UPDATE by Nate Wilcox: I’m jumping into Zane’s post to add the latest Sean Strickland shenanigans. He was confronted about his past homophobic remarks by Alex Lee of MMA Fighting and attempted to turn the tables by attacking Lee in the strongest possible terms.

Here’s the video of their exchange:

Mediaite has the transcript (obscenities removed because we have a deal with MSN):

Before the reporter even asked the question, Strickland asked him if he was “part of the opposition” when the reporter informed him he was Canadian. The reporter was confused by the question, prompting Strickland to clarify and ask him if he voted for Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. When the reporter declined to answer, Strickland claimed it was proof that he did vote for him. He also called the reporter “the enemy of Canada.”

Finally, the reporter asked Strickland about something he said in the past about disapproving of his son being gay. Strickland cut him off and asked if he was gay, to which the reporter claimed he’s an ally. Then, Strickland asked what he would do if his son was gay. When the reporter said he’d be OK with it, Strickland went off.

“You’re a weak man, dude,” Strickland said. “You’re part of the problem. You elected Justin Trudeau when he seized the bank accounts. You’re just pathetic. And the fact that you have no backbone as he shut down your fucking country and seized bank accounts, you asked me some stupid **** like that? Go **** yourself. Move the **** on, man. (Effing) coward.”

Then, the reporter followed up by asking Strickland about past comments about the trans community. When the UFC announced its partnership with Bud Light, Strickland voiced his disapproval for that, as well.

“Here’s the thing about Bud Light,” Strickland said. “Ten years ago, to be trans was a mental fucking illness; and now, all of sudden, people like you have weaseled your way in the world. You are an infection. You are the definition of weakness. Everything that is wrong with the world is because of (effing) you.

“And the best thing is the world’s not buying it. The world’s not buying your (effing BS) you’re (effing) peddling. The world is not saying, ‘You know what? You’re right. Fucking chicks have *****.’ The world’s not saying that. The world’s saying, ‘No, there are two genders.’ I don’t want my kids being taught about who they could **** in school. I don’t want my kids being taught about their sexual preference.”

Strickland then continued to direct his fury at the reporter for asking the question.

“This guy is the enemy,” he continued. “You wanna look at the enemy to our world? It’s that ******** right there, asking me stupid questions.”

Outsports spoke to Lee about the incident.

“I come from a city that has a very strong LGBTQ community,” Lee told Outsports after the encounter with Strickland. “I’ve never been comfortable with a lot of fighters’ stances on LGBTQ issues, and he’s been worse than most. I felt it was my responsibility to communities in the city of Toronto to ask these questions.”

Mainstream sports figures, as well as MMA media were quick to condemn Strickland’s statements.

This being MMA, Strickland has plenty of defenders:

Your regularly scheduled Love/Hate to see it


This week in our regularly schedule Love/Hate to See It rundown, we’ve got Mayra Bueno Silva talking plans for the UFC title and Renato Moicano keeping it absolutely 100% on fighting at the UFC Apex. We’ve also got Sean Strickland still in the feelings he tells other people not to have and that Logan Paul impersonator trying to plea his case for a shot at Nate Diaz.

As always, I’m trying to sift through the MMA’s smaller stories for news that pulls some kind of gut reaction. Love it or hate it, combat sports is never short on drama.

LOVE TO SEE IT

Mayra Bueno Silva has plans for her UFC belt

This coming weekend Mayra Bueno Silva faces off against Raquel Pennington for the women’s UFC bantamweight title. It’s a competitive booking for both women that should provide for a lot of back-and-forth action, with Pennington being the more determined, round-winning grinder and ‘Sheetara’ the more proven, dangerous finisher.

It’s a goal both women have been striving for over multiple years, and could provide either of them with life changing money. If Bueno-Silva captures gold, however, it sounds like it could also provide life changing funds for a lot of other people too.

“It’s hard to talk about this,” Silva said in an interview with MMA Junkie. “But I’m born in a community where some days I don’t eat. I don’t have water and other things. It’s hard for me to talk about this. I don’t want the kids in my community to stay in this same position. I want to change lives. I want to show for everybody if you work hard, if you believe in God, everything can happen.

“When I get the belt, I will start everything. I will start the project in my city. When I put on my belt, everything starts in my life. It’s not only about the belt, it’s about my life. This is about my dream. This is about my kids. This is about my community. This is about everything I believe in.”

Back in the days when I did more interviews, one of the questions I used to ask fighters was ‘What are your plans for the belt?’ So many fighters talk about becoming champion as the entire goal of their career, as though the world stops once they’ve got a title around their waist. But, the belt is just a means to an end. It’s official recognition of skill, an opportunity to make more money, and leverage to negotiate.

It seems like a small thing, but I can’t help feeling like it helps fighters a lot to have plans beyond just ‘becoming champ.’ Having an idea of what that title can do is having extra motivation to go out and win. And maybe, hopefully, the foresight to make better choices with the opportunities that come along.

Maybe none of what Mayra Bueno-Silva wants to do will come to fruition, maybe she’ll lose on Saturday night. But for now it’s great to see her have a cause to fight for. Especially one that seems like it could do some real good for the community around her.

Renato Moicano keeps it real

Often it feels like MMA fighters have little to no personality for years. Then, suddenly, almost out of nowhere, they start showing the world their hidden selves. As often as not, I wish they’d kept it all hidden. Jake Matthews going all in on his fellow fighters over fighter pay, Jamahal Hill: domestic abuse defender, Aljamain Sterling: Andrew Tate superfan… just leave it at home. Nobody asked for this.

Renato Moicano, on the other hand, has been a revelation. The Brazilian has made a habit lately of getting on YouTube to post rants, highlighting problems with referees, problems with the UFC, and his own desire, of course, to make more money.

In a recent interview , Moicano talked about his upcoming bout against Drew Dober, where he’ll be playing co-main event to a middleweight bout between Nassourdine Imavov and Roman Dolidze. So is the 34-year-old excited to get some prominent card placement after sitting in the featured prelim spot last time out?

“This is a Fight Night. Nobody gives a s—t about Fight Nights,” Moicano told MMA Junkie. “It doesn’t matter if you’re the co-main event, main event, or the prelims. Who gives a f—k? It’s just a s—ty way to put UFC on ESPN. So hey, Dana White, I’d rather be on UFC 299. But I don’t make the rules. I’m an employee. Feb. 3, I will beat Drew Dober. It doesn’t matter if it’s in the Apex. Nobody likes the Apex, my brother. You can ask anybody. The fans hate the Apex. The fighters, I’m pretty sure they don’t like the Apex, too.”

“… “I know the UFC has so many fighters right now and have to make so many fights. It makes sense for the Apex and ESPN. If you’re asking me if I’m happy to fight at the Apex, no way, brother. No way. Imagine UFC 299 in Miami, a lot of people, you have a great performance and then you can talk in a mic with a great guy like Joe Rogan or even Michael Bisping, DC, and you can express yourself.”

A couple years ago, when the UFC first established their run of APEX events, at the height of the pandemic, I felt pretty sure they’d never leave. The promotion had created a cheap and easy way to put on filler content in a location they control, that doesn’t require travel coordination, site fees, or a need to attract a live gate. In 2024, it seems clear that’s just the reality fans will have to accept. The promotion might be traveling more than it was during the height of the pandemic, but there’s little desire or necessity from the promotion to leave.

In that kind of environment, the best anyone can do is call it like it is. There may be no changing the UFC’s course, but there’s no reason to be happy about it either. Can’t help but appreciate Moicano being willing to speak his mind.

HATE TO SEE IT

Sean Strickland can’t pick a lane

I suppose I’ll start this out by saying that, just like Strickland’s insinuations that Ian Machado Garry’s wife is a pedophile, or Colby Covington trash talking Leon Edwards’ dead dad, Dricus du Plessis’ comments about Stricklands abusive childhood genuinely suck ass. It’s part of the current ‘f— your feelings’ MAGAfied era of the UFC, and it seems to be something that more fighters are willing to embrace.

A recent piece on MMA Fighting highlighted the exact culture at play, talking to a whole bunch of Strickland’s current and former teammates about his behavior in the gym. The narrative, without exception is one that the current middleweight champ is a fantastic teammate, as long as training partners aren’t sissies who can’t handle a little tough talk.

“I think he’s a great teammate,” Xtreme Couture team captain Brad Tavares told Fighting. “If you’re sensitive and your f—ing feelings get hurt, then you’re not going to like Sean. Simple as that. If you’re not a p—y and you can get past what he’s saying—not even what he’s saying, but how he’s saying it, that’s just how he is—if you can get past that, then you really see he’s actually trying to help you. He really is an addition and a plus for the team.

“If you can get past that, you’ll like Sean. If you’re sensitive and your feelings get hurt, you’re not going to like it. That’s just how it goes.”

At least to hear the likes of Tavares, Sam Alvey, Max Roshkopf, and Eric Nicksick tell it, problems people have with Strickland are largely a matter of being too soft. All this nasty rhetoric flying around is just the way fight culture is. (They aren’t all that far wrong either, considering how long fighters have been going after their opponents through the media.)

Of course, then there’s Strickland’s latest tough talk, where he says he’ll stab Du Plessis if he brings up Strickland’s trauma in Toronto.

“I’m not telling you I don’t want to fight you, Dricus,” Strickland said in a video on his YouTube channel (transcript via MMA Junkie). “I’m not saying you’re not a good fighter. I’m just saying that’s a line that, when crossed, it transcends fighting. If I go to Canada and you bring that up, guess what? I’m going to go to jail, they’re going to deport me, and we spent eight weeks of training for no f—ing reason.”

There are pretty much two ways that can skew. Either his absolutely BS-ing and isn’t about to stab anyone, least of all his PPV opponent (seems most likely), or he’s coming to grips with the reality that all these fighters just seem unwilling to face. The reality that there are actually a whole bunch of things that people aren’t interested in talking about, dragging out in public, or having used as cheap heat for a sporting contest.

Either way it makes all these dudes look like they’re entirely full of crap. People set boundaries for a reason, and those have nothing to do with how tough they are in a fight. Playing pretend on emotional vulnerability is pretty sad all around. Whether it’s pretending that he’s going to commit murder, or pretending that he’s too much of a stone cold badass to be bothered—Strickland’s just acting out a fantasy he can’t maintain. Doing both at the same time? That’s just a little hysterical.

Fake Logan Paul calls out Nate Diaz after brush with death

Hey everybody, remember that guy who was pretending to be Logan Paul for likes on Instagram? If you said ‘no’ congratulations on living a healthy, well balance life, free from the sin that is carnival combat sports.

If you said ‘yes,’ then boy have I got an update for you! In a recent video uploaded to the Misfits Boxing YouTube channel Rodney ‘Not Logan Paul’ Petersen wove a tale of shocking violence over his ill fated encounter with Nate Diaz out in the streets. To hear Peterson tell it, after getting choked unconscious and dropped on the concrete by the former UFC title contender, he’s lucky to be alive.

“I walked up to him, I was like, ‘Hey dude, calm down,’” Petersen said. “I would have bought him a drink. I did not think that he was … he walks up to me, grabs both my hands, I’m like, ‘Whoa, dude, calm down.’ He grabs both of my hands, tosses it down, throws a hook, lands on my jaw, pulls me down into a guillotine choke.

“Not only am I being choked out by Nate freaking Diaz, but I have two of Nate’s friends — one of them’s in the UFC — blast me in my ribs. At this point and time, I’m pretty sure I was already asleep. That choke was tight…”

“I’m on the ground, the back of my head hits the street. I end up with eight staples and a severe concussion. I am lucky to be alive.”

We already know the case isn’t going to criminal court, since the New Orleans Parish has declared Diaz’s actions a case of self defense and declined to pursue the case. But surely, if Petersen feels he was dealt potential life threatening injuries and never acted in aggression toward Diaz he could pursue some kind of civil case? It all sounds pretty bad, right?

Or maybe all he wants out of the whole thing is to turn it into another celebrity boxing payday. With a current pro boxing record of 0-6, Petersen claims he’d be more than happy to meet the Cesar Gracie black belt inside the ring.

“If he wants to fight me in the ring, yeah. But as far as the street goes, there was no money to be made in that,” Petersen admitted. “If he wants to box, for sure, I’d box him tomorrow.

“If he wants to do an MMA match, you’re going to have to give me some time to train … so maybe five or six years?”

Fortunately for Diaz, it seems he already has his next spectacle in hand. The 38 year old is reportedly set to face Jorge Masvidal inside the boxing ring. The two men met in the UFC already, back in 2019—with ‘Gamebred’ walking away with a third round doctor’s stoppage. Maybe once that plan’s wrapped up he’ll pick up the phone and give Petersen a ring.

UFC champ Jon Jones can’t get off his phone | Hate to see it

Posted on by Zane Simon in MMA Editorial, MMA News, UFC Editorial, UFC News

We’re back again with more of the bitter and more of the sweet from all around the MMA world.

In this week’s Love/Hate to see it, we’ve got Aljamain Sterling making concrete plans for 145 and Francis Ngannou laying out his plans for 2024. Over on the flip side we’ve got Jon Jones getting far too much screen time and Israel Adesanya passing the buck. Plenty to mull over.

LOVE TO SEE IT

Aljamain Sterling staying at 145

Few things feel more chancy and unforgiving in MMA than a late career change in weight class. For one reason or another fighters often spend years tuning their bodies to a competition weight that either they or their fans feel isn’t actually ideally suited for their build.

For some, they cut massive amounts for years on end, to the point that they’re permanently depleted. For others, they enjoy the speed advantage that comes with being the small guy in a bigger division, up until the point they start losing a step, and then feel like they need to make the drop. Either way, the result can be short and disastrous, especially at first.

Fighters like Anthony Pettis, Luke Rockhold, Chris Weidman, Ovince St. Preux, Miesha Tate, and many many others have tried to make late career shifts only to abandon them after finding that they didn’t provide the kind of immediate advantage they’d hoped to have.

Still just 34-years-old, former Aljamain Sterling looks to make the jump up to featherweight against Calvin Kattar at UFC 300. He’s young enough that he should still have some tread on the tires. And hopefully not cutting anymore will help keep him going in the later years of his career.

Win or lose this April, however, at least it doesn’t sound like he’s making this move out of desperation. In a recent interview with MMA Junkie, Sterling made it clear that he’s preparing to stay at 145 lbs.

“Safe to say (I’m done at bantamweight),” Sterling explained. “One of my managers was asking about that, about going down to 135, and I said, ‘Brother, let’s stop this conversation right here.’

“There’s no more 135. I didn’t even want to do it the last time. Whatever, I’m not going to bring it up again because people are going to say I’m making excuses, but this is all factual, but 135 is done.”

I hope that he sticks with the decision. It may be entirely anecdotal, but it feels like fighters who really buy into the idea that they’re making a real career shift and not just hoping for an immediate stock boost tend to do better for longer. Even if that’s not the case, it always feels worse somehow to see someone go back to the division they left, hat in hand, after losing in a new weight class.

Francis Ngannou may not return to MMA in 2024

I know this is going to make some people sad. An article I wrote recently on Ngannou landing his fight with Anthony Joshua prompted more than one comment from readers about how they were disappointed that we wouldn’t be seeing Ngannou in an MMA bout in the near future. Honestly, however, I can’t say I share the feeling.

Francis Ngannou’s combat sports career has always been a wildly unique one. A massive powerhouse of a man, even in MMA his bouts have rarely (never?) been marked by displays of his technical prowess. Over 9 years and 20 fights, his most deft showing was likely his second bout against Stipe Miocic, where he out-boxed the champion to take home UFC gold. That was, however, followed by a hilariously sloppy grappling battle with Ciryl Gane and preceded by one of the most awkward series of violent blows to ever grace the Octagon in his KO over Jairzinho Rozenstruik.

A single moment of “good” MMA in a sea of wild violence.

I bring that up not to say that Francis Ngannou is bad, but to say that I don’t feel like I’m missing a whole lot when I see Ngannou turn his attention to boxing. The prospect of a bout between the ‘Predator’ and the likes of Ante Delija, Denis Goltsov, or Renan Ferreira isn’t some chance to see Ngannou ‘in his element.’ Because he doesn’t really have an element outside of violent chaos.

The opportunity to see him try and create that in the boxing ring is just as interesting, if not more so, to me. Especially after he showed himself at least somewhat capable of it against Tyson Fury. In a recent conversation on the MMA Hour Ngannou admitted that depending on how the Joshua bout goes, he very well may not see the cage again until 2025.

“I win this fight, I’m fighting Fury –period,” Ngannou said (transcript via MMA Junkie). “Whether or not he has the belt.”

“When I received a call and the offer for proposal of this fight, what happened? I reached out to PFL and told them because we’re in the business together,” Ngannou said. “They gave me their blessing and said they can’t take away this opportunity from me, so I was happy to do that. I didn’t want to know what else they’re going to say, as long as they approved. They didn’t have a problem with this.”

The most entertaining part of the Francis Ngannou saga right now is watching him stick it to the UFC and blaze a trail for other talent to bet on themselves and not just play it safe with whatever rope Dana White is willing to give them. There’s no better way for him to do that than securing these kinds of huge fight opportunities.

Even a couple years from now, Ngannou in the PFL is still going to have mystique and prestige to it. But at this moment, he’s got a chance to do something historic in the boxing ring, and it’d be foolish to waste his time with anything else.

HATE TO SEE IT

UFC champ Jon Jones can’t handle the Tom Aspinall heat

The moment Tom Aspinall got his interim UFC title belt, his one, singular task was clear as day. By whatever means necessary, this man needed to unify the heavyweight title belt, ideally in a fight against Jon Jones.

I’d say he needed to do it against the winner of Jones/Miocic, but it’s hard not to feel like that fight is already something of a foregone conclusion. If Stipe does somehow manage to win and doesn’t retire, then sure, Aspinall should be trying to fight him too. But for now, Jones is champ, and once he recovers from injury he’ll be taking on a 41-year-old challenger 4 years removed from his last victory in the Octagon.

Thus (although often in a far too kind and soft spoken way, honestly), Aspinall has made it clear that his goal is a fight with Jon Jones, and that the UFC making any other bout is just ego stroking and getting one last squeeze of juice from one of their longtime stars before he too likely rides off into the sunset. It’s all absolutely true and nothing Jones or Dana White can say is going to change that. But, man is Jones trying.

I’m not a big Instagram stories guy, but this is absolutely what that platform was designed to do. Get on camera, record a video, vent, let it all out, and have the whole thing be gone a few hours later. Sure, someone would save it and upload it, and it’d still get circulated around, but we’d all know the intention. This? Jon Jones doesn’t need to do this. He doesn’t want to fight Tom Aspinall and he’s not going to. The UFC has already said as much. All he’s gotta do now is rehab and talk about how much he wants to smash Stipe.

Trying to spin this whole yarn about how he was young once and he did things the right way by fighting great fighters only makes Shogun look damn foolish for not telling Jones to hit the bricks when the UFC pushed him into a title shot just three years after his UFC debut. Jon Jones doesn’t need to convince everyone that Stipe Miocic is the deserving challenger. It’s the fight he wants and it’s the fight the UFC wants and it’s the fight that will sell. In combat sports that’s all the excuse anyone needs.

Israel Adesanya shirks the blame

There are no two ways about it, Israel Adesanya’s performance against Sean Strickland sucked. The two-time middleweight champion looked completely surprised by Strickland’s pressure and persistance and offered little in the way of resistance on his way to a 5-round decision loss in which he got dropped hard early in the fight.

Fans would have to hope that the bout would have been a learning experience for Adesanya and a point of reflection, as he increasingly found himself reliant on a style that was more subtractive than anything else, in an era where the MMA meta-game increasingly rewards busy fighters. And maybe in his own way, that’s what this is. But if so, it doesn’t seem so much focused on his own flaws as it does the coaching in his corner.

“I went back to the corner, round three or round four, whatever it was, I was like, ‘Right, we go this round, we must go this round,” Adesanya explained in a recent video on his YouTube channel (transcript via MMA Fighting). “Even like, when I asked Eugene in the fifth round, I said ‘Should I just go?’ and he’s like, ‘No, let’s be tactical.’ I wanted to kind of be like, ‘F— it, let’s go.’ Like, if I die, I die, like, go out on your shield. Kill or be killed.

“He was like, ‘Let’s be tactical.’ It got to the point where I realized this fight’s getting away from me. It got to a point where I felt like, ‘Damn. It’s too far gone.’ Like when someone’s in a race in the 100 meters, he was too far ahead and I just couldn’t catch up. I was trying my best to try and finish him in the early rounds. Regardless, I never lost hope, that’s the thing.”

Adesanya has landed more than 100 significant strikes in a five round fight just once since beating Kelvin Gastelum back in 2019. That’s 10 title fights, largely defined by patient, cautious approaches. But he didn’t look patient or cautious or even “technical” like his coaches wanted him to be against Strickland. Mostly he looked confused and gunshy.

Fighting technical and fighting on the front foot aren’t two different things. And being busy isn’t the antithesis of being a counter puncher, plenty of great counter fighters over the years have built their opportunities off of solid output and offense. Alexander Volkanovski tore Max Holloway to pieces at UFC 276, all while out-landing him almost two to one… and he trains with Adesanya’s coaches too.

Then again, fighting is also a game of ego maintenance. For as easily picked apart a cover story as this feels like, maybe it’s just what the man needs to convince himself that he can go back out there and win more fights, that the problem of his last bout was just a pep talk away. I can understand that, but I’d also council not trying to make it a public conversation.

UFC Vegas 84: The curious case of Andrei Arlovski

Posted on by Zane Simon in MMA Editorial, UFC Editorial, UFC News

The following piece first appeared on The Bloody Elbow Substack on Sunday, January 7, 2024. Subscribe for early access to more premium pieces and to support your favorite online karate magazine.

When former UFC champion Andrei Arlovski enters the cage next Saturday, January 13th, it’ll be 23 years since he first stepped inside the Octagon. It’ll be nearly 10 years since he made his return to the UFC, after braving the wilds in Strikeforce, Affliction, and the WSOF.

Suffice to say, Arlovski has been fighting at a very high level in MMA for a long, long time. And while we don’t know exactly what his current contract looks like, it’s also a near sure thing that win or lose against Waldo Cortes-Acosta the ‘Pitbull’ will make a healthy six figures just for showing up.

In his last publicly reported payday, against Philipe Lins in 2020, the Belarussian took home $325,000 for a unanimous decision victory. A year earlier, in a loss to Augusto Sakai, Arlovski made a cool $300,000. In 2018, he brought home $275,000 for a win over Stefan Struve. No win bonuses, just a flat salary, steadily increasing year over year. If that math has remained the same, that could mean the 44-year-old will be taking home $425,000 in just a few days no matter the result.

This all seems to stem from a renegotiated deal ahead of the then Jackson-Wink talent’s 2015 fight against Frank Mir. On a five fight win streak at the time, Arlovski jumped from $42,000/$42,000 (show/win) against Travis Browne to a flat $225,000 with incremental bumps. A smart move to be sure, but also one that feels—8+ years on—like an indication of an increasingly present option for UFC talent.

UFC lawsuit changes the landscape

Back in the old days of the promotion, the UFC’s cutthroat attitude to talent retention put a whole lot of emphasis on hardball negotiations both from promotion and from fighters. Joe Silva was a notorious hardass when dealing with talent, and fans regularly saw top guys like Murilo Bustamante, BJ Penn, Randy Couture, Tim Sylvia, and Vitor Belfort leave the company in prusuit of better paydays.

Considering how quick the UFC was to pull the trigger on cutting fighters back in the day as well, talent was smart to leverage whatever money they could, as fast as they could.

The still ongoing class action lawsuit, however, seems to have changed things. I’m not going to say it’s softened Dana White & Co., but it does seem to have given the world’s largest MMA promotion more hesitancy about cutting contracts before they’ve been completed. Fighters often appear to be getting more 2nd, 3rd, and 4th chances, even with losing records.

As a result, we’ve also seen what once felt like a rare opportunity reserved for the sports’ biggest stars extend to many more rank and file athletes—the chance to be a career mid-level UFC fighter.

A new middle class

These days, athletes like Marcos Rogerio de Lima, Angela Hill, Ovince St. Preux, Bryan Barberena, and Neil Magny increasingly find themselves running toward a decade or more spent in the Octagon, often without ever even sniffing title contention.

Largely that seems to be because they’re willing to play the game entirely on the UFC’s terms. Accept longer contracts on slow, incremental increases and, most importantly, pick up the phone whenever the matchmakers call.

Doing that has the look of a recipe that more or less ensures these fighters will never see a single, truly huge payday, and often it means they won’t ever fight for a belt either. Being willing to take any fight at any time in a promotion with as many top talents as the UFC hosts is a way to ensure regular upset losses.

Redefining success

But, if it’s also a way to make sure a fighter gets plenty of rope to fail and keep fighting, it’s not hard to see why so many people are willing to tread that path rather than taking a more bullish, aggressive negotiating stance.

To some extent, that’s a reality worth lamenting. Combat sports are, as a rule, incredibly deleterious to the health of their participants. Get in, get paid, get out is a smart way to go about it. However, in a market with little competition and a promotion that increasingly looks like a profit juggernaut even without star performers, it just may be that a fighter like Andrei Arlovski is as clear a picture of modern MMA success as most fighters could hope to achieve.

Ex-UFC title contender Jorge Masvidal un-retires | Hate to see it

Posted on by Zane Simon in MMA Editorial, MMA News, UFC Editorial, UFC News

2024 is only a couple days old, but we’re already getting a steady stream of new stories to ring in the new year. And, as is ever the case with MMA, there’s a few things to get hyped for, and a whole bunch of stuff to treat with trepidation.

This week in Love/Hate to see it, we’re tackling a major payday for one of MMA’s best coaches and a little luck in love for one of Japan’s best fighters. We’ve also got another in a long stream of short-lived MMA retirements, and a UFC schedule that’s already starting to feel gimmick heavy.

LOVE TO SEE IT

Erick Nicksick gets paid

Long before he fell out of favor with UFC brass, Francis Ngannou was already running into trouble with his public image. Not from anything he’d said, or from any kind of criminal activity that so many other fighters seem to find themselves involved. Not even for any lackluster performance inside the Octagon (well, maybe tangentially that Lewis fight had something to do with it).

Mainly, the thing that got Ngannou put on blast was his decision to leave longtime head coach Fernand Lopez and his Paris gym, the MMA Factory. With not just a little help from Dana White, Lopez went after his once-prized pupil for what he claimed was an overabundance of pride and an apparent lack of gratitude for all the hard work his coaches had put into his career.

As always when these kinds of camp divides end up happening in MMA, I can’t help but look askance at any coaching or manager that so willingly burns a bridge with fighters in public. By all accounts, fighters are a fickle lot, often seemingly tending toward impulsive behavior, and in need of constant validation. But, that’s the nature of the industry, and (to some extent) also their right.

They’re the one’s taking the risks, putting their bodies through hell, entertaining the crowds. If maintaining that kind of life means leaving some partnerships and even friendships in their wake, then so be it. After all, a good coach will always have another new talent on the rise to work with. Their career can last decades, while an elite fighter is lucky if they have a really solid ten year run.

Of course, time has only made Ngannou’s decision making skills as to his own career look better, and Lopez has found himself with other, bigger controversies to deal with. So, it feels a little bit extra sweet then to hear from Ngannou’s current coach, Eric Nicksick at Xtreme Couture, who had no end of good things to say about the ‘Predator’ and his generosity after the Cameroonian-born athlete’s recent boxing match against Tyson Fury.

“It was the most money I’ve ever been paid by a fighter,” Nicksick said of his cut from the Fury/Ngannou bout. “It was unbelievable. It was more than I expected. I wasn’t expecting—obviously Francis has always taken great care of me, but it floored me. I saw my Wells Fargo account that morning and it literally brought me to tears. That’s a true story; literally brought me to tears. Because, he changed my life.

“Not only from a professional standpoint, but a monetary standpoint; allowed me a lot of financial freedom to be able to enjoy my coaching, enjoy being a dad and a husband… allowed us to buy a new car. There’s a lot of things that just, with Francis moving over to boxing, and the way he takes care of his team? He loves every single one of us and he shows it. He takes care of us, and I couldn’t thank him enough.”

Nicksick even went on to add that, despite being really only an assistant for the bout, working behind Dewey Cooper—who acted as Ngannou’s head coach—he made more money for this one fight than he did as head coach for Ngannou’s title fights with Stipe Miocic and Ciryl Gane combined.

“If he wants to box,” Nicksick concluded, “I’m all for it.”

Nicksick has built one hell of a reputation over the past few years as one of MMA’s most well prepared and invested coaches, with multiple UFC title winners operating out of his gym in Las Vegas, NV. It’s not always the case that a rising tide raises all boats, but it seems Ngannou isn’t forgetting the people that have helped make him one of combat sports’ most dynamic forces. That’s always awesome to see.

Kyoji Horiguchi gets another W

It was to absolutely no one’s surprise when, after exiting the UFC on his own terms back in 2016, Kyoji Horiguchi immediately took over bantamweight MMA in Japan. Still at the time in his mid-20s and already a former UFC title contender, ‘The Typhoon’ rattled off 10-straight wins, picking up victories over Manel Kape, Ian McCall, Shintaro Ishiwatari, and Darrion Caldwell, among others, and not just winning gold in RIZIN, but in Bellator as well.

The years since that run have been a bit less kind, however. Horiguchi suffered a shocking upset to Kai Asakura at RIZIN 18 (later avenged), suffered an ACL injury, vacated his Bellator title, and then lost back-to-back fights stateside against Sergio Pettis and Patchy Mix.

An attempt to kickstart a new flyweight division for Bellator and RIZIN in 2023 fell to pieces after a first round eyepoke from Horiguchi rendered his opponent unable to continue. Fortunately, this NYE in Saitama everything got put back in its proper place.

A now 33-year-old Horiguchi defeated Makoto Takahashi, handing the 23-year-old just the second loss of his pro-MMA career, and snatching the title of RIZIN’s first flyweight champion in the process. But that wasn’t his only win on the night. After the victory, the American Top Team talent celebrated with a in-ring proposal to his longtime girlfriend.

Public proposals are always a little fraught, since the proposed always has that much more pressure to say yes, but this one is really, entirely just adorable. Right down to the hilariously stereotypical Japanese bullishness of his “Will you marry me!?” shout. Real cute stuff Horiguchi, here’s hoping to a long and happy marriage.

HATE TO SEE IT

Jorge Masvidal un-retires

I’m not going to pretend it’s any sort of big surprise, after all Jorge Masvidal was fighting dudes in Florida backyards as a teenager even before he ever started competing in MMA—and then he fought for another 20 years, mostly at the highest level. If ever a guy wasn’t going to make a clean break with combat sports, he seemed like someone who would hang on longer than needed.

Still, after suffering four-straight losses between 2020-23 and slowing his appearances in the cage down to just one a year, it really felt like ‘Gamebred’ had picked the right moment to call it quits on fighting. He was running up on 40 in a hurry, dealing with more injuries than ever, and even got clean KO’d for the first time in more than 50 fights. The message couldn’t have been clearer, Jorge Masvidal was a spent commodity as an elite competitor.

Hell, he even appeared to have a retirement plan in place. Gamebred FC may not be any kind of household name, but it gave the former multiple time title contender something to put his energy to—and the cards he put together were a reasonably fun blend of boxing, bareknuckle, and MMA.

The message, however, delivered over social media was simple:

I have no idea what he’s unretired for, only knowing that Masvidal was very clear that he was still under UFC contract when he made the decision to hang up his gloves last year. So if he wants to box, as he’s expressed some interest in doing, then he’ll have to hash that out with Dana White.

If that’s the kind of bag he’s running after, I guess it’s fine. There’s clearly money to be made in watching former MMA pros struggle with 10oz gloves, but it rarely ever means watching a good fight.

And if it’s MMA he’s running back to? That’s a hard pass from me. Outside of just the wear of age, Masvidal seemed more gunshy and more checked out in the final fights of his MMA run. A guy looking for a few big moments to put on a technical punching display against his younger opposition, and otherwise uninterested in all the other dynamics that make up the sport. I can’t imagine a few months off have re-lit his fire to be grappled against the cage for 15 minutes.

What’s up with UFC 300?

Conor McGregor made his big NYE announcement and, as expected, he’ll be headlining one of the year’s biggest PPVs at UFC 3…03??? There were whispers a few weeks ago that the UFC were thinking of keeping McGregor off their centennial card, with the thought that that PPV will sell big no matter what, and putting McGregor on another, random PPV event would give the promotion another top drawing event in 2024.

It’s an idea that always rang a little hollow to me, if for no other reason than looking back at UFC 100 & UFC 200, the reasons those events sold big was not because they were centennial shows, but because the promotion tried to stack them with every notable talent they had available at the time. Even with two big main events falling apart for UFC 200, that was still a card with bonafide PPV stars Brock Lesnar and Anderson Silva on it.

Right now, for UFC 300, we’ve got a Jiri Prochazka fight against a guy whose biggest win is laying on Anthony Smith, and Mr. Box-office himself Aljamain Sterling against Calvin Kattar. Oh wait, and there’s Leon Edwards saying he’ll defend his belt on the card… maybe against Belal Muhammad. A lineup crafted to get fans drooling if ever there was one.

As for the idea that the UFC would put McGregor on a smaller show? International Fight Week is pretty much THE guaranteed big card of the year every year. So, there’s no real extra ‘big card’ apparent in this plan. Although, I guess the only thing booking McGregor this way suggests is that Jon Jones won’t be ready to go soon enough and probably won’t be fighting until next fall… maybe, probably.

To cap it all off, the fight itself between McGregor and Chandler has slipped into complete carnival mode with McGregor opening as a favorite despite the ‘Notorious’ Irishman having picked up just one win (over the shell of Donald Cerrone) in the past seven years. I get that the lines are set to reflect the fact that McGregor’s fan base will almost certainly be betting on him in droves, but that also means the discourse is probably going to get insufferable. That’s all without even noting that the fight is apparently happening at middleweight of all places.

Just a couple days ago, I was talking about my hopes that 2024 would serve fans better than 2023 did, but now the new year is here and it’s already pretty hard to take it seriously.

2023: UFC business was booming, fandom not so much

Posted on by Zane Simon in MMA Editorial, UFC Editorial

The following piece first appeared on The Bloody Elbow Substack on Sunday, December 31, 2023. Subscribe for early access to more premium pieces and to support your favorite online karate magazine.

It’s hard not to look back on 2023 and feel like the chips are down on MMA as a whole. The latest PFL season failed to deliver anything like a compelling series of finale matchups. Bellator continued putting on reasonable, decent shows in front of a dwindling audience to the point that they finally sold off their assets and are likely to close up shop in the coming year or so.

Then there’s the UFC. Having started 2023 on the right foot—with the long awaited return of Jon Jones and a superfight between Alexander Volkanovski & Islam Makhachev—by the back half of the year it felt like the promotion was doing all it could just to make sure they still had PPV cards to put on, let alone high profile fights to headline them.

Jones got injured, Conor McGregor’s return never materialized, and Israel Adesanya dropped his belt to Sean Strickland and decided to take a long break from competition. There were still highlights, but for the first time since the pandemic, the UFC failed to put 20k+ fans in an arena for any given event (they came close a couple times).

Suffice to say, in terms of high profile fight years, the UFC has had better ones. Financially, however? Business seems better than ever.

UFC is still big business

A combination of increasingly lucrative rights deals, advertising deals, and a Contender Series Heavy labor force keeping costs low has the world’s largest MMA promotion raking in cash from all corners. Throw in their recent WWE merger and increasing opportunities in Saudi Arabia and it seems highly unlikely that the UFC will be any less a cash cow for the foreseeable future.

Whether that will be good for fans hoping that 2024 brings those big fights they missed out on this year, I’m not so sure.

It’s a feeling I’ve had for years now, that the UFC’s ability to create such a broad, unfocused international fan base and strong financial foundation has eroded their interest in actually serving any particular set of fans. Apex shows feel like the truest proof of that theory; events that lack relevance, stakes, or any sort of name value—seemingly produced almost entirely to meet contractual obligations. The quality change when the UFC actually puts a Fight Night card on in front of an audience couldn’t be more stark. When they have fans to serve, they do better.

Gone are the days when it felt like Zuffa was a huge force in Brazil and Canada. Now the UFC is more interested in putting cards in Abu Dhabi in front of a select audience of the absurdly wealthy.

PFL & all the rest

Unfortunately, with the promotion having conquered so much of the global market, everything else MMA is still living deep in its shadow. As the UFC gets more disconnected from putting on the best cards possible, other brands are still finding very little room to breathe. The PFL is trying to make a run at PPV, but the chances they succeed where every other promotion has failed still feel terribly thin. If for no other reason than that fan interest across the sport rises and falls not with the quality of MMA, but with the quality of the UFC.

The less the UFC cares about serving fans, the less likely it feels like another promotion is going to find a fan base rabid for more MMA content. It seems just as likely that people will get bored and move on to other things.

The chaos factor in all this, of course, is the ongoing class action lawsuit—which if successful could truly rattle the UFC’s cage and change everybody’s business structure. Would that be enough to spark real competition with the Endeavor-owned giant? Or would that just be another nail in the coffin of MMA as a culture craze that’s been slowly in decline since 2014?

My hope is for something bigger and better to rise out of all this mess. I’m not entirely convinced by the UFC’s 2024 lineup to date (so far UFC 300 seems like it’s a shadow of past centennial events). But there are still plenty of big fights to make, and curiosity can always carry when hope falters.

There’s little doubt in my mind that next year will be a big one for UFC business, here’s hoping it can be a better one for MMA fans as well.