The Live Experience: My First Time

I am just over two weeks out from flying to St. Louis for the Strikeforce: Heavy Artillery card and thought I would talk a little about the live mixed martial arts experience. Over the next two weeks leading up to my trip to St. Louis I will be talking about my live experiences and then going to hopefully blog throughout my time in St. Louis to bring the live experience to you as I experience it.

I have been an mixed martial arts fan since the mid 1990's and that first trip to the video store that saw me rent the UFC's as they come out before finally convincing mom and dad that I had to order the PPV's or my life simply would not continue. Through college there were several events I was tempted to attend, but the situation never really lined up to make it work. By 2008 I was on my feet financially after graduating school in 2006 and it was only a matter of time before I saw the UFC live. I was going to Las Vegas for a bachelor party the weekend of UFC 84, and naturally I could not miss that opportunity.

I bought tickets for the BJ Penn headlined events and planned to take in as much of the UFC experience while also hanging out with my buddies who were not really into mixed martial arts. I was able to do two days in studio with Goze and Alton, who were sitting in for George Garcia and Frank Trigg on TAGG Radio. The two days were nothing short of a blast hanging out with those guys and getting to be on the radio show. I was amazed on Thursday night at MGM Grand that guys like Carlos Newton and Ricco Rodriguez were just walking around. These were some of the guys I grew up watching, just milling around the casino like anyone else.

Everything around the event was awesome, but the event itself was beyond anything I could imagine. Seeing guys like Wanderlei Silva, BJ Penn, and Lyoto Machida live was amazing. The whole atmosphere was unlike almost anything I had ever seen at a sporting event. Afterwards I hung around outside as guys like Big Nog, Evan Tanner, Joe Lauzon, and others hung around outside and took pictures with the fans. It was truly a unique experience I will never forget. I told myself though that I would not come to another event till that was the sole reason of my trip. That would happen again in Las Vegas for UFC 100, but that’s another story for another time.

I didn’t really get to meet a ton of fighters outside of Evan Tanner and a couple others because of being there with guys that were not mixed martial arts fans, but as soon as I left that event I knew that I had to find a way to another event as soon as possible. I think that’s the common thing you will find with anyone who has the UFC Las Vegas experience. It almost puts you on a high that takes a couple days to come down from. My next exposure to the UFC in person would be in Atlanta at UFC 88, and this is when I realized that not all UFC events are created equal.

GSP Should Not Coach Season 12 of TUF

Historically the Ultimate Fighter Series has taken fighters from good fighters to household names and pay per view draws. We have seen the likes of BJ Penn, Rich Franklin, and Rampage Jackson gain even more notoriety by going on the reality television show. There are currently two rumors out there regarding the twelfth installment of the cable television series. The first one has a newly signed Jake Shields headlining against GSP and the second scenario sees the winner of the Josh Koscheck vs. Paul Daley fight taking their spot opposite of current welterweight champion Georges St. Pierre.

While I think either opponent is credible for GSP at this point in his career, I fail to see what putting St. Pierre on my television set for 12 weeks is going to do in regards to the UFC bottom line. There are several reasons behind this and not just the obvious. The first one is the language barrier. GSP will need subtitles at many times during the broadcast and while Nog vs. Mir proved to be a pretty good draw, the reality is that since then Big Nog has failed to draw the PPV buys while headlining events. While you won’t immediately have this issue with GSP as he is one of the companies 3 or 4 largest draws, it likely means that you will gain very few new buys by putting him on the television show.

The second point that I see when I think about GSP being on season 12 of the Ultimate Fighter is it will lead to another extended period of time off for the champion. GSP has not fought more than twice a year since 2007. That means from 2008 through 2010 he will fight only 6 times. As I alluded to earlier, St. Pierre is one of the 3 or 4 biggest draws for the UFC in terms of PPV buy rates. What sense does it make keeping him on the shelf 9 months when he is healthy? I don’t believe that it makes any sense at all. He is in the prime of his career and failure to utilize him for three fights a year when possible is a horrible mistake.

My final point comes from what the UFC stands to gain by putting GSP on The Ultimate Fighter Season 12. I believe there is actually very little that they stand to gain. That being said I do believe Shields, Koscheck, and Daley can make legitimate strides from coaching on the series. Setting up Shields with the winner of Thiago Alves/Jon Fitch would make exponentially more sense in the term of creating draws in my opinion. GSP has fought in multiple main events, has had 3 hours (6 episodes) worth of UFC primetime hyping his fights and countless UFC Countdown shows. How many fans should they expect him to gain by coaching on the Ultimate Fighter? Even worse, what if he somehow leaves a negative impression (which I doubt) by doing the show? These are all scenarios that the UFC must consider before moving forward with this season.

At the end of the day it seems extremely odd to me that the UFC is choosing to go in this direction. It's almost as if they feel obligated to get him on the series because of his extended success in the organization. While many people know I am far from a GSP fan, which does not mean I don’t want to see the best fighters in the world fight consistently as possible. I hope the UFC decides to move in a different direction as they look at the business side of this decision. While I can’t imagine the decision having a negative impact on the UFC's bottom line, I can see it hurting the long term growth of additional PPV draws.

Snapping Reactions: UFC 112

I thought the show started out great with Munoz vs Grove. It was a back and forth start with Grove clearling coming in with a gameplan to counter the takedown defense. Grove then starts landing some shots and is able to get him in several chokes. I thought at times he might have been to aggressive with chokes that weren't likely to finish. Munoz once he gained top position in the 2nd round looked awesome.

Phil Davis has all the potential in the world and that choke he sunk in whats amazing. I was impressed with the takedown defense though early in the fight. I think Davis needs to continue to take fights and get experience.

I thought the Dos Anjos vs Etim was a great back and forth fight and was nothing short of a grappling clinic that the fans had to enjoy.

Hughes vs Gracie was neither interesting or enjoyable. I thought they were far to timid in the first two rounds, and the style match-up resulting in a very boring fight as Hughes just used leg kicks and eventually finished.

Congrats to Frankie Edgar. Edgar used his speed and activity on the way to winning the LW title. I am a huge BJ Penn fan and I could not help but be disappointed in his performance. I hope that he can regroup fix what was wrong and come back better then ever. Once again this was a five round fight made only interesting by figuring out how to score the rounds. Most observes had Edgar winning 48-47, but no one had 50-45. Many scored the bout for BJ. The fact that BJ is content to sick back and counter jab though is bad. He must become more aggressive, especially since he is likely headed back to 3 round fights.

The Anderson Silva vs Demian Maia fight was extremely boring and I hated it. Not going to waste words on a fighter that wasted my time today.

My UFN 21 Experience

UFC Fight Night 21 emulated from Charlotte, NC this week. For all the traveling I have done to see the UFC in person, I was finally fortunate enough for it to come to my hometown. I was a little worried going into the week, cause from some indications ticket sales started sluggish and I was worried about a 2/3 full arena. Another thing that worried me was the fans. I was afraid that we would get the fly by night, boo after 10 seconds of ground actions, obnoxious fans. So while I am usually an optimist, for the weeks leading up to the event I was very pessimistic about the outcome.

While I couldn't go to weigh-ins on Tuesday afternoon cause of work, I was able to take in Joe Rogan on Tuesday night. I have seen Rogan's standup previously on television and in person the night before UFC 107 in Memphis, but I have to say he really outdid himself this week. His opening act went for about 30 minutes and Joe took the state about 9:30pm on Tuesday night. Joe did some of his usual bits and a lot of material I had not heard for the first hour and a half and put on a great show. After that he started letting the audience throw out subjects for him to talk about and started taking more and more shots. Also the great thing about going to a Rogan show the night before an event is that a few people from the UFC usually show up. Stitch, Eddie Bravo, the Spanish announce team, Chandella Powell, and Tracy Lee all were there to watch Joe's standup and just hung out in the back and chilled. I must say Chandella is stunning in everyday street clothes.

The day of the event I had to work in the morning, and then got off around lunchtime and went to meet MMAWeekly posters Snapcase and NeonJesusFreak. As with every other time I have met one of the long time forum posters, it was a great time and they are good people. Upon getting into the arena and looking at my seats I realized that I was in for a treat. Bojangles Coliseum is older, and not very big. After being used to attending PPV's in huge arena's the sightlines and view was fantastic. I settled in and waited for the fights to begin.

Most everyone has seen the fights, but there are certainly a couple fights that everyone should make an effort to see if they did not. The first one is the Gerald Harris fight. I think it’s safe to say he will have to wait a while before heading back to Bum Fighting Championships. Gerald struggled a bit early with Miranda's reach, and at one point was even rocked by a shot and down on the canvas. With about 20 seconds left in the round, everything changed though Gerald landed a big shot, and the killer instinct kicked in. He dropped Miranda a total of 3 times before finally knocking him down for the final time. I have seen a lot of fights in person, and this might be my favorite ending.

The other fight that people really need to see is Yushin Okami's fight. These guys really cleaned up his standup and pushed the pace at times, when he used to sit back and be almost over patient. The repeated shots bloodied his opponents face, and it was one of the better technical striking displays I have seen in a while. I don't think we can measure Okami's improvements without a step up in competition, but there is no denying the fact that he looked great. The prelim fights ran up to 10 minutes before the start of the main card.

One of the highlights of attending a UFC live event is getting to see the video they put on just before the broadcast starts. It’s the best UFC video they have ever put out, and every time they show it at an event I get chills. It basically runs through the gambit of past UFC moments, and is perfectly in tune with the video. It features the Frank Trigg vs. Matt Hughes II and Griffin vs. Bonnar fights over the others, but there are few great UFC moments during the Zuffa era that are left out.

The arena actually filled in nicely and was full everywhere but the 4 corners of the arena, where there was a reasonable amount of open seats. The most amazing thing during the course of the event was just how amazing the fans and refs were. There were not any restarts due to inactivity and the fans rarely if ever booed. Not only that, but much like in Japan they would clap after a good sequence and after most every round. I certainly underestimated the fans of North and South Carolina coming into the event. I had yet another great time at a UFC event and can’t wait to get back to another one.