From what I’ve heard, he had a torn MCL in that fight. Looking at it afterwards, he did seem to be protecting that braced knee in his stance. Lots of the times he failed use any sort of guard also seemed to be due to that leg. Hopefully there was some reason, because that performance was just godawful.
Quite true. He looked flabby and out of shape, also he looked like shit.
Has anyone else noticed that the Pride re-runs have been highlighting losses by “UFC” fighters recently?
Tim Silvia needs to be taken down a peg, he’s good, but he’s more lucky than good IMO. Wanderlei or Fedor would make him look stupid, Cro-Cop could kick his ass too.
I say it’s about time that international fighters get to fight UFC guys. Not a single guy in the UFC has a “solid” hold on their title, when Pride fighters are introduced.
All I know is they were showing it at the bar where we held our Xmas party and it was like some weird gay porn where a guy was alternately punching and humping another guy.
Wow, pretty good thread, a lot more active than any previous UFC thread on this board I remember. Responses:
Cisco - I’ve seen same-day weigh-ins touted by someone on fightforum.com. I think the current UFC brass would be crazy not to at least consider it. Weight cutting is creating borderline horror stories now, and I don’t want someone to fall into a coma before this gets seriously addressed.
Regarding Lutter, IMO, he just plain needs to go up a weight class. Remember, he barely managed to cut down to 186 for the Ultimate Fighter 4 finale. He looked flat-out wasted at the recent weigh-ins, and even so, he managed to win the first round against Silva and come pretty close to a lucky win. I absolutely thinks he deserves another chance as a light heavyweight. And if this isn’t feasible, Dana White should make it feasible.
As for frequency of PPVs, there were 7 PPVs in '02, 5 in '03 and '04, and 6 in '05. '06 was when things realy took off, with 10 PPVs, as well as two complete seasons of The Ultimate Fighter and a number of UFC Fight Nights. It all depends on if the fighters are ready, if the venues are ready, how many unforseen complications there are (like injuries), etc. It’s always subject to change, which of course is nothing unusual for this league.
ES-H Tucker - Doesn’t Spike TV have the exclusive rights to UFC non pay-per-view broadcasts? I’m not sure if there’s enough product to divide between two channels. Spike TV is on basic cable, so there’d be no advantage to a move to ESPN.
Maybe so. My main point was that ESPN doesn’t even report UFC results–and if they have been recently, then it took quite a while for them to come around. They just ignore a sport that has been generating several hundred thousand PPV buys (similar to, and sometimes surpassing recent boxing PPV offerings).
Now that you mention it, they have shown Cro Cop lose to Roidleman, Herring lose to Fedor, and Anderson Silva lose to that other-worldly flying heel-hook by Chonan within the last couple weeks. Then again, they still love to show Rampage’s brutal KO by slam against Ricardo Arona. I think it’s probably just because the guys who came to the UFC happen to be some of the most popular.
Wanderlei is vulnerable to strikers bigger than him so I could see Tim catching him with a lucky shot or winning another 5-round snoozefest decision, but you’re absolutely right about Cro Cop and Fedor. My prediction is that big Tim will lose to Randy in 3 weeks and then he will lose to Cro Cop for the #1 contendership and then Dana will drop him. He obviously doesn’t like fighting so he needs to go be an accountant or something.
GSP is safe. I’m not really a Chuck fan but I think Chuck is a bad fight for Wanderlei, so I’d say Chuck is pretty safe against Pride fighters too.
A. Silva would probably lose to Hendo, but is otherwise safe (unless you mention Lindland, who is moving up to heavyweight and not in Pride anyway.) Sean Sherk would get eaten alive by Gomi, Tim would be the first Octagon death if he fought Fedor.
Several hundred thousand PPV buys is miniscule as compared to the sports they do cover. And ESPN doesn’t devote much coverage to boxing highlights; their staples are the big team sports, golf, and major events.
There might also be a difference in terms of the nature of the market. ESPN’s big draw is Sportscenter. If UFC fans are either buying access to the big events via PPV, or going to a friend’s house who paid for PPV, then why would they want to watch highlights on ESPN? The benefit of Sportscenter is that the fan of a sport can see what’s been happening around the league without having to watch all the games. I’m a baseball fan, and it’s flatly impossible to watch all major league games; in fact, since I happen to have a life, I can’t even just watch all of my team’s games. A sports highlight show allows me to catch up on what happened yesterday and how it affects the league. But if you’re a UFC fan who arranged to watch UFC 67, there’s little draw for you to watch Sportscenter a week from now to see highlights of… UFC 67, which you saw a week ago anyway.
I’d argue that PPV is a dead end in terms of sports marketing, except for niche sports. I cannot help but notice that boxing started to lose a lot of its lustre exactly at the same time that it started putting all the big events on PPV. PPV looked like a fabulous way to make an enormous sum of money for big events - Tyson-Spinks made about fifty trillion dollars an hour (since it only lasted 91 seconds) - but the overall lack of exposure hurts the sport. It’s not a coincidence that the NFL began to overtake Major League Baseball as the USA’s primo pro sport at exactly the time Pete Rozelle made it into a TV show.
Yeah, it’s been that way for at least a year now. If anyone doesn’t believe it, I’ll show him my cable bill!!
No shit . . . ours is about $160 a month now and UFC is the only PPV we buy.
Seems to me ESPN could at least mention who won a big UFC event.I watched Sportscenter the day after Liddel and Ortiz fought but nary a word about it.
I agree. They show cheerleading, hula-hooping, jump-roping, and Ms. Fitness USA, so UFC not being popular enough is not a valid excuse.
I think MMA will be up there with the mainstream team sports in terms of popularity within 5-10 years.
Not on SportsCenter, though.
From the clips I’ve seen on youtube Pride fighters/fighting makes the UFC seem very tame.
Have any Pride fighters fought in the UFC and, if so, how have they fared? I saw Rampage Jackson kick the shit out of Chuck Liddell in a Pride match. Was that because Liddell isn’t that great a fighter or because the format of Pride fighting put a great UFC fighter at a disadvantage?