Author: Ben Fowlkes

UFC on FOX: By the Odds

Filed under: UFC, UFC on FOXUFC on FOX is no ordinary event, so this is no ordinary odds breakdown. Normally we have a main card full of favorites and underdogs to sort through and pick away at. This time? It’s the main event, a lightweight contender b…

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UFC on FOX is no ordinary event, so this is no ordinary odds breakdown. Normally we have a main card full of favorites and underdogs to sort through and pick away at. This time? It’s the main event, a lightweight contender bout, and then a lot of stuff that (at least by comparison) feels like filler designed to keep the fans in their seats until it’s time.

With the abbreviated TV offering just a few days away, it’s time to take a look at the action that really matters.

Cain Velasquez (-190) vs. Junior dos Santos (+155)

It hasn’t gotten a lot of attention so far, but before we get crazy can we talk about Velasquez’s injury layoff for a minute? Not only is a torn rotator cuff kind of serious, but it kept him out of the cage for almost 13 months. He hasn’t gone that long between fights since the first year of his career, so maybe we shouldn’t assume that it’ll be no big deal for him to jump right back into the cage against one of the world’s top heavyweights just like that. Ring rust is real, and it doesn’t help that one of Velasquez’s main sparring partners — former Olympic wrestling team captain Daniel Cormier — has been sidelined with a broken hand lately. You factor in the possibility that the champ might be feeling some pressure to brawl in order to give the FOX audience (and his boss) a show they’ll remember, and suddenly dos Santos starts to look like a very strong underdog pick, right? Maybe, but that is an awful lot of faith in a few intangibles. On paper, Velasquez’s speed and wrestling skills should make the difference. He ought to be able to get in close, negate dos Santos’ ability to box from the outside, and either put him down or rough him up in the clinch. It’s hard to feel terribly confident after the lay-off he’s had, but it’s also hard to pick against the champ at this point in his career. This is one fight where dos Santos will not be able to take his foot off the gas in the later rounds.
My pick: Velasquez. If you were smart, you jumped on this line back when it was -150. Then again, if you’re smart you don’t bet on fights this tough to call to begin with.


Clay Guida (+220) vs. Ben Henderson (-280)

I admit that I’d be salivating over this underdog line on Guida if not for one thing: Henderson’s last fight. Jim Miller was riding a seven-fight win streak and looked for all the world like the next major lightweight title challenger, and Henderson absolutely demolished him. If he can do that to Miller, who’s a solid all-around fighter, what can Guida threaten him with? It sounds as if Guida’s pinning his hopes on his wrestling and his non-stop motor here, and why not? It worked against Anthony Pettis, and if we want to start playing the transitive property game, we could point out that Pettis beat Henderson. At the same time, Henderson’s takedown defense keeps getting better, and he can be absolutely brutal when his striking game starts to click. Guida has outworked superior athletes before, but this is a tall order even for him.
My pick: Henderson. I still think it’s a closer fight than these odds would suggest, but it’s a tough style match-up for Guida.

Quick picks:

– Ricardo Lamas (-130) over Cub Swanson (even). I’m afraid Swanson’s best days may be behind him. Lamas is just good enough to get the job done.

– DaMarques Johnson (-280) over Clay Harvison (+220). Johnson’s getting a much easier bout after stepping up late to face Sadollah. Expect him to make the most of it.

– “Kid” Yamamoto (-370) over Darren Uyenoyama (+280). Kind of seems like the UFC might be tossing Yamamoto an easy one to keep him around for at least a little while longer. Oh well.

Crazy underdog pick of the night:

Pablo Garza (+220) over Dustin Poirier (-280). People may be getting a little too hot on Poirier just a tad too soon. There aren’t a lot of attractive underdog lines on this card, so this one will have to do.

The ‘For Entertainment Purposes Only’ Parlay: Velasquez + Henderson + Johnson + Yamamoto

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As Hype Increases for UFC on FOX Fight, So Do Risks for Cain Velasquez

Filed under: UFC, UFC on FOXLOS ANGELES — UFC president Dana White has made no secret of what he’s hoping to see when Cain Velasquez and Junior dos Santos climb in the cage for the first UFC on FOX fight this Saturday night.

“You see what these two f…

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Cain Velasquez and Junior dos SantosLOS ANGELES — UFC president Dana White has made no secret of what he’s hoping to see when Cain Velasquez and Junior dos Santos climb in the cage for the first UFC on FOX fight this Saturday night.

“You see what these two fight like and you can pretty guarantee the way this fight is going to go,” White said at Wednesday’s press conference. “I can tell you what’s not going to happen. It’s not going to be boring, there’s not going to be any stalemating, and this fight’s going to be an absolute war.”

In other words, a cross between Griffin-Bonnar I and Hagler-Hearns might be acceptable. Anything less and it will feel like a disappointment.

But projecting such enormous expectations onto the fight could have unforeseen consequences, especially if the fighters feel an obligation to deliver a certain kind of fight in order to please their boss and make a good impression on the network TV audience.


Some segment of the viewing public might like to see the fight become a wild brawl, but that seems like an outcome that would benefit the precision striker dos Santos much more than the former All-American wrestler Velasquez. It’s not hard to imagine the champ leaving his game plan in the locker room in an attempt to deliver what White has promised, and if he does he could be looking at a fight that doesn’t necessarily play to his strengths.

If Velasquez’s camp is worried about the effect of the pressure of their fighter, however, they won’t admit it. But that doesn’t mean they recognize the danger.

“If they go out there and go crazy, it probably will be to [dos Santos’] advantage, because I think Cain has more skills than he does,” said AKA teammate and sparring partner Daniel Cormier. “…But Cain could fight the strategy that’s been laid out for him on cruise control. That’s the best thing about being at AKA, is we emphasize strategy and how we’re going to fight and our game plan and we follow it every day of the week in training. It’s not like you’re going to spar however you want. You spar according to the game plan that [head trainer Javier Mendez] sets out in front of us. You don’t abandon it.”

Undoubtedly Velasquez will benefit from having the experience of his trainers and teammates behind him, but at the same time, has any of them ever been in a fight of this magnitude? Are they fully prepared for what it might do to their fighter’s mind to have White promising a war whether Velasquez’s game plan calls for it or not?

According to Mendez, the team isn’t relying on Velasquez’s ability to block out the hype so much as his ability to deliver on it without changing anything about his fighting style.

“Cain’s going to come in and if Junior can be mauled right away, I’m sure Cain will maul him right away,” said Mendez. “But Cain’s never put on a boring fight because he’s constant action, he doesn’t stall, doesn’t hold. He’s a chain-type fighter. He’s always looking to do the most damage and get you out of there as fast as possible, so I can guarantee you this fight will be the most exciting fight in the heavyweight division. There’s no way this fight will be boring. I’d bet my life on it.”

Still, it’s an awful lot to ask for from any fighter, particularly one who’s been out of action for a little over a year. Velasquez suffered a torn rotator cuff in victory over Brock Lesnar to claim the title last October, and had surgery to repair the injured shoulder in January.

The road back wasn’t an easy one for the champ, who slipped out of fighting shape when he couldn’t train like he’d become accustomed to.

“He got big,” chuckled Cormier. “I don’t know how heavy he got, but he got big. I used to give him a hard time, calling him Mark Hunt. He didn’t like that very much.”

According to Mendez, it took about a month of gradually getting Velasquez back into good condition before they could begin the real work.

“In the beginning it was hard,” Mendez said. “I was having him just do footwork stuff and he was so out of shape, he got tired just doing footwork. He had a callous on the bottom of his foot and he ripped it so I had to have him stop. It went from that to where he is now, which is pretty amazing.”

But even as Velasquez and dos Santos both swear that they’ve barely noticed the added pressure for this fight, those around them certainly have.

“It’s bigger,” said Cormier. “It means a lot more. But I think those guys are trained to ignore it, and that’s good. When you’re in the fight, whether it’s on FOX or on Spike or in a damn garage somewhere, you have to focus on the fight. That’s really all that matters. But for everyone else around, we know it’s bigger. You can feel that it means so much for the sport. If they go out and lay an egg, it’s not going to be good.”

Even Mendez, who initially insisted that it felt like any other fight, had to stop himself and admit, “well, you know, actually I’m probably lying about that.”

There’s no use in denying it: this is a different kind of fight. If Velasquez and dos Santos didn’t know it already, they found out when they showed up to the presser and White started making promises and guarantees on their behalf.

“Give me my entire roster of guys, make every one of them healthy, and this is still the fight I’d pick,” said White. “This is the fight that I picked to put on network television, and it is important, and I picked this fight for a reason.”

With the bar set that high, it would be easy to get a reckless while trying to reach it.

 

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Clay Guida Grapples With Role as UFC on FOX’s Forgotten Fighter

Filed under: UFC, UFC on FOXLOS ANGELES — When Clay Guida arrived at Wednesday afternoon’s UFC on FOX press conference, there was an empty chair and a card with his name on it waiting for him on the dais. By the time the press conference got underway,…

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Clay GuidaLOS ANGELES — When Clay Guida arrived at Wednesday afternoon’s UFC on FOX press conference, there was an empty chair and a card with his name on it waiting for him on the dais. By the time the press conference got underway, there was neither.

“They had spaces and then they realized, oh wait, they’re not showing our fight [on FOX] so why would we be up there?” said Guida. “I understand, but old duder could have been hanging out at the hotel, sitting by the pool or something.”

If you’re waiting to hear Guida complain about his lot in life, that’s about as close as you’ll get. Clad in shorts and a hoodie and looking more like he was ready for a day at the beach on this warm fall afternoon, Guida’s laid-back attitude fit right in with his southern California surroundings. If there’s any fighter in the UFC who could look so relaxed about not only being left off the historic FOX debut, but also about being pulled out of his hotel to stand around in the L.A. sun for no reason, clearly it was the duder.

When you really stop and think about it though, it’s hard to fathom how even Guida could not be seething with a certain quiet rage on this particular afternoon. Here he was, a few days away from a top contender bout with Ben Henderson — the kind of fight that can make or break a nearly 30-year-old fighter’s career — and he was being treated like the kid who’d showed up to the dance without a date.


In a way, being on the first UFC on FOX card makes him a part of history, but being relegated to the internet stream and the Spanish-language broadcast also makes him more of background player to that history than a living participant.

But instead of brooding in a corner while Cain Velasquez and Junior dos Santos soaked up the media attention, Guida sat in the front rows, snapping his own photos like one of the fans. He wasn’t interesting in griping about what he’d missed out on, he explained afterward, but rather focusing on where he still had to go.

“I’m not necessarily disappointed, more determined now,” said Guida. “Life has kind of come full circle and my MMA career has come full circle. Five years ago I was on the undercard of UFC 64, just trying to win my fight and get put on the broadcast. This one, hopefully there’s a chance, but they’re going to put it on FoxSports.com, Facebook, you know.”

In other words, people will see his fight, even if it’s just the hardcores. And Guida is confident that the bout will eventually find its way onto the airwaves, since “Dana [White] is a magician. …He will do his best to get it on TV.”

Of course, by the time the bout does air for English-speaking American viewers, there’s always the chance that Guida won’t like what they see. Some oddsmakers have Henderson as a nearly 3-1 favorite, and if Guida loses this chance to position himself as a lightweight title challenger, he may never get another one.

After all, his current four-fight win streak has been almost two years in the making, and he hasn’t faltered since his submission loss to Kenny Florian at UFC 107 — an experience that stays with him to this day, he said.

“I still use the Kenny Florian fight as motivation,” Guida said. “I thank him every day in my training for teaching me a lesson, unfortunately. I was trying to strike with a striker, but now I’ve learned to go back to my roots and that’s hard work and wrestling.”

It’s hard to argue that Guida has made the most of those two attributes in recent fights, but will it be enough against Henderson? Not surprisingly, Guida doesn’t seem to be stressing himself out over it at the moment.

“Patience is part of being a professional athlete,” he said. “Five years seems like a long time, but to me it seems like I was just stepping in the cage on Oct. 14, 2006. To me it’s about the journey, not just the destination.”

 

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Dana White Promises ‘Biggest Fight in UFC History’ for FOX Debut

Filed under: UFC, UFC on FOXLos Angeles — Despite the magnitude of the UFC on FOX event this Saturday night in Anaheim, UFC president Dana White kept it simple and direct at Wednesday afternoon’s press conference to promote the show. No supporting cas…

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Cain Velasquez and Junior dos SantosLos Angeles — Despite the magnitude of the UFC on FOX event this Saturday night in Anaheim, UFC president Dana White kept it simple and direct at Wednesday afternoon’s press conference to promote the show. No supporting cast. No big procession to mark the big occasion. Just the two people who mattered, and the one man willing to shout from the rooftops about how important it all is.

Right across the street from the Staples Center in downtown L.A., walled in by the trendy bars and restaurants of the L.A. Live complex, White stood flanked by a couple of men whose dented faces and misshapen ears were enough to tell you that they hadn’t come down here for a screen test, and squinted into the sun as he declared that what we were looking at was the ingredients for “without a doubt, the biggest fight in UFC history.”

At least, that’s what he’s hoping for. It’s what he’s betting on, and why, White said, he chose heavyweight champ Cain Velasquez and Junior dos Santos to lead the charge in the UFC’s network TV debut.

“If you’re in this position where it is the biggest fight in UFC history, the biggest moment for the sport of mixed martial arts, these are the two guys you want to step in there and go out and fight,” said White.

Of course, while Velasquez and dos Santos might make for a great pairing in the cage, they don’t seem to be the UFC’s best and brightest when it comes to selling a fight. Maybe it’s that both are just too easy-going, too agreeable. Neither is known as a man of many words, and both are too respectful to reach into the pro wrestling bag of tricks for snappy one-liners and stinging insults.


Even when dos Santos was reminded during the presser that he once suggested that the champion in any given weight class isn’t necessarily the best fighter in that division, he owned up to the remark before quickly adding that “in this case,” Velasquez is the current top dog at heavyweight, “but I’m going to change this on Saturday.”

For his part, Velasquez was bolstered by the support of the Hispanic fans who had come out for the event, drawing cheers when he thanked “La Raza” for their support, but mostly relying on White to play up that angle for him in typical fight promoter fashion.

After running down the bullet points of Velasquez rise to stardom, White called his heavyweight champ “a testament to the American dream…where somebody can go out there and work hard and focus and he really is that story. I don’t care if you’re Mexican, American, German, or Puerto Rican, man, I don’t know how you can’t love Cain Velasquez and his story.”

Velasquez, not surprisingly, kept it slightly more low-key.

“I represent hardworking people,” he said. “That’s what my family is and that’s what I’ve grown up around. Mexicans are hardworking people. That’s what it means to me.”

Not that dos Santos was without his supporters, however. Even after it was suggested to him that he might find himself in unfriendly territory inside the Honda Center, small, but passionate chants of “Cigano! Cigano!” broke out among a few fans.

“I think for sure there’s going to be a lot of people rooting for Cain on Saturday night, but I know I’m going to get a lot of people rooting for me too, in the whole world,” said dos Santos. “That’s the energy I will bring with me inside the cage and use in the fight.”

A question from one enthusiastic fan about which hand dos Santos planned to knock the champ out with drew boos from the mostly pro-Velasquez crowd, but merely seemed to confuse dos Santos at first, before he replied, “I have two hands for a reason…but I like this one,” as he held up his right.

Another fan told Velasquez that his achievements made him proud to be Mexican, which seemed genuinely touching before he quickly followed it up with a slightly unreasonable request to walk to the cage with the champ’s entourage on Saturday night.

“I don’t think we can do that,” said a visibly uncomfortable Velasquez.

But White, who’d already agreed to give another fan tickets to the promotion’s upcoming Toronto event immediately after telling fans not to ask him for tickets, dismissed such practical concerns easily.

“Yeah, we’ll do it, dude,” he said.

Maybe it was the sunshine getting to the UFC president. Maybe he’s just feeling so good about the upcoming network debut, he’s become a soft touch for increasingly demanding fans. Or maybe sometimes all you have to do is ask and the rest takes care of itself.

As for White, he’s already made clear what he’s hoping for out of Velasquez and dos Santos when FOX pulls back the curtain on Saturday night. Whether he too will get what he wants remains to be seen.

 

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Junior dos Santos: I Will Be the Heavyweight Champion on Saturday

Filed under: UFC, UFC on FOXIt’s difficult to tell whether Junior dos Santos truly appreciates the magnitude of what’s about to happen to him on Saturday night. Though the Brazilian heavyweight has swiftly picked up the English language like something …

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Junior dos SantosIt’s difficult to tell whether Junior dos Santos truly appreciates the magnitude of what’s about to happen to him on Saturday night. Though the Brazilian heavyweight has swiftly picked up the English language like something out of a Rosetta Stone ad, his grasp of American culture might still be a tad hazy.

After all, if someone told you that you were about to appear on Brazil’s Globo network, would you have any idea what that meant? So it is with dos Santos, who has heard enough by now to know that his UFC heavyweight title fight against Cain Velasquez on FOX is a very big deal, but still seems unclear about the exact ramifications of it all.

“I have no idea what that means for sure yet,” dos Santos told MMA Fighting on Tuesday afternoon. “I know it’s going to be huge for our sport, for all of MMA, and for the UFC. I’m just happy to be here and I want to do my best to win this fight.”

What it means, of course, is that dos Santos is about to become a significant part of MMA history. The sport has had primetime network TV exposure in the past, but nothing like this. As if fighting for a UFC title wasn’t enough, dos Santos is about to help the UFC expose its product to millions of viewers, many of whom will likely have never watched an entire MMA bout before. Talk about pressure.

Because dos Santos’ meeting with the champ is the only fight scheduled for Saturday night’s hour-long broadcast, the stakes couldn’t be higher for this fight. If it’s a dud, the whole sport may be judged by it. If it’s a thriller, dos Santos and Velasquez will likely be heroes not just to their bosses at the UFC, but to the multitudes of other pro MMA fighters — present and future — who are hoping that a successful debut on FOX will be the rising tide that lifts all ships.


Just thinking about it might be enough to give a normal person a panic attack, but the nerve-wracking immensity of it all doesn’t seem capable of reaching dos Santos.

“I know it’s an important show, it’s an important fight, for me and the whole of MMA, but I’m feeling no pressure,” he said. “Actually, I’m feeling the same pressure that I had for other fights. … For me, it’s going to be the same thing. I’m really happy with where I am now, fighting for the title, and it’s more important than everything. I will keep my focus on the fight, on Cain Velasquez, and I’ll try not to think about that other stuff.”

It’s a smart approach, since Velasquez’s non-stop motor will probably provide dos Santos with plenty to think about once the cage door closes. The champion is far from the biggest or strongest man in the heavyweight division, but what he lacks in size he has more than made up for with speed and pace.

Once the former All-American wrestler gets started, he doesn’t stop. He hardly even slows down, and there aren’t many big men in the sport who can keep up with him. To make sure that he’s one of the few who can go step-for-step and blow-for-blow with the champ, dos Santos had his conditioning coach adjust his training, he said.

To prepare for a fast-paced title fight that could, at least theoretically, go five rounds, dos Santos never sparred less than six rounds in training, he said. And while UFC president Dana White once criticized him for beating up on opponents early and then coasting in the later rounds, the Brazilian now says he’s “more prepared for this fight, and I train a lot to keep fighting like in the first round for the whole [fight].”

“Cain Velasquez has really good stamina. For the heavyweight division, it’s very different and that makes him very dangerous for this division. But you know, he seems like an unstoppable guy, and that’s going to be my challenge. I’m going to do my best to stop him.”

And how does he plan to do that, exactly? Fortunately for dos Santos (or maybe unfortunately, depending on how you think about it), he’s not one of those fighters who needs to keep his game plan much of a secret. He wants to stay off the mat against the decorated wrestler and put his boxing skills to work, and he doesn’t much care who knows it.

“I don’t know how the fight will be, but I would love to fight standing with him,” dos Santos said. “I think he’s going to try and take me down and make his ground-and-pound. He’s very good at ground-and-pound and I think he will try to do that. But I’m going to try very hard to keep this fight standing, because I want to knock him out and I will try my best to knock him out on Saturday.”

It’s a feat that none of Velasquez’s other opponents have accomplished, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be done. Whether it ends via KO or not, dos Santos insisted, “I will win the title. I’m really confident [that] I will be the heavyweight champion on Saturday.”

He’s known nothing but success so far in the UFC, but a win would vault him to heights that even dos Santos seems incapable of imagining just yet.

As he put it, “When I started, I had dreams to fight in the UFC and be one of the best fighters in the world one day. But I never thought I could be here at this point right now. I’m just enjoying everything. I’m really prepared for this fight, and for sure it’s going to be huge.”

How huge? That’s a question still waiting for an answer.

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UFC Not the First on Network TV, but Can It Learn From Others’ Mistakes?

Filed under: UFC, UFC on FOXMake no mistake: the UFC on Fox is a landmark event, and it is a very, very big deal for the UFC and its fans. But it’s not quite an industry pioneer. Not by a long shot.

A live MMA event on network TV? Sorry UFC, but it’s…

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Cain VelasquezMake no mistake: the UFC on Fox is a landmark event, and it is a very, very big deal for the UFC and its fans. But it’s not quite an industry pioneer. Not by a long shot.

A live MMA event on network TV? Sorry UFC, but it’s been done. Not particularly well, but still.

Before there was the UFC on FOX, there was EliteXC: Primetime. Before Cain Velasquez and Junior dos Santos agreed to meet for the UFC heavyweight title on network TV, Kimbo Slice and James Thompson introduced America to their own interpretation of MMA on CBS. Like many trailblazing efforts in other fields, this was an imperfect foray into the unknown. Let’s just say mistakes were made, lessons were learned, and both EliteXC and CBS found out that sometimes it hurts to go first.

This was late May, 2008. Compared to today’s MMA landscape, the field of battle was positively littered with would-be competitors to the UFC. The IFL had a pre-taped weekly spot on MyNetworkTV — at the time one of the consistently lowest-rated English-language networks — airing weeks-old fights and highlight reels. Strikeforce had a similarly pre-taped, extremely late-night (or, more accurately, early morning) show on NBC at 2 a.m., following “Poker After Dark.” Even clothier-turned-promoter Affliction was getting ready to jump into the MMA scene with a bloated payroll and a recklessly ambitious business plan.

And then there was EliteXC. First announced in 2006, the upstart organization put on its first fight in 2007 at the DeSoto Civic Center in Southaven, Miss. It wasn’t the most auspicious of beginnings, particularly for an event entitled “Destiny” — the main event ended in a disqualification loss for Frank Shamrock after he illegally kneed Renzo Gracie in the head several times — but with a main card on Showtime and an undercard streaming on Pro Elite website, it was perhaps a sign of things to come for the MMA industry as a whole.


On May 31, 2008, EliteXC brought a live MMA event to primetime network television for the first time in American TV history. The aptly named “Primetime” event went down in Newark’s Prudential Center, and was loaded with EliteXC’s most marketable stars, including Kimbo Slice, Gina Carano, Robbie Lawler, and Phil Baroni.

From the very beginning, the big network debut wasn’t exactly a Swiss watch. Carano missed weight badly for her fight with Kaitlin Young, and didn’t seem especially thrilled about being on the card at all. The event was headlined by former internet brawler Kimbo Slice (who had just two pro MMA fights at the time) taking on journeyman heavyweight James Thompson (who was riding a two-fight losing streak and had been knocked out in five of his last eight bouts).

The main event pairing was panned by many fans and pundits, particularly since the undercard featured a legitimately attemtion-worthy middleweight title bout between Robbie Lawler and Scott Smith, but the rationale behind it seemed obvious enough. Here was Slice, an internet novelty act who had sprang into a sudden, bizarre form of fame capable only in the age of the internet, taking on a Brit with a glass jaw who at least looked the part to people who didn’t know better. Slice would knock him out in front of millions of new viewers, all of whom would be instantly hooked on this new-fangled MMA stuff, and CBS and EliteXC would both scoop up their enormous piles of money and go home.

As you probably already know, it didn’t go down like that.

The good news was, the millions of viewers showed up. The bad news was what they saw when they got there. Dancing girls, some not quite primetime-worthy performances, and, strangely, not all that much action. As Yahoo! columnist Kevin Iole pointed out later, “after the show had been on the air for 32 minutes, there had been 61 seconds of actual fighting. When it was 70 minutes into the show, there had been just 2:12 of fighting.”

CBS would have reason to regret that, since the Slice-Thompson main event didn’t even get underway until well after the show was scheduled to end. By the time the sloppy heavyweight affair finally ended — and with a highly questionable stoppage that gave Slice the victory, no less — EliteXC had run over by nearly an hour in its network debut. It also hadn’t made too many friends.

Newspaper columnists and radio hosts around the country heaped various amounts of scorn on CBS for airing the spectacle. Even then-governor of New York David Paterson admitted to listening to the broadcast over the radio, though he was apparently unimpressed with descriptions of Thompson’s cauliflower ear popping as a result of a Slice punch. Perhaps least surprisingly, UFC president Dana White slammed the effort as “disgusting.”

Said White: “You can hate me, you can say whatever you want about me. I’ve been busting my ass for the last ten years in this sport, and there’s a lot of great athletes in this sport…and last night was a [expletive] joke. Did it set us back? I don’t know. I did Sportscenter today, where some guy’s saying this stuff shouldn’t even be on television. I agree. What happened last night should not be on [expletive] television, especially network television. But you can’t say that about the real fighters in this sport.”

Of course, that wasn’t the death knell for MMA on network TV or even for EliteXC on CBS. On went the show(s), and America hadn’t yet seen the last of Kimbo Slice. It’s worth noting that then, just as now, the MMA community had high hopes for what network exposure might help the sport accomplish. The Baltimore Sun’s Mark Chalifoux said it would be a “moment of truth” for EliteXC and MMA, writing that the “entire MMA-world has a lot riding on this event as it will be the first exposure to MMA for a lot of casual sports fans.”

Sound familiar?

EliteXC promoter Gary Shaw promised it would be “the biggest thing ever to happen to MMA.” After “Primetime” on CBS, Shaw said, fighters would be as big as American Idol contestants. “They’ll be recognized at airports and Burger Kings,” he added.

Somehow, I doubt that if James Thompson walked into a Burger King right now his biggest problem would be fending off autograph-seekers.

So what’s different for the UFC’s debut on FOX? In short, everything. Better fighters, probably better production values, and much better pre-fight promotion. While CBS seemed tepid in its support of MMA both with EliteXC and later with Strikeforce, FOX has already thrown its weight behind the UFC, plugging the Velasquez-dos Santos fight on NFL games and World Series broadcasts. If you were eating wings and watching the Packers beat the Chargers on Sunday, there’s simply no way you didn’t catch at least a half-dozen promos for the UFC on FOX.

This event also has simplicity on its side. With just one fight to get done inside of one hour, running long won’t be an issue, nor will an overburdened slate that asks new viewers to try and differentiate between multiple fighters and weight classes.

If EliteXC’s network debut was a three-hour variety act designed to introduce new fans to the sport, the UFC’s first FOX outing is more like a band showing up to play its hit single and then getting back on the tour bus. Whether it will leave fans wanting more or simply leave them confused and/or disinterested remains to be seen, and a lot depends on whether Velasquez and dos Santos can live up to the hype and the pressure.

At least the UFC chose its fighters based on skill rather than fame. At least it has a partner that really believes in it enough to want to put its name on the product all the time, rather than only when it’s convenient. At least it has the experience to pull something like this off, and the promotional savvy to do it right. The UFC might not be the first to make the leap to network TV, but it could still be the best.

 

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