Author: James MacDonald

Much has already been written about the injuries and withdrawals that currently plague the UFC. Fewer column inches, however, have been dedicated to discussing the cause of these afflictions.

I previously argued that health insurance has played a fairly prominent role in the recent rash of withdrawals, but this fails to explain the injuries that precede fighters pulling out.

What is it that makes mixed martial artists so susceptible to injury? Either they have been cursed with an inherent fragility, or their issues relate to flawed training methods.

Your average MMA fighter is no more brittle than your average boxer. The difference lies in how each prepares for a fight.

While boxers focus relentlessly on honing their hand skills, the mixed martial artist engages in a more eclectic approach, refining their grappling and the art of eight limbs.

So few boxers withdraw from contracted bouts—relatively speaking—that one can deduce that striking very likely isn’t the major source of injuries. Rather, the most notable difference between the two sports is that MMA requires grappling.

Fights occasionally fall through due to cuts, but grappling injuries appear to be the sport’s greatest saboteur. We so often hear about fighters blowing out knees or injuring their shoulders as the result of an overly-enthusiastic wrestling session.

This points to a related issue, which is indicative of particularly counter-productive mind-set that is almost systemically pervasive at this point: many athletes within the sport of MMA believe that one must train as one means to fight.

Just consider that point for a moment.

Many of these athletes are fighting at full pelt almost every day for six to eight weeks. Is it any wonder that they so frequently get injured?

If you believe that this mindset isn’t a mainstream notion within the sport, I would urge you watch this clip. Some of the sport’s biggest stars, including Rashad Evans and Michael Bisping, discuss this suicidal approach to training.

Given how open fighters are about engaging in training methods that are so obviously flawed, it is astonishing that Dana White has not yet sought a solution. Admittedly, that is easier said than done.

How exactly do you police the way that a fighter trains?

The short answer is that you can’t.

Instead, it seems like incentives should be offered to those who manage to maintain a clean bill of health or fulfill their contracts.

Those who routinely fail to show up to agreed bouts needn’t be punished, but the fighters who demonstrate their reliability most certainly should be rewarded. Their ability to effectively manage risk in training is something that the UFC must attempt to spread to its other fighters.

Show up to all of your contracted fights in a calendar year? Here’s a little Christmas bonus from Uncle Dana.

Rest assured, if the UFC sufficiently rewards good risk management, fighters in training might think twice about putting all their body weight behind the next power double they attempt or cranking on the next armbar they secure.

Until fighters are encouraged to better manage risk in training, we can expect to see this injury trend continue for the foreseeable future.

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Dana White has made no secret of his desire to expand the sport of mixed martial arts until it surpasses soccer as the world’s most popular sport, but how realistic is this vision?

Luke Thomas recently made the point during one of his weekly chats—always worth checking out, by the way—that MMA is “cooling off” and is no longer doing the kind of business it did from 2008-2010.

He didn’t elaborate on this point with any great detail, so I will answer this argument as I understand it—at the risk of perhaps mischaracterizing his views.

There is no doubt that the UFC no longer pulls the kind of numbers it did in 2009. One look at MMAPayout.com confirms that point. However, one could argue that several other factors have played into this downward trend.

The first thing to note is that it is difficult to quantify the sport’s popularity simply based on PPV buys. I’m sure some might also point to The Ultimate Fighter’s dwindling ratings, but that is more likely the product of an antiquated show format and a horrendous time slot.

The reason why one cannot look at PPV numbers in isolation is that the sport has changed immeasurably over the past year, largely because of the Fox deal. By comparing 2009 to 2012, you are essentially stacking the deck.

The sheer number of events alone would be sufficient to drag down the UFC’s bottom line. Indeed, Joe Silva could book GSP, Brock Lesnar, Chael Sonnen, Rashad Evans and Anderson Silva on the same card and it still wouldn’t clear the lofty bar set by UFC 100.

Dana White and his chums are offering so much more content in 2012 that it was bound to have a deleterious effect on card depth. The expansion of the UFC roster has not been commensurate with demand.

The result of this is that so-called “name” fighters are spread around more to compensate for the UFC’s packed calendar, which has in some ways realised Dana White’s greatest fear: promotional parity with boxing. We now have cards that are so top-heavy they make Playboy Playmates look proportional.

Injuries and the subsequent withdrawals have only served to exacerbate the problem. Cards that initially boasted something approaching depth have been poached in order to paper over the cracks left by the UFC’s ailing army of employees.

Of course, this doesn’t prove that the sport is as strong as ever. Rather, it simply offers an alternative explanation for its diminishing returns.

MMA hasn’t grown in popularity over the past couple of years—certainly not noticeably—but it has very likely maintained its fanbase. In other words, the UFC’s current issues and limitations have kept the sport in promotional stasis—make no mistake, the sport’s future is inextricably tied to the fortune of the UFC.

The bad news is that the sport may be forced to endure a few more years of its somewhat painful quiescence; the good news is that those kids who were inspired to take up the sport by the mixed martial arts boom of the late noughties will soon mature and once again boost its growth.

Until that time comes, we must tolerate the dilution of the UFC’s product and maintain optimism for the future.

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