Author: Jonathan Snowden

UFC 183 Preview: Once-Great Anderson Silva Has Much to Prove Against Nick Diaz

MMA Kingpin is a funny responsibility. It’s an entirely fictional position, sure. But it’s one with no small level of import. Filled by a single fighter at a time, it’s the man with the combination of accomplishment, skill and pure swagger that ma…

MMA Kingpin is a funny responsibility. It’s an entirely fictional position, sure. But it’s one with no small level of import. Filled by a single fighter at a time, it’s the man with the combination of accomplishment, skill and pure swagger that makes him, unmistakably, the sport’s top dog.

For most established sports that’s not a big deal—baseball is still baseball, no matter how classy Derek Jeter is or whether Yasiel Puig is hustling enough on the way to first base.

But for MMA, a sport still being introduced worldwide, the man on the throne makes a big difference. It means, like it or not, the Kingpin sets the tone for what mixed martial arts is and what it might be. He represents all of us and our sport. 

After Saturday night’s humbling of Daniel Cormier at UFC 182, Jon Jones sits alone at the pinnacle—but it’s a seat still warm from the seven years Anderson Silva reigned with such grace and impish vitality, a strange combination, but one he pulled off with style. 

You remember Silva, right? 

For six long years, he was the sport’s top middleweight, the kind of fighter who didn’t just beat his challengers—he dismissed them, with a disdain fans alternately found off-putting or thrilling. But no matter where you fell on that spectrum, at some point, not even his biggest critics could deny that, whatever you thought of his sportsmanship, Silva was a special talent. 

That Silva is no longer with us, a casualty of age, injury and the humbling fists of new middleweight stalwart Chris Weidman. Who exists in that same set of skin and bones, wearing an Anderson Silva suit? It’s a question worth considering.

It’s never clear how a great athlete will choose to face his physical mortality, how he’ll respond to signs he’s no longer the man he once was. For Silva’s contemporary Kobe Bryant, the answer was simple—though diminished, he brings the same drive and power of will to the court nightly—despite shrinking returns. 

Pete Sampras, the tennis great, chose another path. He walked away, not at his absolute peak, but when he was still more than capable of competing with the best. Following his 2002 U.S. Open win over Andre Agassi, he never laced them up again. The idea of not being the best was too much for him to process.

Like Sampras, Siva’s been great enough long enough that the idea of him walking away after consecutive losses doesn’t feel right. He needs to prove that he’s still got it—to his fans and to himself. Only then could he leave with his head held high.

That’s what makes Nick Diaz such a great opponent for the once-great Spider. Diaz, for all his beautiful boasts and despite his fan-friendly style, is a man born for Anderson Silva to clown.

Undersized and outgunned, it’s unclear exactly what kind of threat he poses. He can’t knock Silva out. Nor can he take him to the mat without a full-fledged miracle. That leaves constant attack, five rounds of attacking the lion, hoping the old man doesn’t have the energy to take a swipe at you anymore.

What Diaz presents is opportunity. It’s a chance for Silva to regain his swagger against an opponent with a name and little more. Only then can the once-great man walk away into immortality—where he belongs

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UFC 182 Results: Jon Jones Uses Title Fight to Prove a Point to Daniel Cormier

UFC light heavyweight champion Jon Jones is the best fighter in the world. If that was a controversial statement before he dispatched undefeated Olympian Daniel Cormier by unanimous decision at UFC 182, it’s surely a given afterwards.
It wasn’t ju…

UFC light heavyweight champion Jon Jones is the best fighter in the world. If that was a controversial statement before he dispatched undefeated Olympian Daniel Cormier by unanimous decision at UFC 182, it’s surely a given afterwards.

It wasn’t just that Jones beat Cormier, a top heavyweight who dropped down a weight class to avoid a collision with his teammate Cain Velasquez, the heavyweight kingpin. It was the way he beat Cormier, half athletic god and half message board troll, his two sides working together to create a truly memorable night.

“I don’t like Daniel Cormier,” Jones said after the fight on Fox Sports 1. “I don’t respect Daniel Cormier. I hope he’s somewhere crying right now. I’m sure he is.”

To understand the level of animus in UFC 182’s main event, you have to understand how the two men ended up in the cage in the first place. It’s the story of giant egos, wounded pride and transcendent talents.

The blood feud between Cormier and Jones began way back in 2010 at UFC 121 with a bold boast. Jones, developing a reputation as one of the best wrestlers in the Octagon, famously told the two-time Olympian, within seconds of meeting him mind you, that he believed he could take Cormier down to the mat.

Cormier was not amused. What followed was a tension that simmered for years before finally devolving to backstage scuffles, epic trash talk and even the casual toss of a shoe. But no matter how heated it became, it always came back to one thing—professional and athletic pride.

It’s fitting, then, that when the two finally met in the cage, Jones provided his point emphatically, taking Cormier down three times en route to a demoralizing win. Cormier, when pushed against the cage, had no answer for the champion, a man he swore he’d make respect him.

“I just couldn’t find my rhythm tonight,” Cormier said after the fight. “Jon is the best for a reason and he was the better man tonight.”

The storyline leading into the match was pretty simple. Jones would try to keep Cormier at a distance with his long legs and outrageous reach advantage. Cormier would try to close the distance and force Jones to fight him in the proverbial phone booth, opening Jones up to his Olympic class wrestling.

But Jon Jones doesn’t operate quite like other fighters. He seems to relish the challenge of another man at his very best. Beating Cormier by putting him at a disadvantage, though the name of the game for most fighters, isn’t nearly as satisfying as beating him at his own game. 

That’s decidedly what Jones did. Ducking down to make himself smaller it was Jones who often initiated the clinch, pushing Cormier up against the cage and unleashing with his familiar knees to the body, elbows to the head and a brand new sidekick to the leg.

When he closed the night with a quasi cheap shot, raising his hands to celebrate in the final seconds before suddenly switching gears to pop Cormier one last time in mush, it was a fitting way to end a battle of wills that never approached classy. These were two men who didn’t like each other and it was Jones with the final chance to make that all too clear.

Appreciate what we have, fight fans. Unlike boxing, where top fighters twist themselves in pretzels to avoid facing a tough challenge, Jones not only seeks them out, he actively looks to make them just that little bit harder for himself.

There was no particular reason to meet Cormier where he lived and breathed. It’s just that Jones thrives when he finds an angle, something that will make him train a little harder, to try a little harder, to push himself to his absolute limits. 

He found that something in Daniel Cormier. He beat his top challenger at his very best, at his own game. It’s time for everyone in the sports world to take a long look at Jon Jones. This is what greatness looks like.

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Sorry Haters: UFC Champion Jon Jones Is the Greatest Fighter of All Time

Controversy, as always, is swirling around Jon Jones (20-1). On Thursday, it was a hallway war of words. What it will be tomorrow, no one can say.
The UFC light heavyweight champion has managed to stuff a career’s worth of drama into just a f…

Controversy, as always, is swirling around Jon Jones (20-1). On Thursday, it was a hallway war of words. What it will be tomorrow, no one can say.

The UFC light heavyweight champion has managed to stuff a career’s worth of drama into just a few short months in the lead up to his fight Saturday with two-time Olympian Daniel Cormier, a fight that will, finally, bring one of MMA‘s greatest feuds to a close.

The bad blood started years ago with Jones’ offhand claim he could take Cormier to the mat. Cormier, a proud wrestling legend, was not amused. That was the beginning. But the two were separated, at the time, by a weight class and by promotional boundaries. Nothing came of it except simmering anger.

It began in earnest last August with a scuffle at a pre-fight media appearance, a dustup that included a tumble off the hastily constructed stage, a terrified UFC PR flack and even a thrown shoe.

That was just the beginning, the first step in a journey that would peak with Jones asking Cormier, “Hey p—y, are you still there?” between breaks (note: language in video NSFW) during a SportsCenter appearance when the two men thought the cameras had stopped running.

For Cormier, one of MMA’s true nice guys, it’s been an out-of-character foray into the world of trash talk and burning, uncontrollable anger. For Jones, a master of mind games, it’s just another fight, just another blood feud in a career full of them.

All this theater and the subsequent conversations in the MMA world about whether or not Jones is “fake” or a “hypocrite” simply distract from the question we should be asking each time he fights: Are we watching the best of all time compete in the cage?

The answer, resoundingly, is yes.

When you see Jones in the cage, you’re looking at the culmination of a 21-year journey that started with Ken Shamrock vs. Royce Gracie at UFC 1 in 1993. Back then, a fighter like Gracie could excel with a single skill set, in his case the superlative Brazilian jiu jitsu his family helped spread to the world. 

Four years later, when Frank Shamrock was the face of the UFC, things had evolved significantly. The top fighters had a working knowledge of several arts and excelled in at least two diverse areas. It was still recognizable as the sport Gracie built, but bouts between first-generation fighters and their successors (like Kazushi Sakuraba and Matt Hughes) showed the modern athlete was on a different level.

Ten years ago, when the UFC first burst onto the scene on Spike TV, Chuck Liddell became the UFC’s lead attraction with a potent combination of takedown defense and knockout power. Game plans were rudimentary. Two men met, one fell down, everyone went out to the bar.

Jones, and his predecessors like Georges St-Pierre, have helped the sport evolve yet again. It’s not enough anymore to be good in two areas. The top stars and champions must be able to compete successfully at kicking distance, in punching range, in the clinch and on the mat. There is no room for weakness—and Jones doesn’t have a significant one. 

Jones, of course, is far from perfect. No fighter is. He was pushed to the limit by Alexander Gustafsson in 2013, forced to reach into his soul for the heart and courage to overcome the Swede’s precision punching and persistent leg kicks and lateral movement. 

While many point to his struggles in that fight as a sign of weakness, I see it differently.

Fighting is one of the few sports where an athlete is exposed to the world, his strengths and weaknesses obvious to all. There’s a naked honesty to cage fighting, an ability to cut right to the chase, to see what a man is made of in a way few other pursuits can. 

Jon Jones passed that test against Gustafsson. Cormier is a formidable opponent. His wrestling and rare athleticism will allow him to challenge Jones the way few have. When he does, however, we know Jones won’t break easily. He’s been cast in the fire already—and emerged a stronger fighter. 

When you discuss the greatest of all time, many things come into play. At 27, Jones doesn’t yet have the weight of historical accomplishments to measure up to other legends like St-Pierre, Fedor Emelianenko or Anderson Silva. That will come with time.  

In the moment, however, as he walks into the cage at UFC 182, Jones is the best fighter MMA has ever produced. In a sport that only reached legal drinking age last November, it’s silly to think that will always be true. But, right now, his combination of skills, physical tools and mental toughness make him the ultimate fighter in the ultimate sport.  

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Jon Jones vs. Daniel Cormier and the Most Anticipated Fights in UFC History

Jon Jones is the greatest mixed martial arts fighter in the history of the sport. A combination of carefully honed skill and innate physical tools, he’s run roughshod over one of the UFC’s glamour divisions.
Besides a struggle with Alexander Gustafsson…

Jon Jones is the greatest mixed martial arts fighter in the history of the sport. A combination of carefully honed skill and innate physical tools, he’s run roughshod over one of the UFC’s glamour divisions.

Besides a struggle with Alexander Gustafsson in a fight he eventually won, there’s been no sign that Jones will relinquish his title any time soon. In fact, if anything, it’s been too easy for the young prodigy. After seven successful defenses, Jones, and the audience, have seemingly grown a little comfortable. 

Olympian Daniel Cormier, however, is the kind of man to knock you right out of your comfort zone.

When Jones enters the cage to defend his UFC light heavyweight belt, it will be more than just a typical title fight. Cormier has the physical gifts and specific skill set to give Jones a real test, to push the young champion just as he comes into his physical prime. 

Athletically, this fight is a marvel. Better still, at least for the UFC’s pocket books, when the two got into a dust up at a pre-fight press conference, it became something else entirely—UFC 182 became a bonafide event.

You can’t always predict how exciting a fight will turn out to be in the cage. But there have been a handful of other fights in UFC history that were pure electricity before the bell rang, fights that both captured the imagination of the fans and pitted two of the top fighters in their weight class in a “too close to call” kind of contest.

Jones vs. Cormier sits at the top as the most anticipated fight ever. The rest of the top five follow. Disagree? Have another fight to add to the glorious list? Hit me up in the comments.

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White Elephant Christmas MMA Edition: Jones, McGregor and CM Punk Exchange Gifts

If you work in a particularly horrid office environment, you may be familiar with the “White Elephant Christmas” tradition. The basics are simple—everyone brings gifts and puts them in a giant pile. You draw a number and pick in order.
Everyone b…

If you work in a particularly horrid office environment, you may be familiar with the “White Elephant Christmas” tradition. The basics are simple—everyone brings gifts and puts them in a giant pile. You draw a number and pick in order.

Everyone brings something. Everyone leaves with something.

Simple, right? Nice even.

But there’s a twist. There’s always a twist.

Those who follow you in line get the chance to “steal” your gift rather than pick their own. This leads, inevitably, to people stealing the one thing that isn’t disposable crap over and over again, hurting feelings and morale in the process.

Sounds perfect for MMA! After all, this is the hurt business—why not add hurt feelings to the mix? Let’s assume, then, that every fighter has been given a set of natural gifts. I will now proceed to steal them and gift them to another fighter who needs them even more.

The result will be athletes suddenly ready to take 2015 by storm. Happy Holidays! Share your own White Elephant Christmas gifts, and any hurt feelings, in the comments below.

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MMA in 2014: Fighter of the Year

2014 was a rocky year for high-level mixed martial arts. While there were spots of excitement and transcendent glory, for the most part, it was a year marked by loss.
First came the disappearance of the UFC’s two biggest stars, Anderson Silva and Georg…

2014 was a rocky year for high-level mixed martial arts. While there were spots of excitement and transcendent glory, for the most part, it was a year marked by loss.

First came the disappearance of the UFC’s two biggest stars, Anderson Silva and Georges St-Pierre, victims of injury and ennui, respectively. Then its two remaining brightest lights, Jon Jones and Cain Velasquez, were also lost for months to injury. 

What remained were a collection of fights, some great and some forgettable, spread thin over dozens of cards. It was an environment, frankly, that made it hard for individual fighters to stand out. By the time their fight was over, all too often, there was barely time to move on to the next fight, let alone to reflect on what we’d just seen.

Despite this, the three candidates for Fighter of the Year were able to overcome their surroundings, making their mark, not just on the year, but on the sport. Lead writers Jeremy Botter and Chad Dundas join me to run down the contenders and, ultimately, pick a winner.

Disagree with our assessment? Let’s hear your choice in the comments. 

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