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Pressing Pause: Can the Daniel Cormier vs. Jon Jones Fight Survive a Delay?

Being an MMA fan isn’t always easy. Nice things are few and far between. For every truly compelling fight such as like light heavyweight champion Jon Jones vs. Olympian Daniel Cormier, we get our share of random and pointless dreck, a culture informed by the grossest misogyny imaginable and a dark cloud of steroid abuse that continues to linger over the entire sport.

The fights keep us coming back for more, making the rest of it manageable. At its best MMA is about the triumph of the human will—about science and tactics combining with strength and courage in the most beautiful ways.

Top-level MMA contests between the most gifted and stubborn fighters on the planet represent competition in its purest form. It’s primal, ugly and magnificently regal, often in the span of just seconds. Nothing else comes close.

That’s why the announcement that an injured Jones has pulled out of his bout with Cormier hurt so much. There are a lot of MMA fights on television. Most of them are random displays of violence between anonymous competitors that either end spectacularly or drone on for a seemingly endless 15 minutes.

This was not going to be that fight.

Jones vs. Cormier was the best fight of the year—not only athletically but as a spectacle. Jones, the first fighter who feels like a real-life professional athlete, is already the most dominant light heavyweight champion in UFC history. Cormier, an Olympic wrestler who has spent the last several years developing a surprisingly multifaceted striking game, was to be his greatest challenge.

That alone was enough to sell the fight. Then magic happened—the two spilling off a stage during a press conference staredown and rolling on the ground. The dustup was described as either bad for the sport, fake as can be or simply business as usual, depending on your source.

The brawl got people’s attention. The interviews that followed, both televised and live on a hot mic, kept it. Even non-fans like Deadspin’s Greg Howard were enthralled:

What makes this amazing is that neither fighter can see the other and they’re in separate rooms, so without the added stimuli, they’re both speaking rather pleasantly and calmly to one another while kind of staring into space. The conversation gets more and more tense without either man showing any signs of getting heated.

At one point, Cormier, sounding as exasperated as a substitute math teacher, said, “You are just terrible. You are the f*cking scum of the earth, you are a terrible human being, but you can sure turn it on, huh?”

“Thank you,” Jones said, inclining his head.

We were on the edge of our seats as a fandom, waiting to see what was going to happen next. For once, our mainstream brethren were sitting right beside us. And then the folding chair collapsed—the entire apparatus betraying us just when we needed it the most.

Like that, UFC 178, scheduled for September 27, has been irrevocably changed. It’s gone from a show likely to hit one million pay-per-view buys to one that will struggle to hit 100,000.

In boxing they’d cancel the event with the loss of the headliner like Jones, preferring to wait until the star was again ready to shine. In team sports the show would go on, with injuries and change built into the system long ago to make sure no one athlete could make or break any game.

Only in MMA does the promotion simply bump up the next best thing, shrug its collective shoulders and hope for the best.

The most appealing fight of 2014 has been replaced by Demetrious Johnson vs. Chris Cariaso. That’s the MMA equivalent of replacing a Mercedes with a Vespa. It’s fun to ride a Vespa, but there’s nothing quite like a Benz. And, while the official word is that we’ll get our Jones vs. Cormier fix next January, savvy fans know that in MMA “later” can become “never” with a painful suddenness.

What will become of the fight, and the interest it engendered, is anyone’s guess. Bitter blood feuds between top fighters, believe it or not, are few and far between. There are, however, several precedents for how it might play out.

In the early days, as fighters first made their mark in the UFC, the hottest potential fight was between Ken Shamrock and Tank Abbott. The matchmakers wanted to see the fight in the worst way. Fans were equally enthused. Even the two men’s entourages were circling each other like packs of rabid dogs.

“Ken had the Lion’s Den guys, and they were marching around. And Abbott had his guys, and they were marching around,” former UFC president David Isaacs told me in Total MMA. “You got the feeling if those guys turned the corner at the wrong time and stood there looking at each other it might get pretty hairy.”

At the Ultimate Ultimate 96, they were put on the same side of the bracket in an eight-man tournament. But when Shamrock broke his hand in his first fight against Brian Johnston, his night was through. He wouldn’t fight again for almost four years, leaving a dying sport for professional wrestling. When he finally returned, it was Abbott who was chasing big-time money in World Championship Wrestling. The dream of finally seeing the World’s Most Dangerous Man against Abbott was dead.

Ten years later, little had changed. The hottest feud in the sport was Matt Serra vs. Matt Hughes. An improbable UFC welterweight champion, Serra had overcome both Georges St-Pierre and the odds to earn gold. Hughes, the former champion, was Serra’s polar opposite.

One was a Midwestern wrestler, twangy and cocky in a polite and old-fashioned way, the kind of fighter who made traditional sports writers smile; the other was a fast-talking New Yorker with a hot temper and a loud mouth. It was a combination that sent sparks flying on The Ultimate Fighter, both when Serra was a contestant on the show and later when the two men coached against each other in Season 6.

Fans were ready for the grudge match to end all grudge matches.

Then a herniated disc forced Serra out of the Octagon and onto an MRI table. By the time the two finally met in the cage almost two years later, some of the energy had dissipated. Now in the co-main event spot, the fight became a middle-of-the-road performer for UFC at the box office. It was an opportunity lost.

More successful was another battle of TUF coaches, Rashad Evans and Quinton “Rampage” Jackson. Former light heavyweight champions and future Jones opponents, the two seemed to clash over matters large and small. It was a battle over no less than what it means to be a black man in MMA, and the timing couldn’t have been better—thanks to YouTube sensation Kimbo Slice, their season of The Ultimate Fighter was the most watched ever.

Their showdown, set for UFC 107 in Jackson’s hometown of Memphis, Tennessee, promised to be one of the most exciting bouts in UFC history. But when Hollywood called in the form of B.A. Baracus, a role popularized by the iconic Mr. T, Jackson jumped at the opportunity.

The A-Team was in. The UFC was out. It was a decision, he says, that has haunted his career ever since.

“I was wrong, I did the movie instead of fighting Rashad (Evans) in Memphis. I admit I was wrong for doing that, but I had to do it,” Jackson told Bleacher Report. “That killed our relationship, and nothing went right after that.”

Still, when the two finally got around to business five months after their originally scheduled dance, the crowd stuck with them. At least until the bell rang. That’s when the expected grudge match became a tactical struggle instead. Yahoo’s Kevin Iole was not impressed:

The fight was a letdown after literally months of over-the-top trash talking from both men. It was a tactical, technical affair that would have been a perfectly acceptable match had it been stuck in the middle of a card somewhere.

After all the trash these men talked, through a season of “The Ultimate Fighter,” three episodes of a preview show, during a circus-like conference call, throughout innumerable media appearances and on their personal Twitter accounts, Evans’ unanimous decision before a sellout crowd of 15,081 at the MGM Grand Garden Arena on Saturday was clearly a letdown.

While the fight was no barnburner, for our purposes here that hardly matters. It survived a delay whereas Serra vs. Hughes did not, in part because pressing pause didn’t make the underlying issues disappear. Nor was the time off significant enough to change fans’ perceptions of either man.

On January 3, Cormier will still be Jones’ most significant challenge to date. He will still be the best wrestler in MMA, still train with the best heavyweight in MMA in Cain Velasquez and still hate Jones with a burning passion.

Likewise, on January 3, Jones will still be a genetic freak. He will still be the meanest and smartest fighter in the sport. He will still be looking to cement his legacy as the best to ever step in the Octagon.

This fight doesn’t get worse with age—it gets better. Jones will be healthy. Cormier will have a chance to put in a full training camp. Both will have plenty of time to let every insult simmer in their souls.

No, Jones vs. Cormier won’t be able to save UFC’s dismal 2014 on pay-per-view. But it will be a heck of a way to jump-start 2015.

Read more MMA news on BleacherReport.com

Daniel Cormier and Jon Jones Brawl Bad for the Sport but Good for UFC Business

Poor Dave Sholler. What started as a prime gig for the UFC’s director of publicity, running the UFC 178 media day at the MGM Grand while president Dana White enjoyed a rare vacation, ended in chaos with the set in ruins, Daniel Cormier and Jon Jones sc…

There’s a lot to digest here. It was a moment that was bad for the sport yet good for business, one likely to enrage critics and galvanize interest in equal measure.

But first, before Cormier walked away with a single shoe, before Jones cut an Instagram video (since removed) proclaiming his challenger was “weak” and before the UFC prepared its Las Vegas offices for what will certainly be a fleet of Brink’s trucks filled with cash, there was Sholler‘s moment of heroism.

On one side was Cormier. Olympian. Citizen. Gifted in the fistic arts. Fast approaching on the other side was Jones, the world light heavyweight champion, hate in his eyes and violence in his heart.

Sholler was not the target. But collateral damage is damage just the same. Sholler had a job to do—keep the two combatants separated at all costs. And so he stepped into the fray. It was as brave as it was fruitless. He ended up on his backside, dispatched with a two-handed shove, almost courteously, as Jones stalked.

It started gently, with Jones pressing his head down on Cormier‘s as the two faced off, a photo you’ve seen a million times before and will see a million times going forward. It was almost intimate, devoid of context. But for Cormier, the physical contact was too much. He responded with a shove to the face. Jones responded with a left hand.

And then the bodies hit the floor.

Jeremy Botter, live on the scene for Bleacher Report, sent this report:

When the brawl started, the crowd started screaming even louder than they were during the faceoff, which was already intense for Poirier and McGregor. When Jones rushed Cormier and they went off the riser, several of us jumped up to get a better view of what was happening. I saw the UFC’s head of security holding Cormier back while Cormier tried to upkick Jones in the face.

While we were standing on the stage, a bunch of fans came over the barricade behind us and rushed up on the stage. MGM security was screaming at everyone to get off the stage. At this point, I moved off and went over to the side of the stage, and they got everyone under control. The fans were moved back outside the barricade. None of them were hurt, but it could have been so much worse.

It was a crazy thing to be a part of. These press conferences are usually routine, but this was anything but, obviously.

This kind of tomfoolery can have a powerful impact on a fight’s promotion. For boxers Dereck Chisora and David Haye, a press-conference brawl ended in unprecedented business, the two packing 30,000 fans into a British soccer stadium. For Mike Tyson and Lennox Lewis, a brawl led to astounding box-office success, a then-record $54.95 spectacle that sold almost two million homes on watching the two heavyweights slug it out.

But that kind of violence can also backfire spectacularly. Jason “Mayhem” Miller attempted to use in-cage chaos to promote a potential rematch with Strikeforce champion Jake Shields. Instead, an impromptu brawl helped CBS make the decision to drop MMA from the network altogether. Miller never got his rematch. Strikeforce lost an important revenue stream.

The UFC, of course, is in no danger of being cancelled anytime soon. There’s little doubt, in fact, that this incident will do anything but boost UFC 178 into the stratosphere, likely making the promotion’s top fight of 2014. But it’s worth noting that the infamous brawl between Miller and Shields’ team was just four years ago. MMA is still very much establishing its reputation in the broader mainstream community. Could it be that the short-term gain of a single event’s success isn’t worth the long-term damage to the sport’s reputation?

For years, proponents of the sport have tried to explain to critics and potential converts what makes it so beautiful, why it’s more than just a glorified street fight. The athletes are among the most cerebral in any sport, combining diverse techniques with lightning speed, matching wits, guts and tactics in the most thrilling mano-a-mano confrontations in all of athletics.

Cormier and Jones, in particular, are both kinetic geniuses, two of the most thoughtful and gifted in all of professional sports. These are no mere bar brawlers. I hope someone reminds them of that before they embarrass themselves even further.

Read more MMA news on BleacherReport.com

UFC 183: Why Nick Diaz vs Anderson Silva Is a Bona Fide Superfight

Most fight announcements, even the big ones, have the feel of carefully scripted routine. They’re words on paper or a listless television announcement, a token of gratitude dealt from the bottom of the deck to major media players who trade in favors an…

Like all big-time combat-sports promoters, the UFC has done more than their fair share, even on premium outlets like ESPN’s SportsCenter. A guy is fighting another guy. On pay-per-view. Buy it— with your money.

In fact, the UFC, in hardcore circles, has developed a bit of a reputation for promising a big announcement and delivering something about as exciting as paint drying. Come for a super fight that will make history, leave with a toy line that will sit on store pegs for an eternity. You can imagine my skepticism, then, as UFC Director of Publicity Dave Sholler spread the word that major news was coming.

Tuesday’s announcement, however, was different. There was a delightfully madcap energy cascading through the MMA universe that doesn’t flow on a daily basis. It was the kind of energy that surrounds an extravaganza, the crackle you feel in the air as the lights dim and a superstar prepares to make their long trek to the cage.

This was something special indeed—Nick Diaz is back.

You could stop right there and have a major moment. Diaz is the sport’s id, quite an impressive feat when the sport in question is essentially built on bludgeoning and trash talk in equal measure. He does what he wants, says what he wants, comes to press conferences if he wants—but always shows up at the arena on fight night looking to put on a show.

There is no artifice to Nick Diaz. Talking with him you get exactly what he’s thinking in the moment. He lacks a filter, to the point you almost wish you could rent him one, just to save his future kids the embarrassment of watching pops on YouTube in 10 years. His interviews are part performance art and part word collage, a collection of both mad gibberish and the sage advice of the truly wise. He’s the kind of guy who announces his retirement and asks for a rematch—in the same post-fight interview.

If not quite loveable, Diaz is certainly quotable. Whether he’s discussing taxes (“I’ve never paid taxes in my life. I’m probably going to go to jail”), his inability to figure out how to buy a house (“I didn’t go to school for that, you know?”) or his sad Honda (“GSP’s making a couple million dollars. I’m over here f—–g driving a Honda and my s–t’s breaking down?”) Diaz is never short on honesty.

In a sport that sees supposedly bitter foes hug it out after a tough fight, admitting to a bemused fanbase that their animus was phonier than the pro wrestling they are emulating, Diaz is an island. When he’s mean mugging, throwing shoes or jumping fools who are in the wrong place at the wrong time, he means it. Sure, it’s unhealthy and anti-social. At least its real.

But Nick Diaz‘s return is only half the story, the smaller half at that, the one in 10-point type underneath the blaring headline. That’s because, across the cage from Stockton’s own will be the greatest mixed martial arts fighter of all time. Anderson Silva, too, is making his return to the cage.

When we last saw Silva he was being carried from the Octagon, his leg in pieces after Chris Weidman did nothing more than raise his own leg off the ground, parrying Silva’s hard kick with devastating results. It was the second loss in a row for a man who had done nothing but win inside the UFC cage, having his hand raised 16 times before finally falling short.

Reports surfaced almost immediately after surgery that Silva was ready. That Silva was training. That Silva was coming.

“He’s 100 percent healthy, he’s kicking again and he feels great,” UFC President Dana White said on SportsCenter, announcing that the two men will square off on January 31, 2015 at UFC 183. “He’s chomping at the bit to get back into the Octagon.”

For the UFC, this announcement was the perfect cure for the summer doldrums. Once a quarterly and then a monthly extravaganza, in recent years the UFC has become a television staple. On some weekends there will be multiple shows on the same day. And while, perhaps, that’s a sign of increased worldwide demand, for many diehards it was a deluge that left very little to get excited about. Fights came and fights went, with very little making any kind of permanent imprint.

This fight is different.

It’s a bona fide superfight, a battle between fighters who may not be champions anymore, but who have the larger-than-life personas that make fans sit up and take note. Silva may no longer be the fighter who made opponents quake in fear. Diaz may only justify his ludicrous swagger in his own mind. But both believe they are something special. When that belief is real, the audience can’t help but be swept along for the ride.

And, inside the cage, this has the chance to be quite a thrilling ride indeed. In Diaz, Silva has found the perfect opponent. A boxer who never takes a step backwards, Diaz will chase Silva around the cage, looking to close the distance and overwhelm the former champion with volume punching. He will be implacable. Unstoppable. And he will be playing directly into Silva’s hands.

If fighting has a yin and a yang, they are represented by Silva and Diaz. Nick is all about pressing the action; Silva is all about catching a hard-charging opponent coming in with a perfectly timed counter. Together they should make beautiful music. One’s style feeds perfectly into the other’s. It’s the kind of collision that creates legends.

On paper this is also an easy way for Silva to get reacclimated to the fight game after some time on the shelf. As good as Diaz is, resume wise the two aren’t even comparable. Diaz, retired for more than a year, hasn’t won a fight since 2011 and, for all his bluster, has never beaten a truly great fighter in his prime. Worse still, he was tailor made for Silva, the kind of predictable fighter born to eat a right cross he never sees coming.

And yet, despite the left side of my brain telling me there’s nothing to see here, there is something intriguing about this fight. At 39, and coming off a major injury, Silva may have slowed enough that he can be caught by a fighter he would have run circles around in his best days. Diaz, a triathlete, will certainly stalk for five full rounds, never slowing down, never stopping. If he’s not prepared, Diaz will be right there, talking smack and throwing punches in burst mode. For however long this lasts, it’s going to be a fight.

It’s a fight Diaz feels confident he can win. He’s been calling for it for years, even back in when he was the Strikeforce champion. He had Silva on the mind even then, much to the amusement of the MMA press. But nobody’s laughing now.

Read more MMA news on BleacherReport.com

The Sons of Sonnen: Is Big Mouth Conor McGregor the UFC’s Next Big Star?

In the beginning there was only Chael Sonnen.
It was inevitable others would follow.
A middleweight firebrand whose gift for talking the talk superseded his (admittedly formidable) ability to walk the walk, Sonnen went from journeyman to headliner virt…

In the beginning there was only Chael Sonnen.

It was inevitable others would follow.

A middleweight firebrand whose gift for talking the talk superseded his (admittedly formidable) ability to walk the walk, Sonnen went from journeyman to headliner virtually overnight, riding an over-the-top pro wrestling persona to three title shots and a prime spot on Fox television. Sonnen was brash in a sport where most men did their talking in the ring. He was confrontational in a sport where most fighters made a show of outward respect.

Most of all, he was genuinely different. Sonnen’s tongue was always clearly in cheek. Much of his best material was lifted wholly from the wrestlers he enjoyed as a kid. He wasn’t reinventing the wheel. He was appropriating it, taking something that demonstrably worked into a brand-new context.

Sure, Tito Ortiz was a colorful personality, and Don Frye flirted with a “Cowboy” character after wetting his mustachioed beak on the Japanese pro wrestling scene. But there was no one like Sonnen.

While some bristled at this infusion of goofiness and the occasional questionable comment into their oh-so-serious sport, the general consensus was that Sonnen had tapped into something at the heart of any great fight promotion: This was supposed to be fun. He was a man who discovered the secret to success and played his winning hand over and over again—until he tried to play it one too many times.

That’s a story for another day. Sonnen is gone, hoisted by his own petard and two failed drug tests. But into the void he left behind, something must seep. And that something is named Conor McGregor, who main-events the UFC’s return to Dublin, Ireland, on Saturday on Fight Pass (subscription required). You may have heard of him.

If you have, it’s likely not because of his fights in the cage. In truth, he’s competed in the UFC just twice, both times deep on the undercard, once so early in the night his bout was only available to the hardcores streaming on Facebook.

McGregor is a solid prospect, a 26-year-old Irish banger with a stiff left straight and the kind of fluid movement and footwork that makes longtime fans stand up and take notice. He might be something special one day. He might not. Like most on the Emerald Isle, his amateur wrestling pedigree is nonexistent. If it turns out he can’t defend a takedown or defend himself off his back, he’s destined for a frustrating career full of ups and downs.

Despite all this promise, unless you’re the type of fan who streams international fight cards like Cage Warriors in the middle of a random Saturday afternoon, he likely slipped your notice—until, that is, he wowed the fight world on Ariel Helwani’s The MMA Hour last March. McGregor made Helwani a fan, telling the sport’s most prominent reporter right off the bat that he likes to “look the way I feel. And I feel f—–g amazing.”

From there it was on. “They love me because I love myself,” McGregor said, insisting he was already an Irish legend, even though he had yet to make his UFC debut. That would come later, a 67-second shellacking of Marcus Brimage that proved, to some extent, McGregor could back up the hype.

His insouciance was almost contagious. Watching him talk, mostly about himself, brought back the same feelings Sonnen evoked. This guy was fun. UFC President Dana White took McGregor under his wing from there. He was everything White loves in a fighter—a scrappy stand-up artist with a mouth that never stops moving.

White was beside himself in the build-up to McGregor’s second UFC bout against Max Holloway, equating his early hype with Brock Lesnar’s, a comparison so ludicrous it was almost laughable. Lesnar, famously, became the UFC’s leading drawing card from his very first appearance, dominating the box office and established veteran opponents alike.

McGregor, on the preliminary card in Boston, seemed rather shabby by way of comparison—until his amazing entrance, when he was greeted like a true star by fans who are normally inclined to sit on their hands until the main attractions make their way to the cage.

Of course, that was in Boston. What better place for a promising Irish fighter to make his mark? But there was no way around it: Conor McGregor had the makings of something pretty special.

“I love that attitude,” White told MMA Junkie after the fight. “He’s pissed off he didn’t finish. Some guys will sit up here and go, ‘Eh, well, I won.’ No. He’s pissed at himself that he didn’t finish. Are you kidding me? Why am I promoting this kid? Why am I getting behind him? Because I love what he’s about.”

McGregor’s cocky attitude, the one White fell in love with, is straight out of the Sonnen school of fight promotion. It’s not the straight wrestling rip-off Sonnen so blatantly pulled off. McGregor’s approach is somewhat more subtle. He isn’t playing a character exactly. In the tradition of all great pro wrestlers, he’s taking natural elements of his personality and turning them up to a This Is Spinal Tap 11.

As he told Bleacher Report’s Duane Finley:

I’m not sure where it comes from really, it just seems like the right way to be. I’m in it to win it and I don’t think a lot these other fighters are. It may seem like they are, but a lot of them aren’t. It just feels right to be like this. I don’t actually know where it came from…it’s just the way I feel.

I suppose this competitive drive has always been in me, but I just don’t see anything that impresses me around here with any of these people. I don’t know when this attitude started, but none of these guys are on my level. That’s just me commenting on what I see. None of these guys have what I have. None of these guys move like I move.

Irish MMA reporter Andrew McGahon from Severe MMA has been interviewing McGregor for years and said his cocky demeanor was obvious, if less overt, since Day 1.

“The biggest thing I’ve noticed in Conor is his awareness of what he is saying,” McGahon told Bleacher Report in an email interview. “When he was younger and before the UFC, he would fly off with curses and having a laugh when someone was interviewing him. Now he’s a little more cautious.”

While caution isn’t the first word that comes to mind when considering McGregor, his budding stardom has forced him to think about the consequences of his every word and deed. While American fans are knee deep in a debate about oversaturation and too much MMA, in many respects Ireland and other foreign locales are still very much in the introductory phase.

There has been unprecedented media coverage in the wake of McGregor’s UFC debut in Ireland, including a feature on the BBC that dragged out the now ancient “human cockfighting” critique made famous by John McCain. In Ireland, McGregor isn’t just a fighter—he’s an ambassador for an entire sport.

The weight of that, some fans fear, may crush him where he stands.

“People worry he won’t be putting in the training hours,” McGahon said. “But I know he wakes guys up during the night and gets them to go down to the gym to roll or spar at 1 or 2 a.m. He is putting in a lot of work because he knows how much of a platform he is being put on, and that a loss could potentially bring him hurtling down to Earth.

“Conor knows that this event on Saturday will be broadcast into almost every home in Ireland. We only have a certain number of channels the whole country gets for free and 3E is in 98 percent of all homes in Ireland. He knows the nation will be watching on Saturday.”

McGregor, for his part, shows no signs of being even the slightest bit nervous:

Pressure creates diamonds, my friend. This is a historic moment for my nation and I’m looking to grab it with both hands.

This means everything to me. No matter what goes on and what happens; nobody can take this away from me. Nobody can deny what I’ve done in the time that I’ve done it. I’m only warming up here, and I’m just getting started. This definitely means everything to me. This is what I set out to do. I set out to bring the UFC back to Ireland. I set out to headline. I set out to get my teammates on. I set out to show the Irish public what true martial arts were all about. And here we are just a few days out.

There’s a lot riding on this bout—both for McGregor and the UFC. His opponent, former The Ultimate Fighter winner Diego Brandao, is his toughest challenge to date. But he’s also an opponent McGregor was tailor-made to beat. An undisciplined striker without a stellar takedown game, Brandao should be there for McGregor to hit. And hitting is what he does best.

Win or lose, McGregor’s story is far from over. But how he does against Brandao is a clear barometer for his potential in the Octagon. The furor surrounding McGregor is almost beyond rational.

What’s most crazy about his ascension to the top of the sport is how little we know about McGregor as a fighter. It’s rare that the UFC takes this much time and expends this much effort to bolster a fighter of unknown quality. Normally, a rising star must pass a series of challenges before getting the promotion’s full efforts.

McGregor, it seems, is being taken at face value. He carries himself like a star and demolishes middling fighters like a star. Ipso facto, for now, he’s a star.

Does he warrant the hype? We’re about to find out. And that’s something worth getting excited about.

Read more MMA news on BleacherReport.com

Mahalo: Saying Goodbye to UFC Legend BJ Penn

It’s hard to leave behind seats so close you can literally reach out and touch the fighters as they walk out of the UFC Octagon. But leave them I did, abandoning press row for the long hike up to section 205 at the very top of the Mandalay Bay Events C…

Most of the time I’m able to keep my journalist face on, especially when sitting among my peers. I admit that mine isn’t as good as some others—Fox’s Michael Chiappetta, for example, never seems to change expressions over the course of five hours. I admire that restraint but could never replicate it.

Especially not when BJ Penn is fighting.

My relationship with this sport will always be that of a fan. This isn’t a vocation. It’s a passion—and Penn is one of my early favorites. As I’ve watched this sport grow into the behemoth it is today, he’s been there, a constant presence, a steady rock in an industry of constant change.

I don’t know BJ Penn. I don’t want to. He’s from a time before I had to put a mask on and pretend I didn’t care who won or lost, before I had ever met an athlete and had any illusions of heroism shattered by real-life human flaws. Together we’ve shared the pain and joy of a tumultuous career.

And so I made my trek to 205. My friend Jeremy Botter was there to meet me. He understood, though we didn’t really discuss it. I had been with him in Atlanta where his friend Miguel Torres met an awful end at the hands of Michael McDonald. I had seen his own mask fall off as we sat together in the press box. So I knew there would be no judgments.

Surprisingly, I didn’t feel much as Penn was annihilated by Frankie Edgar. Hope can be a cruel poison, but I don’t know that I ever got mine up. Even when a fat man took his shirt off to lead loud cheers for the pride of Hawaii, I never really believed.

In my heart? Maybe. But my head has seen too many older fighters try to tap into a well that has long run dry. As soon as Penn stood up on his tippy toes, looking more like a ballerina than a boxer, I knew it was over. Both his career and the last link to my time before this was my profession, when I was allowed to hoot and holler to my heart’s content.

Penn retired after the fight, admitting he should have probably never come back—but needed to know that in his bones before he called it a career.

“The biggest regret would be if I didn’t get in the ring tonight,” Penn told reporters after the fight. “I’d always kick myself in the butt and complain to Dana White and complain to everybody ‘Man, I could have done it again.’ Now I know for sure I can’t.”

One day, likely soon, Penn will be inducted into the UFC Hall of Fame. Future generations will look at his pedestrian 16-10-2 record and wonder why we held him in such high regard. But we’ll know.

It’s for the way he sprinted from the cage after knocking out Caol Uno in a matter of seconds at UFC 34.

For the way he walked into the ring against an enormous Lyoto Machida, fear nowhere to be found.

For the time he answered a pedestrian post-fight interview question with the simple command “If you wanna know more, go to BJPenn.com.”

For the way he rearranged Diego Sanchez’s face, making his mean mugging all the more comical.

One by one the icons of a simpler time are leaving us. All of our ties to the sport’s formative years will soon be gone. Penn was among the last of the old guard still standing. His void will never be filled.

In a world of corporate sponsors, podcast guest spots and Fan Expos, BJ Penn never really quite fit in. He loved the fans, but the glitz and glamour was clearly not his style.

BJ Penn wasn’t meant for modern mixed martial arts. He was exceptionally athletic but never an athlete. Never one for the gym, he wasn’t the best at exercising. He was a fighter. Who but a fighter would lick an opponent’s blood from his gloves with such glee?

It’s moments like that, when we are both repelled and amazed, that made Penn so special. Moments like that compelled me to get up from my seat. And I’m glad that I did—so I could stand up and cheer BJ Penn one last time.

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UFC 175 Star Ronda Rousey Isn’t the Royce Gracie of Women’s MMA—She’s Better

It’s disconcerting to find beauty in the midst of absurdly cartoonish violence, but there was something jaw-droppingly gorgeous about Ronda Rousey’s UFC 175 win over Alexis Davis.
Watching Davis fly through the air, her night already over long before R…

It’s disconcerting to find beauty in the midst of absurdly cartoonish violence, but there was something jaw-droppingly gorgeous about Ronda Rousey‘s UFC 175 win over Alexis Davis.

Watching Davis fly through the air, her night already over long before Rousey’s perfect harai goshi throw ended all doubts, was mesmerizing. It may have lasted less than two seconds in real time—but in that moment, and in our memories, Davis hung in the air forever.

It’s here, in those eye blinks when time freezes and jaws drop, that legends are born. To watch Rousey is to see combat sports history written right before your eyes.

Davis came into her title challenge looking fit and ready. Gone was the soft doughiness of her last fight. Standing in front of us on press row, back to the cage, Davis looked powerful, her core and shoulders rippling with muscle.

None of it mattered. Rousey was across the cage. All hope was lost.

MMA is more than the sports world’s foremost expression of human aggression. For all its inherent brutality, it’s really a sport of angles and mathematics. The best fighters, like Rousey, are human calculators, constantly gauging distance and position, looking for the most minute opening and then striking like a mongoose.

In the history of combat sports, there’s never been a woman athlete this compelling.

For decades wrestling and boxing promoters have attempted to create a female superstar. For decades they have failed. “Foxy boxing” and mud wrestling have limited appeal. That’s what separates Rousey from her predecessors.

Others have had the cheesecake factor, and a handful have had the athletic skill. But none have combined them, adding a predator’s cold stare and an eternal chip on their shoulder to boot.

In 1993, Royce Gracie ran through the field at UFC 1 like a 175-pound elephant. No man could stand before him. His art of Gracie jiu-jitsu placed him on another plane than his opponents, men who had not yet learned what the new face of fighting would look like.

Rousey and Gracie are often compared for this reason. Like Gracie, no one can stand before Ronda for much more than an instant. Like Gracie, she’s established a dominance that has foes quaking before the bell ever rings.

But while the comparisons are meant to be complimentary, they actually aren’t fair to Rousey.

Women’s MMA is not in the same place the men’s sport was when Gracie reigned. Gracie was a martial encyclopedia in the ring with savage ignorance. Rousey has no such advantage. Her opponents are highly trained martial artists.

When Gracie fought Ken Shamrock, the Lion’s Den founder was completely unaware of Brazilian jiu-jitsu, the transformative martial art that changed the world of fighting forever. Davis, by turn, was a black belt in the same art. She’s fought professionally for seven years, competing with some of the very best women in the sport. She’s not Shamrock—she’s a more sophisticated, skilled fighter than Ken ever was.

That’s the truly exciting thing about Rousey. It’s not that she’s a shark among guppies. She’s a shark among sharks. And her teeth are only getting sharper.

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