Author: Zachary D. Rymer

Saturday night has the potential to be the beginning of the end for Quinton “Rampage” Jackson. If he loses to Ryan Bader at UFC 144, his career will be on a downswing that he may never recover from.

Then again, Bader himself is facing that same reality in his and Jackson’s light heavyweight bout. If Bader loses to Rampage, he will have lost three of his last four bouts, a recent track record that will push him pretty far down in the light heavyweight pecking order.

Rampage is the heavy favorite, but the good news for Bader is that he has the tactical advantage in this bout. His takedown abilities will be a good counter for Rampage’s brawling style. The more Bader can slow this bout down and keep Rampage on his toes, the better. Rampage is going to try to knock Bader out, and he will if Bader makes the mistake of fighting this fight on Rampage’s terms.

It helps that Bader has above-average strike defense, avoiding roughly 76 percent of all attempts to knock his block off. Between that and Bader’s takedown abilities, Rampage is going to be going up against a guy who is a tough nut to crack.

However, strategy and tactics only count for so much against Rampage. By his own admission (see UFC’s event preview on YouTube), Rampage is a street fighter. There is a method to his madness, more than he gets credit for, but generally speaking Rampage fights with his heart. Or at least, a twisted sense of menace where his heart should be. 

No, Bader has never been knocked out (not in UFC, anyway), so Rampage will be trying to succeed where everyone else has failed. Either that, or he’s going to have to take this one the distance and hope to score a decision victory. That could be exceedingly difficult given Bader’s ability to dictate the tempo of this fight.

So there are, admittedly, not that many solid reasons to pick Rampage to win this fight. Picking him requires something else. A leap of faith, as it were.

For me, that “something else” is the fact that this fight is going to be a long overdue homecoming for Rampage. He is very much loved in Japan, but this will be his first fight in land of the rising sun in six years. A return to where it all began will energize Rampage, you can take that much to the bank.

We know this in part because of Jackson’s role in all this, but we also know it because his homecoming will be a shot in the arm for Japanese MMA fans. The mixed martial arts scene in Japan has declined, which is one of the main reasons UFC has decided to put on a show there.

“People all over the world watch all of our fights. But people in Japan are going to see that we put on a different show when it’s live and it’s fun,” said Dana White, according to the USA Today.

When it’s Jackson’s turn to fight, Japanese fans are going to be treated to nothing they haven’t seen before. And that will be the beauty of it. When Rampage beats Bader, it will be just like old times.

(A Very Bold) Prediction: Rampage by KO in the second.

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Getting into mixed martial arts is not easy. It’s a sport unlike any other on earth, and it’s a sport that is discussed with terms that you’re just not going to hear used in conjunction with any other sport. When you hear two MMA fans going on and on for the first time, it’s like listening to two people speaking another language.

It is therefore not surprising at all that MMA video games have a reputation for being largely inaccessible not only to noobs, but even casual MMA fans. In the past, you’ve really needed to know mixed martial arts in order to play the games.

The release of UFC Undisputed 3 is supposed to change everything. The game, developed by Yuke’s and published by THQ, is being widely praised for how accessible it is to gamers who are unfamiliar with MMA games and MMA in general.

Reviewers for both IGN.com and Gamespot.com like the way Undisputed 3 pulls gamers in with a series of comprehensive tutorials. You can find these in every major video game, but the tutorials in this game save noob gamers from having to take on a formidable learning curve. The game prepares players for stiffer challenges that will come later, while teaching them a few things about mixed martial arts in the process.

Ultimately, gamers will be left with an understanding of which buttons they need to press in order to perform which actions, and they’ll also know which actions are appropriate at a given moment. Past Undisputed games left gamers somewhat on their own to figure it out.

You have to tip your cap to the developers for pulling out all the stops to design a system meant to welcome a new crowd. Mixed martial arts is a sport that appeals to a niche crowd and UFC has generally been content to cater to that niche crowd, but Undisputed 3 is clearly meant to appeal to a much larger audience.

It’s a given that Undisputed 3 will appeal to diehard UFC fans, but it should also appeal to fans of fighting games who are looking for something completely different from the tired button-mashing mechanics that have been used in fighting games for decades to this point. Undisputed was too technical before, but the developers have changed things up so there’s a proper balance between being technical and being intuitive.

This combination should result in the one thing that should rule all video game experiences: fun.

If Undisputed 3 succeeds in appealing to the larger audience it’s trying to draw in, you won’t hear Dana White or any of the UFC string-pullers complaining. Expanding UFC’s already big audience is an effort that has led the company to pursue national TV spotlights, but winning over the video game crowd will be an even bigger victory in the company’s ongoing expansion quest.

Remember, the video game industry is twice as big as the music industry and it’s nearly as big as the movie industry, according to The Economist. Virtually everyone plays video games at this point and most of people who play them are just looking for a little escapist action, preferably with a little violence.

UFC Undisputed 3 is a game that will scratch that itch, and some who will venture to play it may discover that the real thing is pretty cool too.

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The co-main event of tonight’s UFC on FX extravaganza is a Welterweight showdown between a dude who goes by “Bang” and a dude who goes by “The Dentist.”

When they’re not in the Octagon, they go by Duane Ludwig and Josh Neer, and both of them are presumably much less violent.

Both of these fighters are well known among the MMA-loving community, yet those tuning in to see UFC’s debut on FX may not be aware that both of them have been around for quite a while. Ludwig has been fighting professionally for over a decade, and Neer has been at it for nearly a decade. Oddly enough, Neer has considerably more fights under his belt than Ludwig.

Common sense suggests that his time in the Octagon will have made Neer a polished fighter, but this is true only to a degree. Neer’s boxing is above average, but he’s just OK at everything else. He’s gotten by mainly on toughness and an undying determination to give people hell, and we can expect to see more of the same from Neer on Friday night.

Between the two of them, Ludwig is the more dangerous fighter because he’s a more polished striker. If he is able to spend the majority of this fight on his feet, he’s going to have an edge.

Neer knows this, of course. And because we know he knows that, we know that he’s not about to let Ludwig have this one without making it difficult for him. He’ll hit Ludwig back when he has to, but you can also look for Neer to take Ludwig out of his comfort zone by using assorted grappling techniques.

If this is the shape this fight is going to take on, it won’t really be a fight. It will be more like a battle, or an endurance contest.

And that’s not a bad thing. It will mean that this fight will have to go the distance, and things will get more and more hectic if Neer is successful in frustrating Ludwig. Neer will likely have to put up with more than a couple hard shots, but his deranged sense of toughness will keep his heart beating, his legs moving and his fists flying.

Ludwig will have to do his best to tolerate Neer’s hectic and random approach to this fight, and it is absolutely imperative that he keep his guard up, as he doesn’t want to leave himself open to any kind of significant damage that could swing the momentum of the fight.

But as long as Ludwig can fight the majority of this fight on his feet and on his terms, he’s going to be fine. He’s going to have to work for it, and it won’t be fun, but this is a fight he should win.

Prediction: Ludwig by split decision

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