Don’t be angry at the NFL. They saw a good idea and took it.
It’s OK that you’re confused. Very few people today remember that mixed martial arts held the very first draft. It’s true!* You can look it up!**
And here we are once again, ladies and gentlemen, ready and rearing to select the top franchise fighters in MMA. We do it every year.
A reminder of the ground rules: 32 picks. Every active fighter is eligible to be drafted. Every promotion, every age, every weight class.
But we’re not just ranking the best 32 and dressing it up in the costume of the season. Our eyes are on the future. Sure, raw numbers are important, but so is upside, a winning pedigree, intelligence (thankfully, no Wonderlics, though) and other intangibles like character and marketability. These are not just the best fighters available but the faces of the franchise.
So here we go. With the first pick in the 2014 MMA draft, we hereby select…
*Very, very true
**Don’t look it up