As you cozy into your couch or your recliner early Saturday morning for UFC Fight Night 63, you’ll be greeted by a familiar voice calling the action.
Now a veteran play-by-play commentator of over 600 fights inside the UFC Octagon, Jon Anik has emerged as a crucial component to the UFC experience for viewers at home and online.
Bleacher Report caught up with Anik before this weekend’s card, and we dished on his pre-UFC career, the magic of a live MMA event, the challenges with commentating, the key UFC Fight Night 63 matchups and more.
Bleacher Report: Hey, Jon, how’s everything going? Nice to talk to you.
Jon Anik: What’s up, man? Good to talk to you. Everything’s good, thanks.
B/R: Great to hear. So first off, I need to thank you for something, because before I got into MMA journalism and I was just a fan in college, you were one of the few guys on Twitter who would actually answer me when I tweeted you. *laughs* So thank you for that, and along those lines, what made you realize Twitter would be a valuable resource for you so early on?
JA: Well, I appreciate you saying that. That’s always the goal—to get back to people as quickly as possible … For me, I was pretty reluctant, actually, to get into social media. I remember when ESPN first approached me in 2008—and I was not on Facebook or anything like that—and I said thanks, but no thanks. Then, in 2009, they were going to start graphically representing us with our Twitter handle, so Molly Carroll, one of my former colleagues, just sort of twisted my arm, so I got on there.
Obviously, I didn’t realize just how valuable a tool it would be. For me, really, the best part of it is just to engage and interact with the fans. It’s a great news source—when I sit down to hop on the Internet, I don’t necessarily even need to go to Boston.com or CNN.com. I can just go to Twitter and find it all there. But for me, it’s just offered the ability to interact with fans in a sport that’s just so overwhelmingly driven by the fans. That made it special to me.
B/R: Right, and your engagement is definitely appreciated. So moving back just a bit, it seems like your MMA broadcasting career developed rather quickly. What was your transition from ESPN to pure MMA broadcasting and analysis like?
JA: Well, I started in radio, and while I was splitting time between my hometown of Boston and Bristol, Connecticut, at ESPN, I was hosting The Mouthpiece Boxing Radio Show, so I was covering HBO pay-per-views regularly, and I was really just a boxing fan.
I’ve told this story many times before, but Gary Shaw, the longtime boxing promoter, was watching an MMA promotion, Elite XC, and he invited our boxing radio show to go on the road to watch this Elite XC debut show in Mississippi headlined by Renzo Gracie and Frank Shamrock.
There were a lot of other names on the card: Julie Kedzie fighting Gina Carano, Charles “Crazy Horse” Bennett knocked out KJ Noons, [current UFC heavyweight Antonio] “Bigfoot” [Silva] was on that card as well. I had never seen MMA live in person before, and that’s really what triggered the response with me. I’d seen it on TV before, the early UFCs, then I took a break and got back into it around UFC 50, but, for me, it was just seeing MMA live that gave me the bug.
So then we started covering it more on our boxing show, and it just became a real passion for me. I probably didn’t become a hardcore MMA fan until 2007 or so, which I guess now has been a little bit of a long time. But for me, it took seeing the sport live to get the bug like everyone else. That’s why I always tell fans, especially the casual fans, “Until you see a UFC event live, don’t talk to me, because once you do, you’ll be hooked forever.”
B/R: Of course, you’re seeing it live regularly now, and you’re about as close as you can get without actually being in the cage when you’re commentating. What were some of the challenges when you first got into play-by-play commentating?
JA: I remember when I called my first MMA fight in 2009; I didn’t know what I had gotten myself into. I had done some boxing play-by-play, but I had never called an MMA fight before, and I just wondered if I was biting off a little more than I could chew. But I felt like once I started, it came fairly naturally, and now, of course, I have the benefit of repetition.
When I started with the UFC, I think the biggest challenge for me was making sure my performance was still good even though the shows are seven hours long and all over the world where maybe conditions aren’t optimal. For me, it was just the length of the broadcast.
It’s essentially like doing back-to-back Super Bowls. You really have to pace yourself, and my boss actually told me early on to leave room in my register to go up as the night goes on. So at the end of the night when the fights are the most important, you still have room to go up an octave or two.
So that was a big challenge for me, then just getting to learn the sport on a more intimate level and getting to learn the fighters and the pronunciations and the way the UFC conducts their broadcast. So much goes into the TV portion of the job that has nothing to do with omoplatas and armbars, and I think a lot of fans don’t realize that.
B/R: Sometimes in my world, I’ll have to do a live play-by-play blog, which isn’t exactly the same as what you do, granted, but I find when I have to do that, I don’t enjoy the fight itself as much. I’m so consumed by every punch and kick and making sure everything gets written down that I fail to see the fight as a whole. Do you experience the same thing with commentating—that it sort of saps that “fun” element out of it?
JA: You know, that’s an interesting question … [UFC matchmaker] Joe Silva always says before the show, “Have fun,” and I try to remember that because the job really can consume you. You’re so focused on the job that, even though it’s always about the fights, you’re trying to have a clean television show. So I think after the fact, when I can sort of take a deep breath and I realize what’s just transpired, then I kind of get that special feeling.
Although, I will say, it’s much harder for you, I would think, to have to type it all. It’s far easier to say it, but I will say, now, having called 600-plus UFC fights, there’s nothing like sitting down and watching a pay-per-view and having a beer. We all love this sport so much.
But, yeah, this is the most fun I’ve ever had in broadcasting for sure, but I guess when it’s going on, “fun” isn’t the first word you think of.
B/R: Do you have a favorite moment when you were commentating where you almost just couldn’t believe what was happening, where it almost made you forget you were commentating and just appealed to that fan instinct?
JA: I have to point to two if you’ll allow me. The first one that comes to mind is Matt Brown and Erick Silva in Cincinnati and how Matt Brown was able to survive that and come back to finish Erick Silva.
Then the other one—and this is one Kenny Florian speaks to all the time—is “Bigfoot” Silva and Mark Hunt in, I think, Brisbane, Australia. You just really got the sense from the crowd and looking around at UFC employees between rounds that we were all witnessing something historic and special in the heavyweight division. Certainly, and I think people would agree, it’s the best heavyweight fight of all time.
And we had matinees in Australia, so here we are at 1:30 in the afternoon, and we all felt like we had just seen the most incredible sporting event of our lives, and it was like, “Man, what do we do now?” The whole day we could just go and enjoy it. That, I think, is something I’ll always look at and be proud to be on the call for a fight like that.
B/R: And that point is something I wanted to ask you about this UFC Fight Night 63 card. It’s starting so early, the prelims kick off before it’s even noon locally—do you think that time zone affects the fighters at all? Have you heard anything from fighters that might indicate they prefer or dislike that early start?
JA: I can tell you from a broadcaster’s perspective, this is Christmas coming eight months early. We love it … I think it’s a good question, though. I would think, as fighters, they would more enjoy this than fighting in Brazil at 3:00 in the morning. That’s kind of the other end of the spectrum, where you’re having to sort of maybe delay the last few weeks of your training camp until late in the night to kind of stimulate that pattern.
But I think when it’s this early in the day it would be to the guy’s advantage, to not sit around and perseverate over last-minute details and think all day. I would think it would be much harder to wake up at 10 a.m. and have to fight at midnight than to wake up at 5 or 6 a.m. and have to fight at 11:00 in the morning. I really think it’s going to lead to a lot of great performances, and I think if you talk to the fighters, they’d far prefer to fight at noon than midnight.
B/R: As you’ve touched on before, the atmosphere of a live MMA event is so different than it is through a TV. It’s hard to explain to somebody what it’s like without them actually experiencing it. So, for the fans, how important is it that Ron Stallings and Justin Jones—who will fight around 11 a.m.—kick off the broadcast with a bang and get the crowd into it early to create that vibe?
JA: Yeah, no doubt about that. It’s always interesting to see the crowds, you know, we were in Fairfax a couple years ago for Dustin Poirier and the Korean Zombie (Chan Sung-Jung), and it was an outstanding main event and a great crowd. So this is a great atmosphere, having been there before, so I expect them to be arriving early and to be loud.
But, yeah, for sure. We’ve also got a couple heavyweights on the card fighting second, so you gotta think you’re getting a finish there. Hopefully, that’ll get the crowd going. But when you go up and down this fight card, I mean, you have Gray Maynard in his first prelim since 2008. You have Lauren Murphy and Liz Carmouche, who are just two of the toughest women in the world in any sport. I just think that one is just going to be two girls beating the hell out of each other. So I’m looking forward to that, then the main card is just really great across the board.
I think [Ricardo] Lamas and [Chad] Mendes are probably two of the top 15 fighters pound-for-pound in the world across all division and all promotions, so the deck’s stacked in Fairfax.
B/R: You just mentioned quite a few fights already I wanted to ask about, but let’s start with Gray Maynard. Having him buried on the prelims feels so strange with all he’s done and all he’s accomplished. Is this his make-or-break opportunity in your eyes? What are you expecting from him?
JA: I expect him to be in desperation mode. I don’t think that means he’s gotta get out of his comfort zone and be unnecessarily aggressive, but I think he’s going to get back to what got him to the top of the sport, or near the top, and that’s his wrestling. I think he should be able to take Alexander Yakovlev down, and it is interesting that Yakovlev is the favorite here. He’s coming down to 155 pounds for the first time in his career, so he will have some size on Gray, but he’s not going to be the stronger man, he’s not going to be the wider man.
But I think both of these guys are going to be in desperation mode, because if you want to call it a must-win fight for Gray Maynard, you make the argument that it is for Alexander Yakovlev, and, really, any UFC fight at 155 pounds for a guy outside the top 10 or even top 15 is probably a must-win in 2015. It’s our most populated division.
B/R: Speaking to the lightweight division as a whole, we have somebody in Dustin Poirier who is voluntarily joining this deep division. Is this the right move for him?
JA: I think it is the right move, and I think he was really reluctant to stay at 145 pounds as long as he did, but he got the cusp of a title eliminator. If he had beaten Conor McGregor, he might’ve been staring at a UFC featherweight title shot, so that’s the reason he put his body through it. His first nine fights were at 155 pounds, so I believe this is where he’s done his best work in the past, and it’s where I believe he’ll do his best work in the future.
He puts so much pressure on himself. He takes losses so hard, and it’s because his self-belief is as wide as anyone’s in the sport. He feels like if he had to fight [UFC lightweight champion] Rafael dos Anjos Saturday evening, he’d beat him. That, I think, is a very powerful thing in MMA. Obviously, on paper, he can submit you, he can knock you out; he has shown to be able to take a shot or two. But I feel like this is where he’ll really put it together, and he’s still not that old. So I really feel like Poirier can make a run at 155 pounds, but, again, there’s just no easy fight at 155 pounds.
B/R: Moving on from him, we have Julianna Pena, who just absolutely blitzed The Ultimate Fighter. She looked phenomenal on the show and really exceeded expectations. She’s been out of action for so long, and we’ve seen basically two things happen when a fighter comes back from an extended layoff: Either they’re rusty and they’re not the same, or we see the “Dominick Cruz Effect,” where they look fired up and just frothing at the bit to get after it. Which path do you see Pena taking?
JA: Well, if you’re going to come up with a list of five women who you think have the best chance to beat Ronda Rousey, I don’t know how you make that list without including Julianna Pena. She has sort of taken the Bethe Correia route a little bit—she’s talking at Ronda, she wants that fight and she believes she can become a bona fide contender rather quickly.
I wonder if Pena is going to be a little undersized against someone like Ronda Rousey. She’s have a big size advantage against Milana Dudieva this weekend, but a couple things I look at: Obviously, the layoff for Pena. She’s been out since 2013 with a pretty invasive surgery, so how will she respond from something like that? And Dudieva—she’s won three in a row and she’s very experienced for a 25-year-old, but I just think Pena’s physicality is going to be too much.
When you watch Julianna Pena, you want to see her fight again, and I think you’re right: She did exceed expectations on The Ultimate Fighter. Of course, now, the flip side is that she makes her UFC return with a boatload of expectations and hype. I think a lot of people, you know, maybe you don’t love Miesha Tate or Cat Zingano in a rematch against Ronda Rousey. Maybe you have Jessica Eye or you think Bethe Correia is a live underdog, but however you feel about the state of the women’s bantamweight division, I don’t know how you look at the two-year plan for Ronda Rousey for 2016 and 2017 and not think about Julianna Pena as somebody who can emerge and contend for the belt.
B/R: And for some more The Ultimate Fighter alumni on the card, we have some guys near and dear to your heart from The Ultimate Fighter: Live with Al Iaquinta and Michael Chiesa. Chiesa owned the season and beat Iaquinta, but now it’s Iaquinta who’s kind of had the most successful UFC run. What’s happening with him lately, and what do you think has contributed to this “groove” he’s hit, so to speak?
JA: I think the 13 weeks on The Ultimate Fighter: Live was a real grind for those guys. No season had to put in the amount of weeks, other than that first season of The Ultimate Fighter, that these guys had to put in. They had to keep their bodies in shape, and I think you have seen the results from The Ultimate Fighter: Live lightweights and how many of them have gone on to see great success … So I don’t think we can discount the nature of that season of The Ultimate Fighter as a reason why these guys have gone on to have UFC success.
Iaquinta, the key for him, I think, has been staying active. He fought four times, I think, in 2014, then got right back at it in 2015 against Joe Lauzon [at UFC 183]. The way he stops people, I think, is so impressive. It’s not like these are 30-second kill shots. It’s just that by the second or third round against him, you just don’t want any more with the way he systematically breaks you down.
But Jorge Masvidal has kind of been The Ultimate Fighter: Live killer. He’s beaten Chiesa, Daron Cruickshank and James Krause, who auditioned for the show, are among his wins, so this is really the perfect challenge at the perfect time. Is Iaquinta going to leave Fairfax a contender, or is Masvidal going to prove once again that he is the guy you sort of have to get through to get to that top 10?
I think what’s interesting about Masvidal in this spot is that his current form is the best of his pro career. He’s had, I believe, 27 pro fights, and this is really the best run he’s ever had. He’s doing it in the UFC, and I think Masvidal, he needs a finish. And he’s got a perfect foe for that kind of fight. He’s a hard guy to beat on points. He scores regularly, he can do a lot of different things on the feet, he’s active on the ground when he takes you down, but he needs a finish if he wants those big fights he so craves.
With Al Iaquinta, he only knows one way, and that’s to move forward. All his fights have been exciting, so I think he’ll bring out the best in Masvidal.
And just a quick note on Chiesa: You talk about somebody exceeding expectations, here’s a guy who not a lot was expected of on that live season of The Ultimate Fighter, and he sort of got by with very rudimentary striking because he was so strong and had such great submissions and back-taking ability and just desire and heart, which, as you know, are big weapons in this sport—and cardio as well.
Now that he’s been able to come off the show and have some UFC success and hone his skills, again, he’s a guy who I think can make a run into that top 15. But he’s fighting another opportunistic submission guy in Mitch Clarke, so I think it’ll be interesting to see how these fights shake out.
B/R: You made an interesting point about Chiesa and Clarke, and that’s that they’re not exactly mirror images, but they’re both opportunistic on the ground. They both make their money on the ground, and Clarke actually submitted Iaquinta in his last outing. Do you feel like Chiesa might want to avoid that part of the game? Where do you see this fight playing out?
JA: You know, that’s a good question. I think he [Chiesa] wants to try to prove that he can strike. I think that Joe Lauzon fight, even though he left with a bonus, was sort of a disappointing night for him to have a fight end via cut. I think he went back to the well and realized he better shore up that defense to avoid that. Just because you have a great chin and you can get hit, and maybe in the case of like a Stephan Bonnar for Michael Chiesa, he actually likes to get hit and get a little bloody, it can still cost you a fight.
So I think he’ll try to prove that his striking has improved, that his striking defense has improved, but when you have the grappling instincts and technique and ability of a Michael Chiesa, I think sometimes you just lean on that and you go back to that. So I think eventually he’s going to try to clinch and try to take Mitch Clarke down. But I think you’re right. He might be wise to try to step outside his comfort zone and try to strike with Mitch Clarke, soften him up on the feet before his instincts take over.
B/R: So let’s wrap up with the main event now. As you said, you feel these are two top-15 pound-for-pound fighters in Mendes and Lamas. It’s obviously a huge fight for the division. Is it an automatic No. 1 contender’s bout, though? Is the next title challenger coming out of this matchup?
JA: Yeah, I think so. They’re getting the main event spotlight, obviously, and July 11 with [UFC featherweight champion Jose] Aldo and [UFC featherweight title challenger Conor] McGregor is a long ways off.
Ricardo Lamas waited for a title shot before, and it didn’t work out all that well. I think Ricardo Lamas is at his best when he’s active. Look no further than what he did against Dennis Bermudez last November as an underdog, and Bermudez came in having won seven straight.
So I feel that Lamas’ biggest problem was that he hadn’t fought in almost 13 months when he fought Jose Aldo [at UFC 169]. I was surprised at Lamas’ performance against Aldo. I thought his output left a little to be desired. A guy who is as good a game-planner and strategizer as Lamas, I feel like he kind of got away from a strategy early and was just sort of in survival mode, looking to go the distance with Aldo instead of that prototypical Lamas style, which is in your face, trying to finish you.
So I am surprised Lamas is a plus-375 underdog here. I have this fight closer on paper. But what else can you really say about Chad Mendes? I feel like he fought Jose Aldo about as well as you could. I had that fight a lot closer than some other people did. I thought that maybe even in the states, Mendes would’ve gotten the decision, you know? Again, two guys who can do it all. There’s a lot of similarities: They’re strong yet fast and just their motion, everything they can do. I don’t see how this fight can’t be exciting given the stakes and given where these two guys are at right now.
Again, I think it’s a lot closer than the oddsmakers do, but I feel that Chad Mendes, given what he did against Jose Aldo and the fact that he’s 16-0 against everybody not named Jose Aldo, has maybe inflated the line a little bit. But Ricardo Lamas has made his career coming through as the underdog, so maybe he’ll do it again.
B/R: I really appreciate the time today, Jon. I’m looking forward to these fights, and I’ll see you in Virginia. Take care.
JA: Yeah, man, thank you for the time, and best of luck career-wise.
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