Tag: Caged In

It’s been a turbulent year for Miguel Torres. He lost a controversial fight to Demetrious Johnson that many—myself included—believe he easily won. And then he had the Twitter incident that saw him briefly fired from the UFC before being brought back to the company several weeks later.

And now Torres has a big fight coming up at UFC 145, with real title implications. Michael McDonald is a young prospect, but he’s also one of the best fighters in the bantamweight division. A win for either man would likely put them in direct title contention later this year.

Torres spent the first half of his training camp in Florida with the Blackzilians camp, but he’s finishing up in familiar territory with Firas Zahabi in Montreal. Torres has an interesting reason for making the move to Montreal midway through his camp:

The reason for ending my camp in Montreal is simple really – it’s far easier to make weight out here. I don’t have the comfort of home foods in Montreal. It’s tough to find tacos out here. The good thing about Florida, on the other hand, is that there is a heavy focus on wrestling, which used to be one of my main weaknesses a couple of years ago. Van Arsdale has me working on wrestling every day in Florida, and that kind of repetition and attention to detail has been a Godsend for me.

I can vouch for Torres’ love of tacos. We were driving back to the hotel from a publicity event during UFC 136 in Houston, and he spotted a taco truck while rolling through a fairly tough part of town. He made me pull over while he ordered, and we sat outside in the brisk Houston air, eating some really great tacos that I never would’ve tried otherwise.

So yes, it’s probably good that Miguel is in Montreal. I’d have trouble staying away from the poutine, myself, so it probably wouldn’t be the best for my own personal weight cut.

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We’re nearing the end of the UFC doldrums of March. April will see a whole new host of big fight cards, with plenty of questions posed and answered in the coming weeks.

For now, though, we’ll take a look at the upcoming Bellator card, the effectiveness of heavyweights in selling UFC 146 and the ineffectiveness of Team Faber on The Ultimate Fighter.

 

1. Will any of the Bellator tournament entrants provide a challenge for champion Ben Askren?

The next Bellator tournament kicks off Friday night, and this time around, it’s the welterweights who will take center stage. 

Askren struggled in his last title defense against Jay Hieron, and he’ll have to defend his belt against Douglas Lima in two weeks. But he’s still the reigning champion, and I have a tough time picking anyone in the season six tournament that will mount much of a challenge for Askren.

Brian Foster would have been an intriguing choice, but he’s out of the tournament due to lingering medical issues. Ben Saunders is the most recognizable name due to his long history with the UFC, but few would contend that he’s on Askren’s level at this point in his career.

Will any of these Bellator welterweights present a real threat to Askren’s reign? I’m not sure they will, but we’ll get a glimpse on Friday night.

 

2. Will UFC 146 be a hit with ticket buyers?

May’s UFC 146 event is an interesting experiment. For the first time in promotional history, the entire pay-per-view card will feature heavyweight fights exclusively.

It’s headlined by a big world title fight between Junior dos Santos and Alistair Overeem. Former champion Frank Mir welcomes Cain Velasquez back to the cage in a No. 1 contender bout, with the winner facing the main event winner later in the year. And Roy Nelson welcomes former Strikeforce star Antonio Silva to the Octagon for the first time.

It seems like a fantastic idea on paper. Fans love a good heavyweight battle. But with tickets going on sale later this week, will the event have enough intrigue to sell better than typical Vegas fight cards?
Sure, Vegas is a fight town. But it’s also not a town known for selling out UFC events on a regular basis. They see a lot of fighting in the city, and so they pick and choose the events they are truly interested in attending. 

Las Vegas also has a packed UFC schedule this summer, and it’ll be difficult to sell a huge amount of tickets for all of them. Will an all-heavyweight bill intrigue enough fans to garner a sellout? 

It’s tough to say, but we’ll find out later this week.

 

3. Will Team Faber rebound?

Team Faber is down 2-0. They were punked heavily in the first episode of the season, and Dominick Cruz’s team has all the momentum heading into the third episode on Friday night.

It’s easy to rebound, especially this early in the season. But they’ll need an upset win from Al Iaquinta over Myles Jury, and that’ll be a tough obstacle to overcome. Jury is an experienced and proficient fighter and was considered an early favorite to advance all the way to the finals.

But like I said, it’s easy to come from behind. Team Faber can start the process on Friday night.

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For fans new to the sport, it probably just looked like a cheesy photo opportunity. Two middle-aged politicians trying desperately not to look their age, to demonstrate some vigor, to sprinkle a little fun into their stodgy old press conference.

But for longtime MMA fans, watching Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper present a pair of signed UFC gloves to his Japanese counterpart, Yoshihiko Noda, was nothing short of mesmerizing. And the fact that this was no random gift—that Noda is actually a huge fan of Canadian superstar Georges St-Pierre—is nothing short of jaw-dropping.

My mouth hung so wide open looking at this picture you’d have sworn I was front row and center at a 1981 taping of Hee Haw. I can remember with a stark clarity those days when the UFC couldn’t buy a break from politicians, whether local or national.

When Rudy Giuliani, George Pataki and Senator John McCain put the sport in their line of sight and didn’t stop pulling the trigger until they thought it was dead and buried.

The UFC, it turned out, was harder to kill than they thought. There is such a purity to the sport, its concept so simple and beautiful that once it gets stuck in your brain, it’s nearly impossible to get it out. And so, we kept this sport alive in places like Alabama, Mississippi and in the Orient, where it succeeded beyond our wildest dreams.

And we waited. We waited for the perfect storm that would catapult our beloved mixed martial arts onto the national stage here in North America. That day soon dawned; the Fertitta brothers and Dana White were the perfect ownership team to take this sport and make sure it got a fair shake. I broke it down in my book, The MMA Encyclopedia:

The Fertitta brothers, Frank Ferttitta III and his younger sibling Lorenzo, were an MMA fan’s dream come true. Heirs to the Station Casino business, the two brothers had aggressively turned their father’s modest Las Vegas casino into a billion dollar real estate and gambling enterprise. They were young, ambitious, and very, very rich. They also had a love for the sport of MMA, as well as close ties to the Nevada State Athletic Commission. If you were creating the perfect UFC owners from scratch, men who could see the UFC through tough times, get the sport approved in Las Vegas (and back on PPV) they would look a lot like Lorenzo and Frank.

White’s passion and work ethic, combined with the Fertittas’ gorge-deep pockets and athletic commission connections, transformed what people thought about this sport—without changing what made it special.

Now, here we are—at a place where new fans can look at a picture of two world leaders holding a framed pair of UFC gloves, smile and say, “Oh, that’s nice.”

Because we have made it. And that’s a good feeling. 

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