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UFC 146: The Ultimate Fighting Championship, Where the Big Boys Play

“World Championship Wrestling. Where the big boys play,” said Tony Schiavone and every single WCW announcer in a marketing campaign that seemed to last for years.It was a marketing campaign that didn’t quite work. “Where the big boys play” sounds like …

“World Championship Wrestling. Where the big boys play,” said Tony Schiavone and every single WCW announcer in a marketing campaign that seemed to last for years.

It was a marketing campaign that didn’t quite work. “Where the big boys play” sounds like a pitch for a summer camp for overgrown high school kids—guys a little too old for camp but unable to talk their parents out of it.

Or maybe it’s one of those lame adult “fantasy camps,” the kind of sports experience in which you spend a week throwing the old rawhide with a former Dodgers middle reliever and get a complimentary photo with Tommy Lasorda (unless you hate Tommy Lasorda).

I’m sure the brain trust at WCW thought they had a good thing going—until Kevin Nash and Scott Hall came into the company and immediately shot it to shreds.

“This is where the big boys play huh?” Nash asked Eric Bischoff. “Look at the adjective. ‘Play.’ We aren’t here to play.”

Ignore, for a moment, the basic failure of this speech. I’m sure his grammar teacher felt like she had been powerbombed on her head after hearing it. More importantly, it showed how something that felt so right could be made to look oh so wrong.

The UFC is walking that same fine line as it promotes an all-heavyweight main card for UFC 146 this May. On paper, it looks awesome. A heavyweight title fight between Junior dos Santos and Alistair Overeem in the main event. Frank Mir and Cain Velasquez competing for the next title shot. And amazing bangers like Mark Hunt and Roy Nelson also on the PPV portion of the event.

What else could you ask for? The chances for explosive knockouts and hilarious slobber knockers? High.

But here’s the rub, and there is always a rub: There is a chance that this will be MMA‘s Titanic. A disaster. A cluster of 15-minute decisions with large mammoth men leaning on each other and gasping for breath for three long hours.

That’s the risk you run when you attempt to create brilliant art. UFC matchmaker Joe Silva is willing to jump in the deep end. Don’t believe those public service announcements that claim that when you “shoot for the moon, you’ll land in the stars.” That’s goofy nonsense. Sometimes, when you aim for the moon, “Big Country” slips, bumps the cannon, and you accidentally set the circus tent on fire. Metaphorically.

When things get it right though, nothing is better than a special heavyweight fight. There’s an allure to watching the big beasts rut in the mud and run into each other as hard as they possibly can. Five of those kinds of fights in a row? That could be truly breathtaking. It’s a risk worth taking.

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Nick Diaz Continues to Entertain MMA Fans in the Midst of Controversy

Things are never boring when Nick Diaz is involved.A few days ago, I shared the news that Diaz would be fighting his drug test failure suspension in Nevada. He hired high-powered Vegas attorney Ross Goodman, and Goodman argued that Diaz didn’t test pos…

Things are never boring when Nick Diaz is involved.

A few days ago, I shared the news that Diaz would be fighting his drug test failure suspension in Nevada. He hired high-powered Vegas attorney Ross Goodman, and Goodman argued that Diaz didn’t test positive for a substance banned by the World Anti-Doping Agency.

Which is technically true, if you’re going by the letter of the law. Diaz tested positive for marijuana metabolites and not actual marijuana itself.

It’s a good argument, but Diaz may still find himself suspended even if the drug suspension is lifted.

As you know, Diaz is licensed to smoke medicinal marijuana in the state of California. He has a prescription. And yet, on his pre-fight questionnaire from the Nevada commission, Diaz said he had not used any prescription drugs in the two weeks prior to the fight.

NSAC public information officer Jennifer M. Lopez—no, not that Jennifer Lopez, though it would be awesome if it were—released a statement saying that Diaz lied on his questionnaire:

Not only did Nick Diaz violate the law by testing positive for marijuana metabolites, but he also lied to the Commission on his Pre-Fight Questionnaire when he swore that he had not used any prescribed medications in two weeks before the fight.

Calling his client a liar sent Goodman into attack mode today. Goodman insists that Diaz didn’t lie about using prescription drugs because Nevada doesn’t view marijuana as a prescription drug. Here’s the regulation regarding the drug from Chapter 453A.210 of the Nevada Revised Statues:

(1) The person has been diagnosed with a chronic or debilitating medical condition;
(2) The medical use of marijuana may mitigate the symptoms or effects of that condition; and
(3) The attending physician has explained the possible risks and benefits of the medical use of marijuana;
(b) The name, address, telephone number, social security number and date of birth of the person;
(c) Proof satisfactory to the Division that the person is a resident of this State;
(d) The name, address and telephone number of the person’s attending physician; and
(e) If the person elects to designate a primary caregiver at the time of application:
(1) The name, address, telephone number and social security number of the designated primary caregiver; and
(2) A written, signed statement from the person’s attending physician in which the attending physician approves of the designation of the primary caregiver.

Goodman spoke to Yahoo Sports on Thursday, saying that no normal person views marijuana as an actual prescription drug, and thus, there was no need for Diaz to check the box.

“Nowhere in there does it say that the attending physician is prescribing marijuana,” Goodman said. “And so, for obvious reasons, before you speak and call someone a liar, you think you’d do a little bit of due diligence and understand what the Nevada law actually says.”

“It’s not like you walk into the pharmacy and start looking around on the shelves and hope to pick up a bag of marijuana. That’s ridiculous. No reasonable person would believe that medical marijuana falls under the category of over the counter medications.”

I have no idea if Diaz will win his appeal. If you go by the letter of the law, then he did not fail a test for marijuana, and thus, cannot be suspended. Marijuana is banned in competition, and if Diaz were smoking during competition, he would’ve tested positive for THC. That didn’t happen because Diaz stopped smoking eight days prior to the event.

But if you think that feels like semantics, well, it’s probably because it is.

Goodman is very good at getting his clients off in cases such as this one. Whether or not he can do the same thing for Diaz remains to be seen.

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UFC Attorney Says Fans Who Stream UFC PPVs Are Not Actually Fans at All

The UFC is taking a new tact in the war against pay-per-view piracy.Dave Meltzer of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter reported earlier this week that the UFC had obtained email addresses, usernames and IP addresses of users who had illegally streamed e…

The UFC is taking a new tact in the war against pay-per-view piracy.

Dave Meltzer of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter reported earlier this week that the UFC had obtained email addresses, usernames and IP addresses of users who had illegally streamed events through the website GreenFeedz.com.

The UFC has spent plenty of time and money going after websites that illegally stream UFC events, and they’ve had plenty of success in doing so. But this marks the first time that the promotion has targeted individual users who stream events.

Today, Zuffa chief counsel Lawrence Epstein had some strong words for fans who would rather stream the event illegally than pay for it. Epstein spoke to MMAjunkie.com:

We love our fans, and we’ve got some of the greatest fans in the world, and all the success we’ve had with the UFC is directly attributable to those fans. But people that steal our stuff – they’re not our fans.

If you’re a huge [Georges St-Pierre] fan, would you steal from him? I don’t think so. So we love our fans, we respect our fans, but people who steal from us, frankly, aren’t our fans.

Epstein makes a valid point here. It’s easy to sit back and say, “Well, the UFC makes plenty of money off of these events, so it won’t hurt them at all if I watch a stream instead of buying this event.”

And that’s partially true, because the UFC does indeed make plenty of money from these events.

But Epstein’s reference to St-Pierre is a wise one. GSP, like many other top-level UFC superstars, earns a portion of his paycheck from the sales of pay-per-view events. He earns a percentage of each individual pay-per-view buy—reportedly as high as five percent, depending on the actual numbers the event draws.

When you stream a pay-per-view, you’re directly taking money from the pockets of a fighter you proclaim to be a fan of. And sure, St-Pierre is a very rich man, and the two or three bucks he earns from your purchase isn’t going to affect him much.

But that’s not the point, is it? The point is that you’re intentionally stealing from a fighter and a man that you proclaim to be a fan of.

That doesn’t seem like a very good way to express your fandom.

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Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Wiz Completely Manhandles Drunk Restaurant Patron

You may not know the name Ryan Hall, but you probably should.Hall is one of the best Brazilian jiu-jitsu players in the entire world. He’s certainly the best American-born grappling wizard.Hall has earned medals at such prestigious grappling competitio…

You may not know the name Ryan Hall, but you probably should.

Hall is one of the best Brazilian jiu-jitsu players in the entire world. He’s certainly the best American-born grappling wizard.

Hall has earned medals at such prestigious grappling competitions as the Mundials and the Brazilian National Championships, and is a three-time competitor at the Abu Dhabi Submission Fighting Championships. As a matter of fact, he’s actually one of the only non-Brazilian competitors to ever score a medal at Abu Dhabi.

So when I tell you that Hall is pretty good at jiu-jitsu, you should believe me.

And you should also believe me when I tell you that getting yourself raging drunk and accosting Hall when he’s trying to have a peaceful dinner with friends is probably a bad idea.

The drunk guy in this video found out the hard way. Watch as Hall executes a fantastic double-leg takedown and immediately moves into mount, trying to calm the situation. It didn’t work, however, and Hall was ultimately forced to put the drunk to sleep in order to avoid any more disturbances.

The video is entertaining, but it’s also a practical look at how the core elements of jiu-jitsu can be used in self defense. This was exactly what Helio Gracie had in mind when he started developing Gracie Jiu-Jitsu.

He was a small and frail man, so he needed something that would allow him to defend himself against street thugs and beach gangs in Brazil.

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Rampage Jackson Will Eventually Fight Shogun, and I Hope He Finds Happiness

I realize that I’ve been somewhat hard on Quinton Jackson over the past week.The truth is that I’ve long been a Rampage fan. He was one of my three favorite fighters during the PRIDE era, and I always look forward to his fights in the UFC. And yes, tha…

I realize that I’ve been somewhat hard on Quinton Jackson over the past week.

The truth is that I’ve long been a Rampage fan. He was one of my three favorite fighters during the PRIDE era, and I always look forward to his fights in the UFC. And yes, that includes his bout with Matt Hamill, which wasn’t exactly the biggest main event in the history of fighting.

I’ve spent plenty of time with Jackson, away from the bright lights of the arena and the media obligations he so hates fulfilling during fight week. My old employer sponsored a post-fight pool party for Jackson last May, the day after he beat Matt Hamill, at the Red Rock Casino in Las Vegas. It wasn’t publicized at all, and when the actual party rolled around, the crew basically consisted of myself, a few of my co-workers, Stefan Struve and Jackson and his crew.

It was a good day. I spent plenty of time talking to Jackson, almost exclusively about video games. Games are a thing that Jackson is truly passionate about, and it was fun to engage him about something other than fighting for a change.

My buddy Jon, who came out to Vegas to spend a week, debated with Jackson over the merits of Call of Duty vs. Battlefield for well over half an hour. Jackson was firmly in the Call of Duty camp, while Jon argued that Battlefield presented the better multiplayer experience. Jackson disagreed and slapped Jon across the face. It wasn’t an aggressive slap—it was a playful thing, and it made Jon’s day.

What we tend to forget, as fans and as journalists, is that these guys are completely human outside of the cage. We all love fighting, and Jackson wouldn’t be a fighter if he didn’t love the sport, but there’s more to these guys than what you see in the cage. Whenever I’m interviewing a fighter for a story I’m working on, I almost always stay away from discussing the actual fight.

I do this intentionally. Fighters are repeatedly asked the same questions, over and over, for each and every fight. The routine never changes, and I can understand how that gets annoying after awhile. They give the same answer and we write the same story, every single time.

So yes, I’ve probably been too hard on Jackson. He’s an emotional guy, and he’s going through a phase of his career where he’s not as relevant as he once was. That can’t be an easy thing to accept. He comes from a time when pleasing the fans meant more than wins and losses, and he’s now stuck in an era where wins and losses actually matter.

He’ll face Mauricio “Shogun” Rua later this year in his final UFC fight. It’s a bout that should deliver, both in terms of excitement for the fans and in the kind of fight that Jackson has been seeking over the last two years. But first, he’ll undergo double knee surgery, as he revealed on Twitter this morning.

2 keep it real,the Shogun fight will have 2 wait,I just found out that I have 2 get surgery on both knees. But I heal fast don’t trip.

I hope Rampage heals quickly, and I hope the fight with Shogun is everything he wants it to be. And I hope he finds happiness after that fight, whether it’s in the UFC or somewhere else in the world. After all he’s done for the sport, he deserves that.

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Jose Canseco, Shaquille O’Neal and a True MMA Dream Match

Dream fights come along only once or twice a generation. For fight fans in the 2010s, there are only three fights that really transcend their respective sports. Fights that would get everyone in the sports world talking.In boxing, the dream fight to en…

In boxing, the dream fight to end all dream fights is Floyd Mayweather versus Manny Pacquiao. It’s a fight that has, thus far, mainly taken place in the press.

Unfortunately, the way things are going, if it ever happens it will be at a retirement home in South Beach with both men coming slowly to the ring on Rascals. A fight while both are in their primes? Forget about it.

Mixed martial arts doesn’t have a single fight that powerful. Some fans are excited to see Georges St-Pierre, the reigning welterweight champion, take on the amazing middleweight champion Anderson Silva. The size differential between the two men, more than 20 pounds, has halted this one in its tracks.

This leaves us with only one fight that can define our generation. A battle between two superstars, men so popular and iconic that it seems impossible to believe a single arena could possibly be enough to hold all the interested spectators.

Of course, I could only be talking about Shaquille O’Neal versus Jose Canseco,

You remember Canseco right?

In his prime, he was putting notches on his bedpost at a Ryan Reynolds-like pace and becoming the first member of baseball’s 40/40 club, notching 40 home runs and 40 stolen bases in the same season. Later, he was one of the first players to admit widespread steroid abuse in the sport.

Today? He’s best known for making a fool of himself on Twitter. Airing his dirty laundry. Challenging the monstrous Shaquille O’Neal to a fight.

Yes, that Shaquille O’Neal. The recently retired basketball star best known for his power moves, mumbling, incoherent interviews and the movie Kazaam, not necessarily in that order.

Will this fight ever actually take place? What would a fight between the two men even look like, considering Shaq is 40 and Jose Canseco is 47? What’s the over/under on high-price escorts traveling to whatever town is blessed with this potential matchup? These are burning questions that demand answers.

I never thought anyone would out-Pride the Pride Fight Championships. But if this fight comes off, there will be a new king of the freak-show fights. I welcome them with open arms.

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