(Indeed. Props: ahura)
Last night I had the misfortune of seeing about 30 seconds of the CW reality show H8R. (That’s pronounced “hater,” grandpa.) In this particular episode, Girls Gone Wild creator Joe Francis tried to convince some chick that he wasn’t in fact the greatest douchebag of our generation. His primary defense was that the girl didn’t know him personally, and was judging him based only on the “character” she knows from GGW — you know, the character he created. Awful. Just awful. And yet, I’d love to see an episode of that show starring UFC light-heavyweight champion Jon Jones.
As soon as Jones won his belt, he immediately went from a widely beloved underdog story (“he learned his striking from YouTube videos, you guys!”) to a lightning rod for message-board criticism. Exactly why some fans seem to passionately dislike Bones is a topic that we’ll discuss more in depth on tomorrow’s episode of The Bum Rush. In the meantime, I decided to revive an old CagePotato feature — “What Your Favorite Fighter Says About You” and its sequel — and twist it to reflect today’s hate-crazed MMA climate. So, for example, if your least-favorite fighter is…
Let’s get one thing straight: Wrestling is not a martial art. It’s the opposite of a martial art. Wrestlers are the reason that you started taking Tae Kwon Do in the first place, when you were 12 years old. (Long story short: There were a couple of kids on the wrestling team that used to push you down and drag you around by your legs in front of everybody, and once you got your green belt in TKD they didn’t do it nearly as much.) Basically, you watch MMA for the action — more specifically the knockouts, though submissions can be cool too, sometimes. But watching a couple of dudes grab onto each other and hump on the mat for 15 minutes? That’s not fighting. That’s…you don’t know what it is, but it makes you uncomfortable. Very uncomfortable. You clear your browser history every time you finish using your laptop.
The only thing you hate worse than a liar is a thief. And the only thing you hate worse than a thief is a real-estate agent. While some UFC fans find Sonnen’s trash-talk hilarious, you see him for what he really is — a slimy, racist sociopath who probably has a few prostitutes buried in his basement. And is it true that his balls are tiny and sitting up in his stomach? Just thinking about it gives you chills. You have normal-sized balls, for the record. If Rick Perry gets elected next year, you’re moving to Canada, seriously, for real this time.
Let’s just say that there was recently a death in your family.
For a long time, Chuck Liddell was your favorite fighter. Then, that cocky son-of-a-bitch Rashad Evans stole his soul. You didn’t know what to do with yourself for a while. You tried to make Fedor Emelianenko your favorite fighter, but that didn’t work out either. Rashad ruined everything. It goes without saying that you’re a Caucasian dude, not that the color of your skin has anything to do with your hatred of Rashad Evans. I mean, you’ve been around plenty of black people. One of your old co-workers was black. Kind of an awful experience, but hey, you got through it.
You followed Dana White on Twitter before any of your friends did, and you send him ‘@’ messages every day. One time he publicly replied to you with “ha!” when you made a joke about Josh Barnett’s blood being radioactive. That was probably the greatest day of your life. Before that, the greatest day of your life was when you wished Arianny Celeste good luck at a photo shoot and she re-tweeted it. You got, like, 20 new followers that day. Whatever it is you do for a living, you get paid hourly. Cain Velasquez vs. Junior Dos Santos will be the greatest, most significant heavyweight fight in the history of MMA. Brock Lesnar is going to smash Alistair Overeem, and you plan on being the first person in the world to tweet “IN UR FACE!!! #strikefarce”
You distrust people with long arms. You read the Bible, but think the book of Philippians is way overrated. When you accidentally knocked up your girlfriend, you had the common courtesy to marry her. Everything you accomplished in life came from hard work, not from being young, or naturally gifted, or talented in any measurable way. You like Rampage because he keeps it real. You like Rashad because he has swagger. You don’t know what the hell Greg Jackson is doing down there in Albuquerque, but if the whole camp turns up dead one day from a mass Kool-Aid poisoning, it wouldn’t really surprise you. Your wife used to watch UFC with you only if Georges St. Pierre was on the card. Well, guess who her new “favorite fighter” is now? If Barack Obama gets re-elected next year, you’re moving to Australia, seriously, for real this time.
That’s about all I have energy for right now. If you’d like to see a sequel one day, shoot your suggestions in the comments section…
– Ben Goldstein
Not too many people are particularly fond of Chael Sonnen.