This morning, I saw a video clip of a nasty 40-pounder doing padwork with an intensity I can only dream of, and I had to find out who that little beast was. Turns out, he’s a five-year-old from Lebanon named Ramadan Ondash, who was trained by his older brother Ahmad Ondash, a Muay Thai coach. And that’s pretty much all I could find out. But if the UFC still exists in 15 years, watch out for this kid.
After the jump: Two more videos of Ramadan Ondash in action from last year — when he was four — including some gnarly ground-and-pound in the second clip.
This morning, I saw a video clip of a nasty 40-pounder doing padwork with an intensity I can only dream of, and I had to find out who that little beast was. Turns out, he’s a five-year-old from Lebanon named Ramadan Ondash, who was trained by his older brother Ahmad Ondash, a Muay Thai coach. And that’s pretty much all I could find out. But if the UFC still exists in 15 years, watch out for this kid.
After the jump: Two more videos of Ramadan Ondash in action from last year — when he was four — including some gnarly ground-and-pound in the second clip.
(Nope. Nothing to see here. Everyone just move along. Photo via Iamflashdance.)
If following loosely MMA-related minor celebrities on Twitter is your thing, there’s a chance that you have already seen Jenna Jameson‘s latest tirade against Tito Ortiz last night. That’s right, the couple known for their crazy, attention-seeking behavior decided to air their dirty laundry on Twitter, and it was just as outrageous and pathetic as you’d expect it to be.
Of course I’m not joking about that last statement. Tito Ortiz said that Jenna Jameson’s erratic behavior distracted him before the fights he lost at the end of his career; presumably because even he has finally realized how pathetic of an excuse “I totally had a cracked skull, you guys” is.
This may be more of a precautionary measure than anything else — who knows if Jenna Jameson will actually come forward with a story about Tito Ortiz almost killing her — but it’s right about now that I think we need to revisit a defunct CagePotato Ban from the days when Ortiz was a free agent claiming to be “very close” to signing with a new promotion every other day:
(Nope. Nothing to see here. Everyone just move along. Photo via Iamflashdance.)
If following loosely MMA-related minor celebrities on Twitter is your thing, there’s a chance that you have already seen Jenna Jameson‘s latest tirade against Tito Ortiz last night. That’s right, the couple known for their crazy, attention-seeking behavior decided to air their dirty laundry on Twitter, and it was just as outrageous and pathetic as you’d expect it to be.
Of course I’m not joking about that last statement. Tito Ortiz said that Jenna Jameson’s erratic behavior distracted him before the fights he lost at the end of his career; presumably because even he has finally realized how pathetic of an excuse “I totally had a cracked skull, you guys” is.
This may be more of a precautionary measure than anything else — who knows if Jenna Jameson will actually come forward with a story about Tito Ortiz almost killing her — but it’s right about now that I think we need to revisit a defunct CagePotato Ban from the days when Ortiz was a free agent claiming to be “very close” to signing with a new promotion every other day:
Well, that settles that. Tito, you have fooled us for the last time. Just as E! banned Speidi, CagePotato will now enact a news ban on Tito Ortiz until he actually does something newsworthy. Seriously. Even if it’s the slowest of slow news days, and the only story going around is that Tito is “very close” to signing a deal with DREAM to participate in their “Super Douchebag Tournament,” we won’t cover it until it actually happens. That’s our promise to you.
Except this time, we’ll strictly bring it back for the Tito vs. Jenna feud. As a UFC Hall of Famer and Cris Cyborg’s manager, Ortiz doesn’t deserve to be banned from this site. But unless one of them either gets arrested or brings the other to court, we’ll leave their tabloid relationship drama to the experts on that sort of thing.
Ladies and gentlemen, meet the future of the sport.
This little tyke is Tarec Saffiedine‘s two-year-old son, shown here during a recent sofa-training session. From his vicious leg kicks (look familiar?) to his jackhammer-esque ground-and-pound, Sponge Jr. already possesses the kind of skills that would make the Ruffo Brothers and Pretty Boy Bam Bam piss themselves. And he’s still so young in the sport. Can you imagine how nasty this kid will be when he’s five?
As for his daddy Tarec, the former Strikeforce welterweight champ is slated to make his UFC debut against Robbie Lawler at UFC on FOX 8 on July 27th. And if Saffiedine has to pull out of that fight last minute due to a gnarly cut and a shattered knee suffered in training, well, you’ll all know who to blame.
Ladies and gentlemen, meet the future of the sport.
This little tyke is Tarec Saffiedine‘s two-year-old son, shown here during a recent sofa-training session. From his vicious leg kicks (look familiar?) to his jackhammer-esque ground-and-pound, Sponge Jr. already possesses the kind of skills that would make the Ruffo Brothers and Pretty Boy Bam Bam piss themselves. And he’s still so young in the sport. Can you imagine how nasty this kid will be when he’s five?
As for his daddy Tarec, the former Strikeforce welterweight champ is slated to make his UFC debut against Robbie Lawler at UFC on FOX 8 on July 27th. And if Saffiedine has to pull out of that fight last minute due to a gnarly cut and a shattered knee suffered in training, well, you’ll all know who to blame.
The morality of children fighting for sport (both here and abroad) has given us plenty of opportunities for debate over the years. In Thailand, no such debate exists. Little kids fight Muay Thai, and that’s the way it is.
Still, it’s always a little unsettling for us American non-sociopath-types to see a child kicked unconscious, which is what happens around the 1:59 mark of the video above. The referee’s position actually blocks the impact from our view, but the aftermath — in which the losing fighter in the blue gloves is motionless on his back for about 15 seconds — suggests that he got seriously rattled. For what it’s worth, the YouTube page identifies the winner as “Baby Muay Thai fighter Pee,” and calls it a KO via body kick. Congrats, Pee.
Look, I know this is how things are done over there, but just because something is tradition, doesn’t mean it’s sacred. Kiddie Muay Thai knockouts — good or bad for humanity? Call 1-888-CAGE-TATO right now and let us know how you feel. Or just use the comments section.
The morality of children fighting for sport (both here and abroad) has given us plenty of opportunities for debate over the years. In Thailand, no such debate exists. Little kids fight Muay Thai, and that’s the way it is.
Still, it’s always a little unsettling for us American non-sociopath-types to see a child kicked unconscious, which is what happens around the 1:59 mark of the video above. The referee’s position actually blocks the impact from our view, but the aftermath — in which the losing fighter in the blue gloves is motionless on his back for about 15 seconds — suggests that he got seriously rattled. For what it’s worth, the YouTube page identifies the winner as “Baby Muay Thai fighter Pee,” and calls it a KO via body kick. Congrats, Pee.
Look, I know this is how things are done over there, but just because something is tradition, doesn’t mean it’s sacred. Kiddie Muay Thai knockouts — good or bad for humanity? Call 1-888-CAGE-TATO right now and let us know how you feel. Or just use the comments section.
It seems that we’ve had to deal with the issue of child abuse more and more over the past few weeks here at CagePotato. You may recall the woman in St. Louis who videotaped her infant daughter’s decaweight debut and provided such insightful ringside commentary as “Ball up some fists!” as one instance of this. But today, Potato Nation, we’ve come across the classiest child abuse video of them all. We’re talking a top of the line, Armani-suited business moguls shrouded in darkness and purchasing sex slaves that were kidnapped at the airport level of class on display here. This is the Rolls-Royce of child abuse videos, if you will. In fact, the level of class in this child abuse video is so high, that it might not be considered child abuse at all.
It’s disorienting, we know, because typically, when treated to a video of a 6 year old and a 7 year old throwing down in a cage, your first reaction would probably be that of outrage. Toss in the fact that it took place in Armenia, at a bar surrounded by drunken patrons huffing cigars and cheering them on, your anger would likely jump up a few notches. But then you take a look at the awesome production value (yes, those are *actual* flames in the beginning), the adorable weigh-ins/staredown, and the scaled down ring, and you almost forget that you’re about to watch two kids beat the piss out of each other for entertainment. Or that a promotion exists out there that will allow this to happen.
So goes the story of ArmFC, an upstart and soon to be shut down promotion that recently forayed into the art of child fighting. And although the promotion insists that we are actually watching a “demonstration of the fight” on the Youtube page in which they posted this video, the fact that the first four words of the video’s description are “death 6 years fighter” leads us to believe that those running this promotion have a tenuous grasp on the English language in general. So by “demonstration”, they likely mean “we didn’t allow them to dip their gloves in candle wax and broken glass beforehand this time.”
It seems that we’ve had to deal with the issue of child abuse more and more over the past few weeks here at CagePotato. You may recall the woman in St. Louis who videotaped her infant daughter’s decaweight debut and provided such insightful ringside commentary as “Ball up some fists!” as one instance of this. But today, Potato Nation, we’ve come across the classiest child abuse video of them all. We’re talking a top of the line, Armani-suited business moguls shrouded in darkness and purchasing sex slaves that were kidnapped at the airport level of class on display here. This is the Rolls-Royce of child abuse videos, if you will. In fact, the level of class in this child abuse video is so high, that it might not be considered child abuse at all.
It’s disorienting, we know, because typically, when treated to a video of a 6 year old and a 7 year old throwing down in a cage, your first reaction would probably be that of outrage. Toss in the fact that it took place in Armenia, at a bar surrounded by drunken patrons huffing cigars and cheering them on, your anger would likely jump up a few notches. But then you take a look at the awesome production value (yes, those are *actual* flames in the beginning), the adorable weigh-ins/staredown, and the scaled down ring, and you almost forget that you’re about to watch two kids beat the piss out of each other for entertainment. Or that a promotion exists out there that will allow this to happen.
So goes the story of ArmFC, an upstart and soon to be shut down promotion that recently forayed into the art of child fighting. And although the promotion insists that we are actually watching a “demonstration of the fight” on the Youtube page in which they posted this video, the fact that the first four words of the video’s description are “death 6 years fighter” leads us to believe that those running this promotion have a tenuous grasp on the English language in general. So by “demonstration”, they likely mean “we didn’t allow them to dip their gloves in candle wax and broken glass beforehand this time.”
(The fight doesn’t start until about halfway through the video, but you NEED to watch all of this.)
Pairing Minas Avagyan against Hayk Tashchyan, the scrap is both a quick and technical affair. I hate to say it, but I was actually rather entertained by the fight itself, leading me to the moral conundrum I placed before you in this article’s second paragraph.
On one hand, this seems incredibly unsafe and abusive. I mean, the kids aren’t even wearing helmets for Christ’s sake. Hitting some pads in a Tapout commercial is one thing, but allowing two softheaded pre-adolescents to swing for the fences with reckless abandon seems a bit irresponsible to say the least. On the other hand, did you even see that guillotine? Effin’ A Cotton, was that sweet. And that Tito Ortiz gravedigger tribute/cage climb? Let’s just say that if I ever have kids, they will learn to do both of those things before they enter preschool, where intimidation and pizzazz is the name of the game.
What I’m saying is, I don’t know whether to be outraged or enthralled, so help me decide, Potato Nation. For once I might just listen to you.
The males ages 18-34 demographic will always be at the core of the UFC’s viewership, but there’s a second graphic that’s also crucial to focus on: children. While some might scoff and be perplexed at directing the sport of fighting to…
The males ages 18-34 demographic will always be at the core of the UFC’s viewership, but there’s a second graphic that’s also crucial to focus on: children. While some might scoff and be perplexed at directing the sport of fighting towards children, the shift in the UFC’s audience will happen organically over time. Think about […]
