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Similar Histories: UFC and WWE
By Luke | October 11, 2006
To some people the similarities between UFC and WWE might just be coincidence, or maybe there are small little details that separate them, and to an extent that might be true. But, the fact that these two promotions are following such a similar timeline, and given the similar personalities that run both the UFC and WWE. MMA and Pro-Wrestling have a lot in common – from historical timelines, to booking philosophy, to marketing strategy.
MMA is going through a similar growth period now, that Pro Wrestling went through in the 1980s. Dana White is on the leading edge of that growth period in MMA in 2006, as Vince McMahon was in 1985.
Vince McMahon used syndication and MTV to squeeze regional promoters, and put them out of business. Lorenzo Fertitta and Dana White used the Commission system to squeeze Bob Meyrowitz years ago into selling UFC for a bargain basement price. After that Fertitta got UFC sanctioned in the state of Nevada. But previously he had just refused to sanction UFC as a member of the NSAC, when Meyrowitz applied. Which strangely enough was only a few months before UFC was sold to Zuffa.
Both took a big risk that put them over the top. UFC chose to be part of a reality TV series on Spike TV that exposed their sport to a mass audience that hadn’t seen it previously. Vince McMahon – after a year of syndication and a few million dollars in losses – chose to work with M-TV on a special to promote a show called Wrestle Mania that would air nationally on closed-circuit TV, exposing the WWF to the masses, during an era of regional promotions, when it was faux-pas to “run†outside your home territory. Who is Forrest Griffin without The Ultimate Fighter? Or, Roddy Piper and Paul Orndorff without “The War to Settle the Scoreâ€?
Vince McMahon had a very close relationship with the New York State Athletic Commission for years that allowed him control that particular region. Dana White and UFC have something very similar in Nevada. As difficult as Vince used to make it for others to run in New York, Dana White is making it as difficult for other promotions to run in Nevada. One example is the upcoming PRIDE shows where PRIDE will be forced to use the UFC round system, and judging criteria, and follow UFC rules. These differences won’t make it easier for PRIDE to be successful in North America. The only thing PRIDE won’t have to do is use UFC’s octagon.
Dana White isn’t doing anything revolutionary. He hasn’t re-invented the wheel. The formula that’s being used by Dana White is very similar to the formula thats been used by Wrestling promotions around the world for centuries.
Even the formula for making money is similar. You take two fighters and position them as stars and put them in a ring together. Then you work to convince people to pay to see them fight. This isn’t anything that hasn’t been used in Wrestling for years and years. If you want evidence that it works, just study the buyrates that UFC has been doing this year in comparison with their TV ratings. Then do the same for WWE this year. The conversion rate of TV viewers to PPV purchasers tells the entire story.
Branding is the use of logos, symbols, or product design to promote consumer awareness of goods and services. Many Fortune 500 companies use Branding to help establish themselves in their marketplace. From WWE to Microsoft, to Apple, to the NFL, to UFC. All have taken great amounts of time and money to establish ‘their brand’ of a certain product to the public.
Most of the MMA coverage you see in the mainstream media is UFC coverage. Without the UFC, there wouldn’t be any mainstream MMA coverage. Just recently I saw that UFC has its own tab on the sports page at the Sympatico.ca website. Sympatico obviously isn’t ESPN, but it shows that without the brand “UFCâ€, would MMA be getting any mainstream attention?
John Q. Public walking the street probably wouldn’t know what MMA stood for if you asked him. If you asked him what UFC stands for, his reaction would probably be “Oh, that’s Ultimate Fightingâ€. What reaction do you want the general populous to have when they’re confronted with the sport? Would like them to say “What is that again?â€, or would you like them to instantly be able to recognize it, and know what you’re talking about.
In all three of these areas UFC has utilized something from the Pro-Wresting business to help them become successful. All the while, they haven’t undermined the sports legitimacy, and they’re skyrocketing into mainstream acceptance, and entrenchment. The key difference between the UFC and WWE boom periods is that one is a real sport with true characters, and the other is fake with cartoon characters. The chances of UFC being embraced long term by the MSM are much greater because of that. Compared with WWE, which is laughed at today by the MSM.
Topics: All Topics, Luke Nicholson, MMA, Pro-Wrestling, UFC, WWE | 25 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
Part of me gets continually more and more irritated as myopic pro wrestling fans continue to compare the WWE to the UFC. Here’s a few points:
-The Nevada State Athletic Commission follows the Unified Rules set up not by the UFC, but by the New Jersey State Athletic Control Board. Almost no athletic commission in the US allows kicks to the head on the ground or massive weight differences outside of illpoliced ones such as Georgia and Iowa. The rules system that PRIDE uses has almost NO PLACE in the US for the simple reason that we have commissions. PRIDE does not have commissions and thus does not need to be sanctioned by anyone except itself, so when they come to America, they actually have to play by a set of rules. Its like complaining that Don King can’t set up a 1900 style “fight to the finish” with no rounds for a heavyweight title bout anywhere but some backwoods third world nation.
-The UFC has a healthy relationship with smaller regional promoters, particularly the WEC and TKO, who work almost as feeder systems to the UFC. PRIDE is not a small regional promoter. They’ve also taken no serious steps to try and curb the IFL, (unless you’re hyper paranoid like Militech) Strikeforce, or ICON and their advances on US soil.
-The UFC is a real sport. This is lost often on people. Their style of promotion is no different than the tact used by Don King the last 35 years, or that of other promoters going back over a century. Having a preview show isn’t Dana channelling Championship Wrestling From Florida, its him copying (right down to the editing style) the preshows that HBO has been doing for years.
I wasn’t attempting to stick up for PRIDE, but most hardcore PRIDE fans in North America prefer their rules and judging criteria. When you’re used to operating without the oversight of commissions, etc. it could be a bit of an adjustment to suddenly have to adhere to them when you come to North America.
I mentioned in the final paragraph about UFC being a real sport, and how it might work to their advantage. Did you skip that part? All three forms of fighting – MMA, Pro Wrestling and Boxing use the same formula for having success, but nobody admits it because one is fake, and two are not. You just mentioned it. Wrestling people see similarities to their sport when they watch, Boxing people see similarities to their sport. There are similarities to both. I chose to concentrate on the similarities I know something about.
Thanks for reading. You made some good points.
[Part of me gets continually more and more irritated as myopic pro wrestling fans continue to compare the WWE to the UFC.]
And it happens to be the case generally that the evil pro-wrestling fans online understanding UFC’s marketing and where they are heading generally better than the hardcore MMA-only, we-hate-wrestling fans.
Look, I got no problem if you hate pro-wrestling. WWE is brutal to watch right now. However, to look down upon wrestling fans as outcasts is mistaken.
A lot of the top MMA writers also happen to be pro-wrestling fans and analyze that industry closely.
Regarding UFC’s relationship with independents. Sure, they can be friendly to the minor league promoters right now. Why? Because the fighters are fighting for so cheap, UFC doesn’t need to create their own farm system (like WWE has with OVW). The minute that the independents start getting stronger and pay more money, this is when the possibility of UFC creating their own minor-league promotion becomes strong.
And what is happening now with the minor leagues? Dana White is gladly picking off talent from these companies and use them. No different than when Vince McMahon cherry-picked the top talent from all the territories as he was crushing them (like Harley Race, like Jimmy Hart, etc.)
Talk to many of the pro-wrestling writers and you’ll find out that UFC management does, in fact, study WWE’s operations very carefully. They may come from a boxing background, but UFC is using pro-wrestling style marketing tactics to pull off big business. And I commend them for it. Tito Ortiz is a prime example.
What UFC is doing is what PRIDE did to the Japanese wrestling marketplace. As Japanese wrestling crumbled under the pressure of MMA, PRIDE managed to steal pro-wrestling’s identity (production, characters, story-telling, TV ideas) without having to be professional wrestling. No different here with UFC. That’s the risk that an aging Vince McMahon faces.
Great article and great responses. Thanks for the insight. Not being a fan of wrestling, and knowing almost nothing of it… this was a bit educational. I know boxing though, and it all sounds familiar.
Not for nothing, Ken/Tito is pro-wrestling. I thought I was watching RAW last night and that WWE was back on Spike TV. You won’t convince me that the whole thing isn’t a work. Also look at when Ken is on the ground against the cage. He’s barely getting hit. All of the elbows miss and Tito punches his shoulder about 5 times only landing 2 clean shots to the face to give Ken a black eye.
Not to mention they used inside-pro wrestling talk after the fight. Ken said this is just business, we have to do this to make money and entertain the fans. Tito thanked Ken for passing the torch (that’s straight up pro-wrestling).
>I wasn’t attempting to stick up for PRIDE, but most hardcore PRIDE fans in North America prefer their rules and judging criteria.Look, I got no problem if you hate pro-wrestling. WWE is brutal to watch right now. However, to look down upon wrestling fans as outcasts is mistaken.
Ugh. I just tried to post and the carrots killed me. Let’s try that again.
-PRIDE Judging: You gotta live by the rules in the US if you want to operate. That’s the way it is. Everyone has to, not just the UFC. If they want to do it their own way, then maybe they’ll have to convince the folks at Soboba.
-the myopic state of wrestling fans: I’m not degrading them as outcasts. Merely that people who have a far more extensive background in wrestling rather than that of actual fighting seem to have difficulty seeing parallels anywhere else but wrestling. I think boxing fans have a better gauge of things thanks to knowing the history of mano-a-mano combat and the promotion there of. Jack Dempsey filled stadiums in the 1920s…did he copy wrestling? Were the promoters behind Joe Louis flying into the future and watching CWF or WWF promo spots (like the Bret Hart/HBK promotion for the Ironman match) when they had the Brown Bomber stand in the wood chopping logs? Of course not.
There are always going to be some similarities because of what’s being presented. MMA is pro wrestling as shoot (sometimes). But the idea that everything that the UFC doing is “based in wrestling” is fallacy. I laughed when Dave Meltzer asked Dana White this a couple weeks back on WOL, and Dana basically said, “I know nothing about wrestling. I have a boxing background.” And he does. He’s a failed boxing promoter and gym owner, remember? One that got beat up by one of the guys he promoted. Does everyone forget this? 3 years ago, people mocked the hell out of him because of the hilariously low buyrates of UFC 45 and his ridiculous pictures as a cardiokickboxing instructor. Now he’s a genius who worships NWA or something? Huh?
Oh, and wrestling and MMA in the US. Totally different than Japan. We all know this. We’ve known it for years. Will pro wrestling suffer? Yes, but not for some time. Its going to be almost generational. It will be 6-10 years before the WWE begins to see the cracks arise. If the house of cards was to fall over, it would have happened after UFC 60. It didn’t. In fact, buyrates are stable compared to the last two years. The thing is that they have no hope of gaining casual fans ever again. And inevitably, the youth watching is going to gravitate to the UFC, when the 12-17s grow up and become the 18-34s (the WWE’s chief audience), they won’t be around. But we’re talking about a long time. Vince isn’t going to send in Undertaker to fight Cro Cop in Vegas on New Years. Kurt Angle won’t be the mouthpiece for Strikeforce. That kind of thing (which occurred in Japan) is going to help pro wrestling writhe on the vine a bit longer.
I totally agree with much of what ZDL says and I grow more and more frustrated by these liberal comparisons between the WWE and UFC that have little factual support. I think these articles are written by fans and journalist that have knowledge of mostly pro-wrestling and MMA fans and little else which results in connecting dots that don’t really exists.
The NBA, NFL and NHL all try to build stars and promote their respective brands. Are they copying WWE? The NBA cut off ties with the CBA to form its own developmental league. Is the NBA crushing it’s regional competitors? Mayorga talks smack about De Lahoya’s wife and Valuev is the size of Andre the Giant. Is boxing taking notes from WWE?
Vince Mcmahon does not rule the world and the WWE is not the center of the fight promotional universe. WWE didn’t invent the art of promotion. All the UFC has done has employed textbook business and marketing 101 tactics and strategies.
UFC has a lot more to do with the promoting style of boxing promoters than with wrestling. There’s 1001 different examples i could pull out of my ass to show you ways the UFC is different … look at merchandising and target market for one. The WWE creates products and marketing opportunities. The actual shows and events are simply the nexus for all their other avenues of business to flow from. The UFC on the other hand still makes their money off of PPV and TV deals.
The point about UFC’s marketing is dead on as well. Recognize that if the UFC was like the WWE, they’d have full control not only over matchmaking and their own footage library, but the merchandising arms would also be owned and controlled by them. Instead, we still regularly see Sprawl, KTFO, Warrior Wear, and so on pasted on shirts and shorts.
The business model that MMA currently employs is, in my mind, totally unsustainable over the long term. Imagine if Tito Ortiz won the title, left the next day, and found someone like a Don King to promote his fights independently. Obviously, some would make the claim that it wouldn’t matter, comparing the previous times Tito left. The problem is, Tito’s profile is at this point (and by then) 7-10 times larger than it was before. Tito headlining his own cage show and running his own promotional entity and booking independant talent will earn him far more than even Dana can muster. Its an inevitablity that MMA will face in America if it continues to grow. As is, there’s so many MMA startups already that the marketplace will be clogged with shows (both internet and on TV) by the end of 2007. UFC may be the most popular of them all, but there will be less clarity than ever, particularly if PRIDE goes down the tubes.
All I’m saying is that don’t be shocked one day when someone like a Tito pulls a Golden Boy and starts running his own show. UFC is obsolete coming out of the starting gates, it just won’t know it until its too late.
A large number of organizations with exclusive contracts could quickly lead MMA down a dangerous path where top contenders rarely get to fight eachother. However, this isn’t something that’s going to happen for a number of years. The UFC has too strong of a stranglehold over the MMA game in North America … ironically, this *is* something the UFC shares with the WWE (although for very different reasons).
If a fighter leaves the UFC, they effectively drop off the average North American MMA fan’s radar. Even former champions and major favorites from the UFC’s past like Matt Lindland, Robbie Lawler, Josh Barnett, etc etc etc all ceased to exist as far as many were concerned ocne they stopped appearing on UFC fight cards.
Regardless, the idea of an champion cut and run like you describe is unlikely to happen now … fighters who get title shots sign very specific contracts which keep them in the organization so long as they hold the belt.
Right. And that’s going to be the case for right now. The US market isn’t totally ready for it, unless maybe Tito went in. However, the guys that have left have actually been finding work fairly easily. Lindland and Lawler are making more in the independants than they were in the UFC. Mayhem Miller had that guaranteed $250,000 contract with ICON…that’s actually significantly more than many of the TUF guys. Barnett’s making plenty with PRIDE and NJPW before that. And they’re not draws like Hughes, Tito, or Liddell are right now. Lindland never main evented a UFC PPV, or really came close, other than as a special attraction, even when the company’s average buyrate was around 70,000 rather than 400,000. Nick Diaz has an open door back to the UFC, but is leaving after his next fight to work for one of the billion or so startups right now.
Hughes and Liddell have specific contracts for number of fights, but Dana can’t hold them indefinitely just because they’re champions. It didn’t work for Penn or Pulver, did it? The difference between what those guys could draw in 2002 and what Liddell can draw now is really incredible. Liddell is LITERALLY ten times the draw right now that either of those guys were then. Think about that for a second. The rules don’t apply as well.
Now imagine if the UFC was even bigger. Its a double edged sword. They need to create big stars (and don’t fool yourself into believing that MMA has its big, first legitimate megastar yet) to move up the food chain, but at some point, the big stars may overtake the brand of the UFC and become brands onto themselves. Suddenly, the need for the UFC as promotional body disappears. That’s where the comparisons with traditional team sports end, and you see a comparison more along the lines of De La Hoya begin. And that’s inevitable if Dana White wants 1.5 million buys on PPV, which I’m sure he does. A lot of these guys are very business savvy (particularly Tito, again), and they’re just as in it for the money as they are for the fighting and glory.
I glad to see that there are some people who think lumping MMA in with wrestling is ridiculous. I don’t know what these wrestling reporters are trying to prove. Do these wrestling reporters that cover MMA realize that mixing wrestling with MMA doesn’t do MMA any good? There’s a reason why Dana White is not interested in using Kurt Angle now that he’s signed with TNA. People may start to think MMA is worked to some degree and wrestling’s negative stigma could rub off on MMA. These are two totally different things. These wrestling reporters and fans are probably P.O’d that no other wrestling group can beat WWE so they are desparate to come up with anything that is ahead of WWE. Gee, the NFL takes chunk out of WWE’s ratings every week and their numbers blow away WWE’s ratings. So how come these wrestling reporters are not putting football in the same category as WWE.
[…] The comments and mail in regards to Luke Nicholson’s article were voluminous. I generally agree with his position and the tone of his article. […]
Wow, looks like people have been living under a rock for the past 10 years. Professional Wrestling is sports entertainment, Nothing more and nothing less. Athletes who perform stories and stunts to captivate audiences. It becomes borderline ridiculous when journalist compare the sport of MMA with Sports Entertainment. When someone claims Pro-Wrestling is fake that person comes off really idiotic when the WWE does not promote themselves as a “real sport”. The reason why we have so many comparisons in a marketing stand point is because the UFC has used allot of what the WWE has done in lighting, music and live event atmosphere. When you watch a UFC event during fighter introductions you can’t help but notice and feel like your watching a wrestling event. So if the UFC wants to distance themselves from the whole idea of Professional wrestling then they should change there whole approach and go back to a sports like broadcast like boxing with little lighting, and music and production value. Just pure sport. Oh wait isn’t boxing dead? can you take a whole family to see a boxing fight? the answer is “NO”. So what does attract and stimulate a whole family to watch a sporting event? Oh yes Professional Wrestling.
That’s not what Luke necessarily said, although you thankfully agree with his sentiment. Luke did not say “UFC = sports entertainment.” He said it’s entertainment (much like sports writer Jason Whitlock agrees that many sports are entertainment first to people).
Ken/Tito II, which was entirely predicated on pro-wrestling style booking, drew 775,000 PPV buys (the highest for a UFC show this year). Ken/Tito III drew a monster 3.1 rating (their fight alone drew over 4 million viewers).
That is wrestling-style marketing without being scripted or fake. It’s excellent.
Watching the Tito ring introduction last night was amazing. That crowd was really great.
What I find interesting that how vehement people get over the mere idea that there may be any connection between pro wrestling and MMA. The possibility that UFC could very possibly be using a lot of the same promotional tactics as WWE really seems to freak people out. Non pro wrestling fans in specific.
Can someone explain why this idea is so abhorant?
No one finds it abhorrent, just myopic. Being shortsighted isn’t necessarily always a bad thing, but the issue at hand is that the people who are most often working within the “press” covering MMA look at it in terms of pro wrestling because that is their background. Dave Meltzer would claim that Mayorga/De La Hoya had “pro wrestling buildup” if he followed boxing too. When you look at the statistics in that fashion, its obvious that you’re going to connote the two.
However, really sit down and read the articles most mainstream sites, from the Long Beach Telegram to the wildly positive articles SI/CNN and ESPN’s Page 2 have, and pro wrestling nary gets mentioned. Again; many people reading this site are from a pro wrestling background, and thus they aren’t looking at the bigger picture of sport or fight promotion to understand what the UFC is doing.
Trust me…if they ran Royce/Hughes on free TV right now, it would probably do a 3.1 as well. Would that be a pro wrestling angle? In fact, is there a single matchup that could be made in MMA that wouldn’t be called a “pro wrestling angle”? Seriously, if you believe they’re copying it, then how do they present fights with any human interest and drama without resorting to base (or, in many people’s minds, “wrestling”) promotional tactics?
The pro-wrestling business used to have legitimate fights. Then when promoters and wrestlers saw that they could make more money with worked fights, they did that. In Japan, Karl Gotch trained many wrestlers (both in the JWA & New Japan Pro-Wrestling) to be shooters-first and wrestlers-second. Then the Inoki/MMA boom happened (where he did worked fights with everyone except Ali). In Japan, pro-wrestling became lumped in with real sports.
Because WWE is marketed as such entertainment and not a shoot, people forget that long ago wrestling used to be much more realistic, if not feature real fights. The element that sold back then for wrestling (with worked matches that had more credibility) was that the fans could get into believing that you would have a clear-cut winner and a loser, and the feuds had closure and new feuds were started. Simply booking.
Vince McMahon has lost that vision. He’s lost in his own product. Wrestling fans have abandoned that product and have either vanished or been looking for a new alternative. TNA hasn’t worked as an alternative, so you’re starting to see more of a crossover with disgruntled wrestling fans watching MMA. It’s grappling, the outcomes are real, you generally have a clear-cut winner and loser, and many of the MMA groups feature pro-wrestling style booking and production.
If you want to consider UFC simply a “pure” sport, then Ken Shamrock wouldn’t have main evented on Tuesday night on free TV against Tito Ortiz. It wasn’t a competitive fight on paper. However, Ken and Tito are two stars with major crossover appeal to wrestling and MMA fans.
A “nostalgia act” versus the UFC’s most dominant 170-pound fighter? Legend vs. champion with the hope that the champion goes over by getting the exposure from the legendary name?
Happens in wrestling a bit, happens in boxing, too.
Pro Wrestling hasn’t been a legitimate sport in 100 years. Think about what you’re saying…you should know as well as any that pro wrestling’s legitimacy ended in the early 1900s when oddsmakers stopped posting odds on the bouts because they knew they were worked. What do oddsmakers now have if the UFC is worked? Do you really believe that the folks handicapping fights who hang out in gyms to get information would be totally ignorant if UFC was a work?
Professional Wrestling hasn’t been marketed as sport in almost 20 years, and even when it was, it wasn’t for the prior 80 years. Maybe even longer than that.
UFC isn’t a “pure” sport because they ran a mismatch? That’s fucking ridiculous. So is NASCAR a “pure” sport for having a Champions Provisional? Since the NFL is a closed league that requires approval of 2/3 of the owners to have a new team, are they a pure sport? Was Holmes/Ali sport, or was it pro wrestling? What about Lewis/Tyson? Of course it happens in boxing. Its *always* happened in boxing, going back to Roman times. Why establish it as a “pro wrestling” tactic when it isn’t? Oh, that’s right, it so happens to be everyone’s prime background that makes the claim, and thus its the only thing they can come up with as a comparison.
Was the Tito Ortiz vs. Ken Shamrock III fight booked because of the recent fight results of both men, or was it booked because Ken Shamrock’s feud with Tito was still a big attraction?
The ‘pure’ argument is in reference to hardcore MMA fans who would like to see fights booked based on results and not on simply the merits of ‘entertainment.’ In the case of Tito/Ken III, that was booked for entertainment value first. And it drew big ratings.
UFC is a sport, but it’s also about entertainment and running a business first.
It was booked for the latter reason. And what does this prove, exactly? That professional sports are a business? What kind of revelation is that? All professional sports are a business, and the UFC promotes themselves in no different a manner than the rest of them. They wouldn’t need TUF or the upcoming weekly “news” show if they had daily coverage on Sportscenter and in major media, but since they don’t, its the only way for them to create the human interest in their sport.
Given that TUF is being pushed back several months after this season’s dismal ratings, as well as the fact that Unleashed (which shows nothing but old taped fights with very little hype) pulls a higher rating than any episode of ESPN’s Friday Night Fights (which is LIVE) in the last 7 years as an weekly average, you don’t need to be a mind reader to see the possibility that UFC is going to move beyond the “drama” program they used to create their fanbase and move on to something more alike a boxing model of promotion, because clearly if it was the soap opera aspect that drove the promotion, they’d be doing better with their episodic TV series right now.
As for Shamrock/Tito somehow being “pro wrestling inspired” because it wasn’t necessarily competitive, that doesn’t matter. Lewis/Tyson wasn’t competitive either, and most everyone with a brain knew it. Yet there was over $100 million in PPV revenue and 1.6 million buys. There’s plenty of other such fights as well. Valuev/Barrett wasn’t competitive. Gatti/Mayweather wasn’t competitive. 90% of the people Joe Calzaghe has fought in his career were never slated to stand a chance. Were those matches and the promotion around them meant to follow in the footsteps of pro wrestling bookers from the 1950s? Is Frank Warren attempting to copy the success of Bruno Sammartino and Pedro Morales or something?
Zach what do the Independent Japanese MMA organisation market themselves as?
are they all seen as independant puroresu or Independent MMA?
Also am i right in saying that the big 3 puroresu companies still all market themsleves as ‘real’ fighting sport?
The whole results vs. entertainment arguement just goes to show how out of touch the “pure” hardcore fans are. There is much more to sport than “results.” There’s rivarly, competition, drama, courage, pride and fighting spirit. The Gatti vs Ward trilogy were non-title fight between two going-no-where fighters and yet it was one of the great boxing match ups of the last decade. Why? Because there more to sport than just Ws and Ls.
Does it matter whether the Yankees face each other in the regular season or in the post-season? Does it matter what the standings are when the two teams face off?
Going back to Tito vs Ken, as Stephen A said on his ESPN show, he just wants to see two guys who want to fight each other. Whether it was for money, fame or hatred, there’s no question that Tito and Ken wanted to fight and just because there was a little “hype” surrounding the fight doesn’t make it less a sport and it doesn’t make the UFC into the WWE.
Because things have gotten so bad with Japanese wrestling (as a business), the fans remaining you see prefer to see a comedy-based product or a flashy product (like Hustle). Those fans view wrestling as entertainment.
The “old guard” in wrestling believe that wrestling should still be presented as believable and covered with the rest of the other sports.
[…] The Oregonian: UFC makes move toward domination (Dana White – We are going to war with everyone. This is a great article that flashes back to an October 2006 article that Luke Nicholson wrote on this site.) […]