« Tuesday media takedowns | Home | Thursday talking chatter »
Wednesday wacky headlines
By Zach Arnold | February 21, 2007
The hot story of the week in Japan continues to be the ongoing politics surrounding Gong Kakutougi magazine. A board of directors meeting was held and Daisaku Maeda, the man arrested by police (background information here), was kicked out of the publishing enterprise. The public stance of the BOD is “never give-up” and that they will cooperate fully with authorities in regards to a criminal investigation. The BOD asked readers and fans to continue to support the magazine.
No Kazuhiro Nakamura on the PRIDE 33 card. When it rains, it pours for bad luck.
A San Francisco Chronicle blog: Eddie Goldman is the world’s greatest MMA journalist.
Off to today’s headlines.
An update via The Salt Lake Tribune on politician Greg Hughes’ attempt to disband the Utah State Athletic Commission. Despite the Athletic Commission being completely against the bill, Hughes managed to get it passed. This has people in the Utah MMA community worried.
Here’s a info note sent out this morning on MySpace:
WEC II: MARCH 24, 2007
Hard Rock Hotel in Las Vegas, Nevada-Rob McCullough vs. Rich Crunkilton
-Doug Marshall vs. Jorge Oliveira
-John Alessio vs. Carlos Condit
-Brian Stann vs. Steve Cantwell
Alright, here we go with today’s links.
- The Houston Chronicle: Jake O’Brien wants next
- Radio: MMA Smackdown #11 w/ Dan Henderson
- Jordan Breen: Takumi Nakayama in Elite XC this May?
- MMA Torch: Analyzing the PRIDE 33 betting odds
- Infinite MMA: Interview with Kenny Florian
- Fight Report: Interview with Compubox co-founder Bob Canobbio
- China Combat: Sanda/Sanshou
- Columbia News Service: MMA works on its image
- The Associated Press: HBO says De La Hoya-Mayweather to top 1 million PPV buys (plus more comments on UFC)
- Slate: The lovely spectacle of ultimate fighting
- The Muscatine Journal: Father and son will compete in local MMA event
- Business Wire (PR): IFL names Joel Ehrlich CMO and President of Sales
- UFC Mania: Sports bars and restaurants airing the UFC 68 PPV event
- The Fight Network: David Loiseau migrating West to train with Greg Jackson
- NBC Sports: Captain comeback
- The News & Star (UK): Alan Murdoch out of Total Combat due a knee injury
- UFC Junkie: Watch Tim Sylvia (literally) crap his pants
Topics: All Topics, Media, MMA, PRIDE, Zach Arnold | 22 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
You link my article with a blurb on TAKUMI?
I thought we were buds, Zach.
No Nakamura but Kharitonov is now on the card facing Michael Russow.
Listen, bookerman, it was news about Elite XC. It’s a better hook than the Gong news, so there.
Japan vs. Spetsnaz > TAKUMI. If some big nosed bearded Ruskie border patrol officer soccer kicked Koji Oishi in the face and kills him, I’m gonna tweak.
I mixed my tenses in that last post, but I’m too street to care.
Woah. Back off the MMA Viagra there bud.
Way too hardcore for me….
If their last name isn’t as common as Smith… then they aren’t MMA fighters IMHO 😉
ROFL Darth! Indeed, MMA names must be as common as Smith or Jones. Names Like Filipovic and Emelianenko, for instance! ROFL! Good one!
That SF Chronicle thing is just a personal blog post from their community pages, not a newspaper article.
This raises the question: Who is the best MMA journalist? While Eddie Goldman gets points for being around for a long long time, he loses more because he hasn’t done much more than his radio show and interviews, hardly cutting edge reporting. MMAWeekly does a stellar job, but it’s spread out across a team of journalists so it’s hard to pick just one. It’s also too bad they don’t put more emphasis on their rumours section, which pretty much all of the mma blogs use as content fodder. Or wait, maybe that’s good. The guy at Sherdog are too safe … they’ve allowed themselves to be preoccupied with blog-style opinion peices rather than good journalism. Dave Meltzer is a master at getting the facts behind a story, but at this point doesn’t dedicate enough time to MMA in order to take the crown.
My pick would have to go to Loretta Hunt. She basically runs the Fightnetwork MMA news section and has been around for a while (there’s even some interesting stories about her getting punched in the face by Phil Baroni or something). She’s got the news scoops covered, has a sharp wit and good writing skills, and if she’s biased towards one org or another I haven’t been able to notice.
no Nakamura = PRIDE will die tomorrow
I’m glad Nakamura isn’t on the Pride card. He’s always been boring to watch, and replacing him with Kharitonov makes his deletion even better.
More on the feud of the year (Rogan/Mencia that is) from a writer of Mencias tv-show:
http://notesfromahack.blogspot.com/2007/02/my-friend-ned.html
“…Joe Rogan can’t get a show on the air that doesn’t involve Thai fighting or eating elephant’s dick…”
AJAX: You can’t possibly have been watching his last few fights then. Nakamura has turned up the volume, and was one of the most popular fighters at PRIDE.32. For him to be out here is definitely a big blow to PRIDE, as he is, along with Gomi, their Japanese poster boy in the US.
I would say that right now things look the worst they ever have for the company. The key is not only PRIDE’s own failure at garnering more interest, but also the success and financial backing EliteXC has had.
Slate sucks. It wasn’t that long ago when they defended MMA…actually it was long ago, back when they had intelligent writers: http://www.slate.com/id/46344. Sad to see it devolve into Best Week Ever for wonks.
Whenever I go to Slate, dust spews forth from my monitor.
“Too much. Boxing has its own problems, but MMA in America is mainly aiming at a much whiter, more affluent fan base than boxing. MMA tried to copy WWE, except they have real fights. The emphases on sportsmanship, technique, and submissions have been auctioned off for high ratings among white, young, male, disgruntled fake wrestling fans. ”
I always felt Eddie had some deep personal problems. I am sure he does now. H ereveals too much of his twisted self in his comments. He was good for the sport back in the mid ninties, but we would all be better if he just dissapeared now.
Sherdog has articles?? I thought it was just a forum…
There are few things more irritating than mainstream reporters who try to make a big, breathless deal out of the fact that crowds make noise when there’s a TKO or a KO or a submission. It is as silly as a reporter making an issue out of a crowd getting excited about a touchdown in football.
I wish all these idiotic “journalists” would quit trying to equate Fight Club to Mixed Martial Arts fighting. Clearly they’ve never actually taken the time to watch the movie or read the book and just like to parallel the fact that men are fighting each other in Fight Club and men fighting each other in mma – the fact that men are in fights is about the ONLY thing these two have in common.
One is a sport and one is a nihilistic commentary on men’s “waking up and rejection” of roles, identity and belonging (or lack thereof) in the modern consumer/image driven society.
But hey if it helps to skew that to make your point…why not?
I have to digress here…I stopped reading the “Fight Club”article after I saw Fight Club and mma in the same sentence, figuring it was just like the rest of them.
Then I thought later – “I guarantee since I didn’t read it that its just my luck, this article would be just my luck that this article wasn’t like the 1000 other ones that tried to equate the two with each other.”
Apologies to the author, however my stance still stays with respect to the plethora of other articles I was speaking about.
“Adoreable Productions has responded to all allegations and will have a hearing before the state. Until then, the shows can go on! To make or break their case, Coppler says representatives from the state are interviewing fighters this week and sitting ringside Friday. He hopes they like what they hear and what they see, or this could be one of the last Toughman matches in Michigan.
Just months ago, a participant at a competition at the Soaring Eagle died as a result of a fight, prompting the state’s attempt to ban such events. ”
http://www.wnem.com/Global/story.asp?S=6122734
Yes. WNEM 5 have turned into crazy bumpheads.
I’d write a note or two, but right now, I’d hinder the cause more then benefit.
I don’t like to slag on anyone, but I have found Goldman’s writing to be amazingly biased and unprofessional.
I honeslty can’t see an intellegent for calling him the best.