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Monday news: BodogFight gets worldwide coverage
By Zach Arnold | April 16, 2007
One of the fascinating things in watching the BodogFight PPV was the play-by-play commentating of Bob Sheridan, who is a famous boxing announcer. I remember him calling the Buster Douglas vs. Mike Tyson 1990 upset at the Tokyo Dome. On the BodogFight show, Sheridan amazingly put over everything he could. I don’t know how to describe it, but Sheridan’s PBP was in contrast to Mike Goldberg (for better or for worse). Sheridan was excited for every punch or every submission attempt. High energy all the way.
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Topics: BoDog, Boxing, Media, MMA, UFC, Zach Arnold | 17 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
The Jake Rossen piece was hilarious. MMA needs more humour like that.
…and one of my many issues with the commentating at Bodog was that Sheridan was so obviously new to the sport, and talked to the audience as if they were even newer, telling us what’s so great about MMA etc…. I can’t help wondering how many viewers found that stuff informative. If they’re going to educate their crowd, do it like IFL and have someone demo submissions and other techniques between fights instead of having some man-toad tell us that there’s a lot of action in MMA.
Absolutely hilarious, Jake Rossen.
It doesn’t bode well when a paying consumer can’t find your PPV to pay for it… Dish Network didn’t have it. I called around to all the bars and they didn’t have it… Maybe I should migrate to Alaska and become an Eskimo so that then I can get it over the airwaves….
Bah.
Sheridan puts over everything, but he also does a lot of prep work. He seemed to have done plenty before the PPV here as well. Probably one of the best shills in the business.
We tried to order it on the internet, but I guess they removed the internet streaming due to a ppv deal? I found Fedor-Lindland on the web, but that was it. Definately interested in seeing more Bodog as it makes a nice alternative to the UFC — and plus, Van Damme? LOL
My GOD Jake Rossen is funny!
Thanks for the laughs!
I love Bob Sheridan. He’s a great announcer.
I remember during Roy Jones v Taylor III, Jones was gassed an he says, “If I were in Jones corner I’d tell him to throw a low blow.” The other announcer goes, “You would?” Sheridan doesn’t miss a beat, “Yeah, you gotta tell him if this thing goes to the judges you’re already blown out. Nail him with a low blow and catch your breath while he’s taking his five minutes, then go all out of the knockout.”
Jake Rossen’s piece was way funny I e-mailed him; it was that funnY!
Agreed on the Colonel. He added something most MMA announcers are lacking – long-time experience in calling fights. Not necessarily MMA fights (obviously) but an understanding of the intricacies of a fight that comes with experience. Bodog did a good job with presentation — it wasn’t PRIDE, but it was a step above when we’ve come to expect from UFC. Nevertheless, I’d appreciate it if they’d get rid of Bodog Music plugs. That music is hideous. Almost as bad as “The Shooter, starring Mark Wahlberg!”
On the other hand, the color men (Lazenby/Osbourne) were generally passable, but terrible for the Aleks/Eric Pele fight. It’s one thing to build up a fight beforehand to suggest it’s evenly matched. It’s another entirely to, while the fight is going on, ignore the evidence in front of you and suggest one person is doing far better than they are, or adhering to a strategy that isn’t played out by the facts in the ring. Pele was getting demolished, pure and simple. It wasn’t a rope-a-dope, and Aleks wasn’t gassing horribly. He looked smooth and comfortable, while Pele looked overmatched.
Aleks even dominates the tattoo battle. Grim Reaper holding a baby? Cannot be topped.
I think this show might be a success for Bodog … they’ve gotten a very large amount of press out of this in the markets where they’re legally allowed to run their gambling sites (remember that internet gambling is illegal in the US now). Am I a bodog convert? No … I still think that they’ll end up going down for one reason or another. But their business plan is starting to make a little more sense to me.
Fightlinker, only problem I notice here is that a lot of these articles don’t seem to mention Bodog by name. It’s not great publicity if it doesn’t get their name out there.
Cant wait till it goes down the pan or UFC buys it out.What was the crowd.
Chis — I think the chance of UFC buying out any Bodog property is less than zero. I guess it’s theoretically possible that if Bodog decided to get out of the MMA game they could sell off contracts to UFC, but even that would have some SERIOUS regulatory repercussions for the Fertitta’s. Doing business with Bodog — an “illegal” gambling consortium in the US — would seriously jeopardize the Fertitta’s gaming license in the state of Nevada, which is their bread and butter.
…and the last thing we need is Zach going on for another month about Zuffa’s troubles to come from another shady purchase arrangement. 🙂
Sheridan knew half-guard, he knew side-mount, knew full guard, he knew grappling… I was surprised enough listening to him on the broadcast. When I read up on him afterwards, seeing how freaking embroided in boxing history he is, I was even more surprised – almost shocked. Definitely the way to deal with the boxing critisism in public(if you wiiiiiiiiiiill).
Except he was talking about how great Fedor was at “the Brazilian Jiu Jitsu.”
Then again, he did a pretty good job. Somebody should tell him about sambo and judo, though.
http://www.ufc.com/index.cfm?fa=eventdetail.fightCard&eid=592
UFC 72 in June is now official.