« May 2nd bonus round of links | Home | The Ultimate Fighter Season 5, Episode 5 »
Thursday trash talk: Angry media writers
By Zach Arnold | May 3, 2007
Mike Freeman, the CBS Sportsline writer who did that ridiculous column on UFC as compared to boxing yesterday, was the subject of news himself in 2004 when he was fired by the Indianapolis Star for falsifying his resume. Freeman, after being told to resign three days before he was going to start as a sports columnist, apologized, said he knowingly stated in an interview that he graduated from the University of Delaware. In fact, he attended the school, but didn’t get a degree. Freeman had worked from 1994-2004 with the New York Times covering the NBA and NFL before moving to Indianapolis.
The boxing media can’t stop talking about UFC as the big, bad wolf. Wally Matthews (of New York Newsday and Versus boxing telecasts) joins the chorus:
Everyone in the world, it seems, will stop to watch two guys fighting in the street, but lately, not too many people have paused to watch two guys fighting in a ring.
Unless Oscar de la Hoya is one of them.
Now, it [boxing] falls victim to another menace, the fad of mixed martial arts, which is a video-game version of professional boxing, complete with cartoonish, but ultimately less damaging, violence. Boxing left the door open for that one by its own hubris and self-neglect.
Onto today’s headlines.
- Radio: MMA Smackdown #21
- ProElite.com (must be a member to view this): In-depth interview with Tito Ortiz (he talks about fighter salaries, insurance, and a fighter’s union)
- The Baltimore Sun: CBS Sportsline columnist rips MMA
- Yahoo Sports (Kevin Iole): Not-so sweet (article on Shane Mosley)
- Savannah Now: Preparing for the Ultimate – MMA coming to Savannah armory on Friday
- The Valdosta Daily Times: Chism, Naville world champs in Iowa
- Eastside Boxing (Mark Pickering): The UFC 70 media fallout
- The Daily Titan (California): CSUF’s Petite Pugilist Jessica Marie Pene Packs a Punch
- CBS Sportsline (Gregg Doyel): Boxing’s big hurrah? More like last gasp before MMA seizes day
- Five Ounces of Pain (Sam Caplan): An open letter to Mike Freeman of CBS Sportsline
- Komikazee: Mike Freeman rebuttal: Mad Lib for Sportswriters
- Fox Sports: How much MMA is too much?
- Deadspin: What to do instead of seeing Spider Man 3 – Boxing’s last gasp
- The Fightworks Podcast: Beginner’s Guide to Brazilian Fighter Nicknames
- The Signal Item: Ultimate Fighting – Bill Vucick enjoys playing the game
- Eastside Boxing: De La Hoya-Mayweather: A Timely Fight for a Timeless Sport
- ITV Boxing (UK): De La Hoya’s mission to save boxing
- The Richmond Review (Canada): GSP holding ultimate clinic
- Yahoo Sports (Kevin Iole): Lasting legacy for De La Hoya?
- MSNBC: MMA organizers pushing for record crowd at LA Coliseum
- Royal Burnell: Sports Media! Stop putting your mouth on the water fountain of boxing!
- Mad Squabbles: Confederacy of Dunces
Topics: Boxing, Media, MMA, Pro Elite, UFC, UK, Zach Arnold | 24 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
I think it’s great. The biggest boxing event in years and the UFC/MMA is a key underlining story, it’s probably second to the actual fight.
White was smart to align the UFC with Boxing in the media.
This Fights has been hyped and I think it’s just Boxing given it’s best and last shot.
Boxing isnt going to die after this fight. Why do people think this. No other fight will sell as many ppv’s but the sport aint going to die. UFC is over in the US not MMA and its hit a hot streak for 2 years. Yet this somehow means MMA is huge and boxing will die. I dont think so!!
I agree with others that this is turning into one of those positive bad publicity things for the UFC. While disgruntled boxing-writers moan in public, Zuffa are getting MMA sanctioned in another state and are premiering in another country – keeping their eye on the ball. Not that MMA in the US is immune to smear-campaigns, but they’re definitely past the point where stuff like *this* would be potentially damaging, IMO.
Just saw the Tito Ortiz interview. What does everyone think of the idea of a fighters’ union?
Although there have been OKish attempts in the past (primarily the Joint Association of Boxers with David Tua, Diego Corrales & Joel Casamayor), the fight industry is closer to the Oil industry where the cartels are unable to continually maintain their price setting as there is a gain to go against it (fundamental Game Theory). The reason is because, unlike the Teamsters where it was drives and some other types of employees who were going to get paid within a narrow range, the Boxing & MMA worlds have such varying levels of skill, drawing power, etc. that no promoter will higher a Reggie Strickland at, say, a $5000 minimum. And, really, there could be issues for the fighters as Strickland may want to fight twice in a week in non-sanctioned states whereas the union may not want him to.
So what is the best way to ensure fairness for fighters?
Mandatory ‘Introduction to Contract Law’ class would be a good start, IMO. A lot of the problems these fighters have tend to stem from shady as hell contracts by promoters, managers, etc. If they knew their rights legally, it’d probably help a good deal with regards to a number of the issues that always comes up (embezzled funds, hidden expenses, etc.) with fighter stories. Also, learning about saving for retirement would probably be useful as well (so they don’t have to come back in their late 30s or 40s and take horrible beatings).
I think a fighter’s union is inevitable, especially if the UFC continues to snap up other lower tier organizations. Don’t expect it for another 5 years at least though, and when it starts I bet it’ll be run by people in Dana’s pocket and will mainly standardize payment across Zuffa-owned organizations and solidify the standard tenants that the UFC already demands like exclusivity, sponsorship restrictions, and re-sign options. The UFC already provides some of things that unions do – full medical coverage for injuries sustained in their events for one. Anyways, just shooting this shit off the top of my head, I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about a fighter’s union in a Zuffa-controlled mma industry and done research into the forming of player’s unions for other sports. I may be guest blogging Luke’s blog next week so if that’s the case I’ll write something more indepth on it.
I doubt it will happen, mainly because if the UFC is linked with the union that would, legally speaking, be negotiating on behalf of the fighters and ensuring their benefits, there could be serious issues regarding its role as a ‘juristic person’ which could potentially cause problems in court.
Furthermore, an inherent problem with unions is that people with the largest earning potential would forgo earnings to subsidize those with lesser earning potential. I doubt a Tito Ortiz would be willing to take a pay cut for the benefit of inferior fighters.
I believe the solution to protecting fighters is high standards for promoter licensing, and good fighter representation.
Don King is a convicted murderer (OK, only manslaughter). That, coupled with his ties to organized crime, should be enough to invalidate him as a promoter (revoke his license). However, he keeps promoting, and collecting short-term gain and the expense of the long-term viability of the sport.
Look at the number of boxers who have been taken advantage of by unscrupulous promoters. How could this happen? Lousy representation, that’s how. Buster Douglas was represented by King’s brother-in-law. Oh! That’s a great idea!
Learn from boxing’s mistakes. Boxing was driven into the ground by the promoters. To prevent this from happening in MMA, watch them like hawks. Hold them up to VERY high standards. Keep MMA regulated. If anything, regulate it more.
Of course, I could just be full of it too.
A Union is a far from becoming a reality right now for MMA. In fact, the MMA industry is still in an emerging industry (like any other industry or business), where it’s starting to merge or acquire new components. These components can include additional product lines at the company level or the competition themselves at the industry level (ie. The acquisition of PrideFC).
Whether you like it or not, there will always be a market leader in any industry, especially while it grows. If not Zuffa, then some other entity will be more than happy to take its place and people will still criticize them for being an evil capitalist pig. We can all bash Dana White and Zuffa to our heart’s content, but like it or not, they’ve taken the right steps to increase mainstream acceptance into the sport. Plus, their making a lot of money and giving the Mainstream viewer what it wants – entertaining shows and PPV’s.
http://elitexc.com/?page=events
– More on Shamrock vs. Baroni (Judgment Day name appears to be gone, surprise surprise). That card is looking all kinds of solid.
It should also be remembered that Mr. King also got a pardon from a Ohio governor (forgot his name offhand) when it looked possible that he was going to get tried and convicted of tax fraud, so technically his manslaughter conviction can’t be used against him to refuse a promoter’s license.
I thought it was Carl King (his stepson) that was the representative. And I agree 100% (as I discussed above with ‘Intro to Contracts’ class/lesson so fighters understood the basics of what they signed and that they couldn’t have hidden manipulations such as Don King adding 1 or 2 0s to Tim Witherspoon’s expense sheet for his training camp usage).
A few other things to consider regarding allowing the promoter to also act as a manager (which actually is illegal in a number of states and hence why Don King had his stepson, Carl King, act as a proxy manager for his stable):
1) A promoter could command 2 fees (33 1/3% manager maximum fee & the promoter’s fee), so in effect they could get the majority of a fighter’s purse through that dual function (which is detailed in “The Life and Crimes of Don King: The Shame of Boxing in America” by Jack Newfield).
2) The promoter, wanting to maximize his own profit margins as a fight promoter, will be willing to throw his fighter to the sharks if he himself can get a nice payday out of it. Traditionally, managers are supposed to protect the fighters and expand their marketable time frame. Hence, the promoter’s motives could lead him to act counter to the traditional expectations of a manager’s job.
3) The potential for fighter options being forced onto fighters in order to get the big fight opportunities (for example, ‘Buster’ Douglas had to sign a 3-4 fight option for King to get his title shot against Mike Tyson and King and Donald Trump had a famous conversation where Trump basically said King ‘couldn’t lose’ since he was the promoter for both of them; this is essentially a predatory practice and is illegal under the Muhammad Ali Boxing Reform Act).
Thanks everyone for the great discussion, I’m learning from everyone.
Fightlinker, I like forward to reading your upcoming piece on the topic.
On principle, I believe workers in any industry have the right to unionize. All this means is they will have the option to bargain collectively, rather than as isolated individuals, and therefore have more clout to get better deals. The exact form the union takes will depend on the nature of the industry, and the demands of the union members. The first step would be to start asking fighters what job-related problems they experience and how they think these can be addressed. Unfortunately, we don’t have access to fighters’ authentic voices because they are usually under contract with a particular promoter, and a job description that makes them full-time marketers of the promotion as much as they are fighters. So I wonder how we can access fighters’ candid descriptions of their experience as workers.
The closest you’d probably get are retired fighters who aren’t working as a Play-by-Play commentator (or similar role) for any organization, which would make your list pretty small. But yeah, most of the higher profile (active) fighters will likely keep mum about their issues in the past, present and future with any organizations to prevent being virtually blackballed.
Someone credible needs to conduct anonymous interviews.
there could be serious issues regarding its role as a ‘juristic person’ which could potentially cause problems in court.
There’s been lots and lots of scenarios where the organization and union leaders have very close ties. Perhaps ‘in the pocket’ is a strong term, but it’s my belief that if there’s going to be a fighter’s union any time soon then it’s going to happen because Zuffa LETS it happen, and is active in the shaping and direction of the initial organization.
[…] More asinine articles are crawling out of the woodwork. This one from longtime Boxing writer Wally Matthews and another from CBS Sportsline writer Mike Freeman. (by way of Fight Opinion). […]
Gregg Doyel is also a whole lot of nothing.
He smells of ‘dog.
If so, it would likely get crapped on as being the equivalent of the aforementioned Carl King-Don King manager-promoter relationship. There would also be the issue of whether the Athletic Commissions would recognize the Union as a de-facto manager to the fighters (since they’d be theoretically negotiating for them), which could effectively block the potential UFC influence (due to the regulations banning promoters from being managers in a good number of states).
http://www.ufc.com/index.cfm?fa=eventDetail.FightCard&eid=547
– Alexander vs. Jardine, Starnes vs. Leben and Marrero(moving down to LHW) vs. Gouveia added to the now apparently complete 71-card.
http://www.ufc.com/index.cfm?fa=eventDetail.FightCard&eid=592
– Murphy vs. O’Brien official for 72.
There will never be an MMA union.