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Analyzing the fallout from UFC 84
By Zach Arnold | May 26, 2008
Josh Barnett is booked for two upcoming Inoki Genome shows in Japan — 6/23 Tsukisamu Green Dome (Sapporo) and 8/15 in Tokyo at Ryogoku Kokugikan.
I added the RSS feed for The Long Beach Press-Telegram on the site. For some reason, the RSS feed doesn’t work on the clickthroughs. Not sure why it’s broken.
Onto today’s headlines.
- The Long Beach Press-Telegram: Tito Ortiz’ future with the UFC not yet determined
- Sherdog: Urijah Faber readies himself for Lil’ Evil
- Jake Rossen: Is Kimbo Slice ready for prime time?
- The Dayton Daily News: How do you solve a problem like Ryoto Machida?
- Bloody Elbow: What if James Thompson ruins the party for Kimbo Slice?
- MMA Analyst: Gary Shaw vs. Dana White – who’s right and who’s wrong?
- Fightlinker: Silly Tito, your press conference is behind the dumpster
- Total MMA: Figuring out the UFC’s Light Heavyweight dilemma
- MMA Predictions: UFC 84 in review
- MMA Opinion: UFC 84 – the days after
- Jeff Haney: Saturday’s UFC wins spark talk of shifts
- The Las Vegas Review-Journal: UFC fuels passion as gladiators did (the author calls UFC ‘Universal Fighting Championship’ and uses the Zuffa myth)
Topics: Japan, Media, MMA, Pro Elite, UFC, WEC, Zach Arnold | 16 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
These are Inoki’s Pro Wrestling shows right?
Is Josh even really all that interested in MMA anymore? If you have him on the show again, I’d like you to talk to him about the Pro Wrestling vs MMA money thing.
It seems obvious that the market isn’t bearing whatever it is that he’s asking for for MMA fights these days…is he really getting paid more to perform at wrestling shows, or does he have some sort of nagging injury concern that’s keeping his fighting schedule reduced?
What’s up with that?
Gary Shaw is criticizing Dana for not loving the sport and caring only about money? Did he forget that he’s making Kimbo Slice vs James Thompson the Main Eevent next Saturday? Is he doing that out of love, and trying to defend the purity of the sport? Or is he trying to make a quick buck using Kimbo’s street-fighting fame? I wonder…
Say what you want about Dana’s greed, but he was in there trying to make it happen back when MMA was a fringe sport that wasn’t making a profit. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that Gary Shaw only started to “love” the sport of MMA after the UFC began making millions in PPV buys.
To be fair JntJ,
He did just fight against Monson at Sengoku and he’s going to be facing Rizzo in July at the Affliction card.
He’s probably just fitting this into his schedule b/c he loves puro, gets paid well and it’s not going to have much effect on his preparation for any mma fight.
I can see why people might think Machida is boring, but why is no one holding Tito to the same standard? Tito had just as much, if not more, culpability in making what Dann Stupp — Mr. MMA Junkie — presumes was a boring fight for the “average MMA fan”.
As far as I could tell, Tito threw about…maybe 5 punches and attempted maybe 2 or 3 takedowns. Just because he was moving forward doesn’t mean he was actually doing anything.
Why are wrestlers allowed to do nothing but wait for their opponents to make a mistake, and then cry foul when their opponent doesn’t make one?
I saw someone making a good point elsewhere that people bitch about Tim Sylvia’s fighting style (i.e. fighting to win but playing it safe and not making mistakes) and call him out on it, but then give a free pass to Machida and praise him for his “cerebral” fighting style.
Tito Ortiz fights are typically snoozefest.
Sylvias boring fights (not all of them are such) wears on my patience because I know he could end the fight with one punch if just used some imagination and set up his strikes. But he instead chooses to wait for the moment even if it never comes. Machida doesn’t have the power to end fights as easily as his contemporaries so he has to set traps and pick his moments, that style doesn’t wear on my patience in fact I find it entertaining.
Let’s see:
Tim Sylvai: jab, jab, jab.
Machida: Kick, flying left-right combo, judio throws, flying knees, ground and pound, and triangle choke submissions.
Whoever’s comparing Machida to Sylvia is full of shit, or just Fightlinker drunk with crappy Canadian beer.
bingo! GKH u said it, Tito was boring too, but noooooobody wants to say it. he realized his gameplan had failed and he didn’t have anything to back him up.
Here’s some pretty screwy news. CroCop vs. Ralek Gracie at DREAM.4….IN A GRAPPLING MATCH!!!
http://www.nokaut.com/?id=12&solo_news=1621&
Mirko confirms on his blog too:
http://www.mma-id.com/CROCOP/?mod=blog&uid=35&blid=582
Crocop vs. Ralek Gracie at DREAM.4 in a GRAPPLING match (modified Abu Dhabi rules) is confirmed by CroCop and Nokaut.
…what?
Does anyone really want to see Mirko in a grappling rules match?
Why is this happening?
Cyph,
If you’re going to include things Machida’s done/attempted once or twice in his past fights then you can’t disregard Sylvia either.
Dirty boxing, hooks, uppercuts, high kicks, knees, overhand rights, triangles could just as easily be argued as part of Sylvia’s repetoire.
Yes, they’ve both pulled out other moves in their attacks but they both stick to what works for the most part.
Machida is a boring fighter. Sure he has the skills and gameplan execution to win fights but it really is boring to watch (aside from the couple of switch kicks which looked cool but did very little damage).
Can’t really fault him on that because he’s in there to win. the big difference between Machida and Tito is that Tito has the ability (to steal a pro wrestling phrase) to talk people into the building. He’s a draw.
Gaijin,
Forget the semantics. Are you going to argue that Sylvia is as multi-dimensional and complete fighter as Machida?
And I’m surprised people are blaming the boring fight, which I admit it was, on Machida rather than Ortiz. The fact of the matter is that Machida attempted more attacks and landed more overall attacks than Ortiz did. Who is the boring fighter? Both of them, but Machida was slightly more exciting based on attacks percentage and effectiveness.
I can accept people declaring the fight boring, but the one sided bashing of Machida only is totally unwarranted.
Acutally the Dayton Daily News story is just: “How do you solve a problem like Machida”.
Adding the word Ryoto kinda throws off the totally awesome Sound of Music reference.