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Media reaction to Brock Lesnar winning UFC Heavyweight Title
By Zach Arnold | November 17, 2008
I just wanted to thank everyone for coming to the site this weekend, as site activity this past week matched levels seen… last July, when there was a flurry of activity between UFC & Affliction. I notice that nobody complains about our server any more! If you have a few bucks and would like to donate to help pay for our server costs, please click here and donate. Thank you.
Arash Markazi (SI): UFC’s Dana White can rest easy — Lesnar more than lived up to the hype
If this was pro wrestling, this would have been the equivalent of Hulk Hogan dropping the title to the Ultimate Warrior at WrestleMania VI before Hogan went off to enjoy a semi-retirement and film some straight-to-video movie. White, of course, is hoping that Lesnar fairs better with the passed torch than the Warrior did.
Franklin McNeil (ESPN): Despite impressive win, Lesnar still a work in progress
The Sweet Science: Brock Lesnar, MMA’s real-life punisher, KOs Randy Couture
The matchup was billed as the biggest in MMA history and is expected to become the sport’s highest-grossing event by making a projected 1.2 million pay-per-view sales. The event failed to break the gate record, but UFC President Dana White says the sagging economy is to blame.
“It was a very successful event tonight, just shy of a sell-out, but it’s $4.8 million at the gate,” he revealed. “Obviously in this economy that’s considered a home run for us.”
George Willis (NY Post): UFC makes Vegas sparkle
It’s a dreary picture in Las Vegas these days. The economy is taking its toll with fewer and fewer visitors leaving fewer and fewer dollars. Gaming stocks are plunging, layoffs have been massive. A cabbie told me, “Vegas has turned into a ghost town.” Not since post 9/11 has it been this bad.
Yet, Vegas looked like its old-self Saturday night. The MGM Grand was packed with customers, and a big-fight feel engulfed the Strip. Walk from the MGM to Caesar’s and all your saw were UFC T-shirts and hats. A big event was in town, all of it courtesy of the UFC. A crowd of 14,272 packed the MGM Grand Garden Arena, generating a gate of $4.8 million, and leaving millions more at the gaming tables, restaurants and clubs. Love it or hate, the UFC is a money-making machine even during the worst economic crisis in recent history. The phenomenon continues.
And for your viewing pleasure…
Dana White’s latest YouTube vlog has gotten nearly 60,000 views in less than 36 hours.
Topics: Media, MMA, UFC, Zach Arnold | 8 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
I never bought into the line that Lesnar would ruin the credibility of MMA. That was just a few Vale Tudo extremists who were crying about that. I saw some clips from ESPN and they were giving it a positive spin.
I wait anxiously for each new video blog.
Everything seems to be very positive. I think people recognize the athletic skills of Brock Lesnar. And credible journalists understand that to bash Lesnar is to really bash college wrestling, which I’m not sure they are willing to do, especially when some of them go on to become Olympians.
Dana White always says that there is something about fighting, that no matter what culture or language you speak, people just “get it”. I think this is the case here. Even casual fans understand that Lesnar doesn’t have the most amount of experience. They also see a guy who is huge, aggressive, quick, and has a grappling background, and the general public understands these qualities can translate into a great fighter. No matter how many fights he has.
Last week several bloggers proclaimed that with Couture’s speed and technique, he would easily dispose of that silly WWE circus sideshow Lesnar who has only size on his side, and little else.
Now, those same people are saying that it was an unfair fight since, in their minds, Couture is a Light-Heavyweight and Lesnar is a Super-Heavyweight.
Uh-huh.
Here is something I just read on Sherdog from genius Jake Rossen ([email protected])
“It’s not that Lesnar should be maligned: Fans should probably be lucky that someone of his athletic ability is choosing to exploit it in this sport. It’s that Couture was essentially a light heavyweight fighting a super heavyweight; Lesnar’s TKO came via genetics, not ability. (His stand-up was rocky, and Couture was able to escape from smothering positions — the problem, as Couture more or less stated, is that even a bowling ball hitting you in passing is enough to put you down.)”
Click here to read the entire article.
http://sherdog.com/news/articles/size-matters-a-ufc-91-postscript-15191
A follow-up:
How Jake Rossen explained on November 10 how size would not be an issue, and that it was ‘incredibly likely’ Couture would win:
“And while Lesnar is undoubtedly a behemoth, Couture is hardly a flyweight; see him in person and you’ll think a brick wall grew legs.
Unless Lesnar simply blasts right through him, it’s incredibly likely a momentary lapse in combat judgment — a side effect of inexperience — will allow Couture to capitalize. I sense a rear-naked choke in Lesnar’s immediate future, the kind of submission that bypasses his Redwood trunk of a torso in favor of his airway — the perfect method for inducing a panic attack in any rookie fighter. If not, expect Couture to use Lesnar’s head for target practice in the clinch until a broken nose prompts a doctor intervention.”
There is virtually no such thing as “MMA Journalism”. By and large you have fanboys who dump out of the second opinions onto the internet. It is a waste of time to take seriously their writings or to cross-reference their articles.
Gary Shaw is 110% right about haters in MMA. Fanboys/pretend journalists like to whine. If Lesnar had lost the story would have been that he’s a joke. Now that he won the story is just that he’s too big. Where are the people complaining that Randy, Chuck, Tito, Rampage and Forrest’s reigns as 205-lb champ are aesterisk worthy because they all cut 15 pounds to make 205 and entered the cage between 215 and 220lbs on fight night. Brock made 265 and hit the cage between 280 and 285. That’s proportionally less of a jump in weight than what the past 4 guys to hold the 205-lb title did.
But you’ll never see these idiots write something like that. One because they are probably too stupid to realize it and two why let a fact or critical reasoning skills get in the way of a bitch-fest article.
Blame it on Randy Couture; he planted the seeds for his legion of fanboys, Rossen included. He stated “I got caught” (lucky punch) and “he was a big sumbitch” (he’s just too big).
Why do they have to make the endless comparisons to the WWE universe just because Lesnar was a pro wrestler in the past?
Seriously – the best analogy they could come up with was Hulk Hogan vs. the Ultimate Warrior? Even Tomas Rios is embarrassed for your stupid analogy 🙂
i’ve been expecting more references to dan severn.