Grab your morning coffee, or late afternoon flask; it’s time for another edition of Monday’s MMA Musings. It’s three rounds of my opinion that is probably completely wrong and totally off the mark; you can’t win them all. Just breathe in the essence of the thoughts and inhale…now pass it around.
Round One: Rousey vs. Zingano and TUF 18
Cat Zingano beat the living hell out of Miesha Tate in the third round of their battle at the TUF 17 Finale last Saturday night. Some people think the fight was stopped too soon, others think there was an illegal knee, and to those people I say: continue making your mountain out of a mole hill. Referee Kim Winslow, who usually is a disaster, actually did a good job in stopping the fight when she did. I’m sorry, but as much as Miesha wants to say she was going in for a double leg, she was also about to get tuned like a piano while doing so. I’m sure she felt like she could keep going because “Cupcake” is a tough chick. I’m actually glad that we don’t get to see Tate vs. Rousey 2. Honestly who really wants to see that fight? Don’t get me wrong; I could watch many episodes of Ronda and Miesha on my television. Instead, I like the idea of an undefeated fighter in Cat (7-0) taking on the undefeated Champion in Rousey (6-0). There is more intrigue to this fight…mystery if you will. What can a powerful striker in Zingano do against Ronda? Probably not much and it will most likely end the same way all of Rousey’s fights conclude; at least it’s against a new challenge instead of Miesha Tate where the ending would be even more predictable.
TUF 18 will have a house full of men and women. Please don’t turn into Big Brother but with violence. I actually didn’t mind the way FOX produced TUF 17; it was more about the fights and the fighters instead of the juvenile in house hijinx. So if they are going to add women to the mix, please for the love of God can we keep the same stylized format that we had with TUF 17 and not go back down to the lowest common denominator. I like what Ronda said, “If you think it’s $100,000 worth of that lay (in potential lost sponsorships), then go for it, but I’m just going to remind them that there’s a lot of very permanent consequences to how they carry themselves in the house.” I have to agree, please let’s not have hookups, and make it TUF 18 on the Jersey Shore.
Round Two: Michigan has blood on their hands
You knew it was going to be just a matter of time before we heard something about another fighter dieing due to incompetence. Felix Elochukwu Nchikwo who was living in Hamilton, Ontario went down to Michigan to fight in an amateur bout and didn’t come back home. Felix, who was 35, collapsed and died on April 6 after losing a fight by technical knockout in the third round. To be fair the cause of death has not totally been determined, but it’s crazy to hear how unprepared and stupid the promoter of the event in Port Huron, Michigan was. I am not going to put all the blame on the promoter because ultimately a good deal of the blame should also be pointed at the state government. When you read quotes like this from Michigan State Rep. Harvey Santana, you just shake your head. “There was never any pre-fight determination by a doctor to say whether or not the man was capable of fighting,” Santana said. “You don’t know if two weeks ago he got knocked out in some other state, came over here to fight. You don’t know if something else was going on with that individual prior to them entering the cage.”
Now the state of Michigan has decided that hmm…maybe now is a good time to pass a bill that will protect amateur fighters. It’s a damn shame it took someone’s death for government to come to their senses. The best part of watching fights in my neck of the woods here in Vancouver is that we have some solid amateur shows that are regulated and treated like professional events. There are other models to look at and emulate, it’s just really too bad it took the death of Felix for there to be any change. However, on cue, the religious zealots, the bashers and haters have started to speak out, saying that the sport of MMA is too violent and see…somebody died! What they fail to realize is that deaths happen in all kinds of sports. We all know the stats, and by now most of us are good at rebuking the non-believers. Yet let me pull out some truths for those of you not caught up. According to Kirik Jenness on the Underground here are some stats to feed the people who think MMA is the most dangerous sport on the planet.
- Seven athletes have died from injuries sustained while competing in the Olympics – one runner, one cyclist, a boxer, one speed skater, one downhill skier, and two lugers.
- Boxing has recorded nearly 1,500 deaths since it’s inception in the 1700s.
- Auto racing has killed countess drivers, and spectators are not immune. A single accident in 1955 killed approximately 60 spectators, and the driver.
- 28 people are believed to have died running, in marathons alone, in the USA, just from 2000-2009.
- In 2005, four runners died, in a single event, the Great North Run half marathon in the UK.
- Cheerleading killed 42 between the fall of 1982 and the spring of 2007.
- MMA 1993 to present time – 8 fighters, and not all due to in cage trauma, some had medical conditions prior to their fight that unregulated events didn’t screen or test for.
Round Three: The Uriah and Urijah
Uriah Hall came out of the TUF Finale like a monster. UFC President Dana White said that Uriah was the meanest, nastiest, scariest guy in “Ultimate Fighter” history, yet that dude didn’t show up last Saturday. Instead Hall seemed hesitant or maybe he wilted under pressure. Regardless, there were flashes of Hall in the fight, but not enough to get the win. It just goes to show you that sometimes too much hype can be a bad thing. Yet there is no reason to dismay, the experience will probably teach Uriah something valuable, and with the right seasoning and training, that kid will be back to knock someone out viciously again. I think the Uriah Hall hype train has just hit a bump and will be back to full steam the next time he fights. I agree with the assessment that Uriah just needs to find that inner nastiness and not be so damn nice all the time.
Urijah Faber keeps on keeping on. He scored another victory by rear naked choke in the fourth round of his main event bout with Scott Jorgensen at “The Ultimate Fighter” finale in Las Vegas. Faber is sitting in the bantamweight division as one hell of a gatekeeper. “The California Kid” is better than anyone not named Dominick, Renan or Jose. He has been given countless title shots only to fall short and hasn’t actually had a belt since 2008. The problem is, Uriah keeps beating everyone else up. If a guy wants a shot at Renan Barao or Dominick Cruz for the bantamweight title, they have to go through Faber. Eventually the UFC might have to give Uriah another shot, but for now he can be judge, jury and executioner at the pearly gates. I would like to see what happens when you throw Faber into the cage with British standout Brad “One Punch” Pickett maybe at UFC on FOX 1 in Boston on August 17?
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You can listen to Trevor on MMASucka Radio heard weekly on MMASucka.com and Sportsnet.ca. Follow him on Twitter @tdueckMMA
