Tired of the Media trying to force feed MMA.

I've heard anywhere from 70,000 to 100,000 for the 1st one, I never heard a number for the 2nd, although I'd guess it didn't do as well.


TFK

 

ohh no doubt it will do 400-500k...but it won't have all the media attention as 100 did....

 

UFC 100 got a lot of hype....but Brock Lesnar is getting even more HYPE....

right now on Yahoo..there is an article....IS BROCK BEATABLE??...:::: Dana White can put on whatever show about being angry w/ lesnar behavior after the fight...but he loved that shit...

 

I know there are other organizations but none of them are as popular and profitable as the UFC....

 

I could get extra gangster right now but you already know!:mj: "Who's Bad!!!"

 

Once MMA's wages rise to the level of boxing it will lose it's luster. Top guys will avoid each other to prolong big paydays and dodgy decisions and fixes will make their way into the sport.

It's the sexy new girl on the block but once she's spread for enough people she'll be just another skank.

 

I'll openly admit to being biased here, because I simply have no time for MMA. The vast majority of times that I have tried to watch it I have been treated to the sight of two grown men rolling around a cage like actors in a gay porn movie. That is not to say that I don't appreiate that MMA fighters have a certain skillset, because I'm sure that most do. I just find the whole thing fucking boring.

As I have said before and it is worth repeating- boxing in the UK is very much on the up and up. At the last Olympics, Britain sent seven fighters (eight if you include Frankie Gavin, who ended up not making weight and didn't fight). In 2004 we sent one (Amir Khan). Ammy boxing, the true gauge of boxing popularity, continues to thrive- there are FOUR good quality and busy ammy gyms within three miles of my house. Moreover, thanks in no small part to Hatton (and a slightly lesser extent to Joe Calzaghe), boxers and boxing has a very high profile here. Amir Khan, despite having achieved precisely nothing as a pro to date, is one of the countries most recognisable sportsmen.

In 2008 Joe Calzaghe came first in the BBC Sports Personality of the Year Award- a worthless trinket but a pretty good gauge of public recognition. In the same year and in spite of being flattened by Floyd only days earlier, Hatton finished third. Hatton's fight with Manny is estimated to have sold about a million or so PP's here in spite of the fact that Hatton had been hammered in his other high profile PPV here (Mayweather) and that we are fairly adverse to PPV here in the UK when it comes to boxing- only Hatton and Lewis have had broad appeal on PPV and Amir Khan is the only other fighter who is on PPV (disgracefully, might I add).

The major boxing publication here, Boxing News, entered the 'boxing is dying' debate very recently and announced that their sales numbers are in fact slightly increasing, despite the recession and general cost cutting at the moment.

The only downside, and a pretty large one at that, is that boxing is leaking television backers right now. Setanta, which provided extensive boxing coverage from the UK, the US and Europe has gone under after paying far too much money for fucking Premiership football. This is a terrible blow for the industry, and may or may not have had an effect on David Haye's decision to pull out of the Klitschko fight. Setanta were supposed to be providing Haye's purse for that fight.

ITV, the terrestrial channel which has provided good coverage since re-investing in the sport a few years ago, seems also to be on the verge of pulling out, despite having a long contract with Mick Hennessey (who in turn manages Carl Froch). ITV refused to be drawn into any bidding war on Froch-Taylor and decided not to broadcast live despite the good audience figures and reaction to their screening of Froch-Pascal. They also might have been stung by Werren's decision to feed Khan mooks on ITV and build him into a nationwide figure, only to then run off to Sky PPV when the big fights came calling.

These are the dark clouds on the horizon, albeit that in the short term Sky Sports will no doubt mop up the good fighters and keep giving them TV exposure. For all of that though, boxing in the UK is in much ruder health than it appears to be in the US and I have yet to meet a single person who seriously considers the possibility that MMA/UFC is going to 'overtake' boxing any time soon or at all. Presuming that the next wave of UK boxers perform to expectations (Gavin, Cleaverly, Barker, Khan etc), then there is no reason to see anything but good things for boxing here in the next ten years or so.

MTF

 

That. People always forget one thing. How many events does UFC hold a year at his absolute height right now 10-12? WWE is holding like 4-5 house shows weekly, 3-4 weekly TV shows, huge merchandise plus 10 something PPVs. Boxing has multiple world title fights around the world in every country almost every week in the US, Mexico, Australia, Europe, Asia, South America and it must still be profitable everywhere otherwise promoters wouldn´t do it.

Yes MMA is succesful and turns a huge profit, but it also looks bigger on the surface than it is, because it´s focused on very few organisations worldwide and 10-12 big events a year. Their big profit doesn´t come from running over pro wrestling or boxing. If boxing only held 10-12 events a year with all the best from around the world, they´d need a stadium for each event and sell more PPVs than MMA. Yes we can wish for that, but it´s just not realistic in a global sport like boxing.

Btw, Goosen took a shot at the UFC and Lesnar yesterday, saying something like "you don´t come in here, have four fights and call yourself the heavyweight champ, in boxing you earn it." It made me laugh because it wa so unexpected. ::

 

I don't get why guys keep spouting off about how great boxing is in other countries. That may be good for those countries, but here in the US it won't mean diddly. First of all how many exciting foreign boxers do we even get from other countries? Just a handful and probably the best one over the last few years was Calzaghe who never had the balls to leave his country and get some US recognition.

If we're hoping the strength of foreign countries boxing is going to save the sport here then we're really fucked.

 

"King of the Cage" was the worst live sporting event I have ever attended.

 

You mean eventually I won't get to see a new MMA movie every 6 months?

I guess I better buy an extra copy of Never Back Down.

 

Interestingly enough, at Yahoo they have changed their 'MMA' tab on the top bar to 'UFC'.

Of course, when one of their writers works for them...

 

Yes to the part in bold, that is exactly what the fuck I'm telling you.

You are wrong about drug testing Otis, it's sanctioned by the SAME athletic commissions as boxing. Same rules apply.

 

No offense dude, but I couldn't give too much of a flying fuck about how boxing is doing in the US. In fact, it makes a pleasant change.

I was asked for my opinion and gave it. This is how it is

MTF :dunno:

 

That was my mistake for quoting you in that post. I did not mean to appear to be responding to you, because I wasn't. At least not directly. I know you don't live in the US and I wasn't attacking your opinion either.

Foreign boxing will live on and to be honest it won't completly die off in the US. However I predict US boxing will fall to a very low level of respectability somewhere around bowling and poker and on a quality boxing level that will pretty much make it even with foreign boxing.

 

That makes sense, the headlines on Yahoo read like press releases.

 

Well, whenever HBO and SHO decide to get out of the game that day may come.

 

I don't even need to do that GF. I understand full well that grappling and submission offence/defence takes a specific set of skills and techniques. I merely can't get excited watching it. I appreciate MMA for what it is, but I simply don't get anything like the thrill watching it that I get from watching two world class boxers walking to the ring...

MTF

 

What garbage is this?

This is the EXACT point I was trying to make in my response to your last post bro. 'Foreign boxing', as you politely term it, is thriving- not just in terms of popularity but also in terms of sheer quality.

The US' problem is simply this: how many world class boxers do the US currently have? The best HW is Ukranian. So is the second best. The best CW is Polish. The best SMW is Danish. The best MW is probably American but he got smashed not so long ago by a 44 year old fellow American. Only one of the top three or four WW's is American. The best LWW is Phillipino. The best LW is Mexican. And so on and so on and so on...

How many talented US althletes would rather box than, say play NFL? Or baseball? Or NHL?

It is as plain as day that there is a shortage, and this in turn is leading to a lack of interest in broadcasters, which has a drip down effect on potential spectators and potential participants. These are the fundaments of the US decline in boxing. The sooner the US realises that it might be the centre of the boxing universe in terms of 'stage' but NOT in terms of boxing quality, the quicker it can pick itself up and get back in the game.

MTF

 

I had a feeling that might rackle your feathers. When I say Foreign boxing I'm more referring to the foreign stuff that doesn't make it over here on tv. The foreign fighter's over here who are champions and continue to fight over here is not who I'm referring too.

 

I have boxed and have belts in Karate and Judo mate. I am far too lazy to go through all that exercise business again... ::

MTF

 

Why should a 'foreign fighter' have to either fight in the US or appear on US television?

MTF :dunno:

 

Like fuck it does. Boxing wears you out big time, part of is the mental drain, of trying not to get punched etc. You can't relax in the ring, you have to be 100% focused.

When two MMA fighters are dry humping, they often just calm down and switch off, if they are at a sort of stalemate.

Have you ever sparred a decent fighter before?

3 mins of proper sparring is more tiring than squirming around on the floor like an amputated penis for 3 minutes.

 

Makes sense why Yahoo went to the exteme in attempting to ridicule any type of competition for the UFC, including Affliction and EliteXC. Yahoo is a f*cking joke! ::