To all those who complain daily about the level of talent in the UFC, the downfall of MMA due to The Ultimate Fighter, production quality, innapropriate commercializing, inability to compete with Pride, bad announcers, etc (and I'm sure I left out many other complaints):
Please rewatch the Griffin-Bonnar fight (just rewatched this myself on UFC Unleashed last night).
That fight in itself shows that this sport and the UFC is heading in the right direction, a direction that many of us have wanted for years.
And think about the potential excitement building up for this Saturday's finale, which could bring us yet another epic battle of fighters that we can talk about years down the road.
We don't always have to be negative on this board.
"That fight in itself shows that this sport and the UFC is heading in the right direction, a direction that many of us have wanted for years."
Well, while I enjoyed the fight and admired both fighters' heart, I can't say that a sloppy slugfest is the direction I want the sport headed in.
As far as good brawls go, I'd take Lawler/Riley any day, since that fight showed better conditioning, sharper technique for the most part, and more techniques in general (knees, a bit of GnP, RNC attempt).
"Have you ever considered that the greatness of Griffin/Bonnar had absolutely NOTHING to do with Zuffa Inc, the mob-affiliated Fertitta Bros. and their stooge/boxercise pussy Dana White"
Would the fight have taken place without the UFC as a venue? If it had taken place in a smaller venue, would you have seen it? Would the fight have been as intense if there hadn't been someone willing to put up big chunks of money as an incentive, and put the guys on national television?
Of course, the fighters are a crucial component of a good fight. But the venue is a necessary component as well, and you can criticize Zuffa for a lot of things they did, but no one else but them took MMA to the level that it is at in the States right now. Everything else is speculation.
MMA is GREAT! TUF was AWESOME and brought MMA on the map!
UFC = MONOPOLY ON USA MMA.
They are raising ticket prices, PPV prices, merchandise prices...EVERYTHING "UFC" has been uplifted price wise.....Why..? BECASUE THE UFC IS GREEDY! And they know ALLLLLLL the hard-core fans will have to pay it if they want to keep seeing there favorite sport on TV and PPV.
Its fucking BULLSHIT and the UFC knows this!
Sure the sport is mainstream, but at what cost..? If your not a fighter, your getting SCREWED by the prices. Not too mention that the UFC let the most exciting devision on the UFC go...
"Duh, I'm DANA, I keep on complaining about fighters not being exciting enough but I just let the most exciting devision go...What to do? what to do?"
Although my post looks like I'm harking on the UFC (which I kind of am) I enjoy the sport FAR too much to ever le tit go and if the UFC PPV's were $50, I'd probably pay it.
[That was also the last time since then that we've seen a truly great MMA fight for free on TV.]
But the point is that you are getting mma fights on free tv. If the fighters don't step up and fight, then that's their fault, not Dana/Zuffa's.
The UFC is doing a great job. They're probably spending a crapload of time, money and energy setting all of this up, and the armchair quarterbacks do nothing but complain.
"In recent memory, a number of bouts like Shogun/Minotoro and Gomi/Kawajiri (to name a couple) were even better fights than Griffin/Bonnar,"
and they took place in Pride, another big name/ big money venue. Thanks for confirming my point, which is that in order to have high-level fights by professional fighters, you need at least a few organizations that can pay significant wages and generate significant publicity. Pride and K1 in Japan, UFC in the US.
"Can you picture the TUF finale if it was only Sanchez/Florian and Shamrock/Franklin that night? LOL."
It would have been roughly as entertaining as some of the Pride shows recently. Big money isn't a guarantee for a great fight. So? BTW, Shamrock/Franklin wasn't fixed.
They are raising ticket prices, PPV prices, merchandise prices...EVERYTHING "UFC" has been uplifted price wise.....Why..? BECASUE THE UFC IS GREEDY! "
Ohmygod, they want some profit in return for all the investment and losses of previous years! How horrible!
That's capitalism. Deal with it.
Or better yet, why don't you found your own MMA promotion and organize pro-level contests and give away the tickets for free? We'd all love that. Oh yeah, broadcast your shows on a big TV network too, and no commercials please!
"They are raising ticket prices, PPV prices, merchandise prices...EVERYTHING "UFC" has been uplifted price wise.....Why..? BECASUE THE UFC IS GREEDY! And they know ALLLLLLL the hard-core fans will have to pay it if they want to keep seeing there favorite sport on TV and PPV."
lol @ fucking morons like you crying that the UFC is "greedy". It's a goddamn business, it has to make money or there's no point of staying in operation. EVERY business out there is trying to make more money. Ticket prices for every major sport have skyrocketed through the years, that's how it works.
You have proved, once again, why you are the poster boy for Jr. College. You post some of the dumbest shit this board has ever, ever seen.
No, not really a FOTY candidate, but that doesn't mean it wasn't a great fight.
Also, all the fights on that UFN were pretty solid. Not sure what you're trying to insinuate by "in light of the fights leading up to it". The fight wasn't on the UFC 55 card, if you recall.
"As far as good brawls go, I'd take Lawler/Riley any day, since that fight showed better conditioning, sharper technique for the most part, and more techniques in general (knees, a bit of GnP, RNC attempt)"
CORRECT!!!Forrest and Stephan didn't have technique but it was exciting.It looked more like toughman because neither could KO the other with how ever many punches to the head and that's insane.