Why is the UFC gaining popularity?

Takahashi was well versed in grappling, he trained in catch wrestling and had a few sub wins, what does that have to do with boxing and street fighting? you're not going to venture far into mma with just hands, ask claressa shields, tyrone spong most recently, or james toney.

most ppl bring up mercer, mercer and sylvia were originally scheduled for a boxing match , it was canceled by the local athletic commission so they changed it to mma, sylvia decided after throwing the first kick and mercer giving him a stare to decide to get into boxing range. which mercer did exactly what everyone knew he would do in boxing, sylvia was never really an elite fighter , he had just gotten sparked by fedor in a few seconds before that fight and was the champion when hw ufc was at is weakest, he was already more grossly obese than ray mercer. The mercer ko is one of my favorite fights, but it doesn't mean that boxing is all you need to win mma, as mercer found out when he fought kimbo. Holly Holm spent three years of mma training while she was cross training in boxing for her to make it to the top, you have to completely ignore this factor to not see it was necessary to achieve success in mma, she would have lost a ton only using boxing.

 

Well you know more about mma, and probably you do, but it cannot be denied that the first UFC were to make the Grayce and their BJJ look good

 

here is a channel with street fights with very few rules

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In my opinion Botha was always a second level boxer

 

Lets not pretend they are on the same footing here. In MMA you can punch (with 4oz gloves) kick, knee, elbow, throw, choke someone out, snap arms and legs, theres no counts after a knockdown and you can fight on the ground. That covers 90+% of what could happen in a "real fight". A lot of the remaining stuff (headbutts, kicks/knees to grounded opponents, nut shots, hair pulling) was legal originally, and some of it is still legal now in certain organisations. MMA is absolutely close enough to a "real fight" that its a solid indicator of who the best fighters are. There are no illegal techniques that can magically give a boxer a viable chance at consistently beating MMA fighters, in fact most of the illegal stuff would make the MMA guys even more effective against a boxer.

 

Yes, but prohibiting things like a kick to the face while on the ground, a knee with the other foot on the ground, blows to the back of the head, completely alter the result, for example, do you think that on Couture Street it would have been lying at Toney's feet, it is much more difficult, and if you could throw elbows in the temples, with 2 elbows from Toney Randy would already be unconscious.
We must also keep in mind that the main weapon of a human being is his fists, instinctively they are the first thing one uses, and boxers are the best with that weapon.

 

What makes you think Toney is going to be able to land perfect elbows to Randy Coutures temple while Randy is mauling him? the whole point is you're pinned to the ground and being restrained and tied up, you dont have the freedom to do whatever you want.

Lets run through the vid of that fight in detail.

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11:20 - Randy fakes a jab then shoots in for the takedown, a single leg. Toney has absolutely nothing for it even though hes already got a pretty low stance and has his right hand cocked for the uppercut. As soon as Randy gets the leg, notice that he forces Toney to turn, to Randys right side. At that point even if knees to the head of a grounded opponent were legal, Toneys window to land one is over, look how compromised the balance of his rear free leg is once the turn happens, he cannot do anything offensively with it now. To put it in perspective, the takedown is initiated at 11:20 and Toney is on his ass by 11:22. Randy could actually legally be knee'd in the head for most of the takedown sequence (it only becomes illegal once his knees hit the ground) and yet, shockingly, Toney didnt figure out how to instinctively counter takedowns with fight ending one shot KO knees in milliseconds.

So 11:22, they've gone to ground. Look where Randys head is. I dont see any window at all where Toney could elbow him in the temple. He might be able to land one to the top or back of the head, but then i'm watching this at 0.25 speed so in real time that window of opportunity was again milliseconds, and Toneys balance is still badly compromised so its not like theres a lot of power behind anything he could do.

By around 11:25 Randy is in full mount already, we are talking FIVE ****ING SECONDS from when he first moved in, from outside of punching range, for a takedown. Initially Randys head is in close, from that position in a street fight he would have carte blanche to bite or headbutt Toney. Toney tries to cling on to Randys head for dear life and manages for about 2 seconds before Randy postures up. Initially as Randy does that Toney partially sits up himself, trying to bring his head up. If 12-6 elbows were legal Toney could be eating some ****ing brutal ones to the top of the head at that point. Not to mention that pretty much any point where Randy has the full mount he could dig his thumbs into Toneys eyes and its game over.

11:30 Toney tries to bear hug Randy. Again exposing his head for potential 12-6 street fight elbows in the process.

11:45 look at the positioning of Toneys arms, what can he land? his range of motion has been 90% cut off, his space has been taken away, he has very little ability to generate leverage. By 12:12 hes resigned himself to throwing weak arms punches from off his back into Randys ribs, they do nothing even in 4oz gloves.

12:37 Randy postures up again, giving Toney more space. Toney gets excited and tries to throw punches upwards, only to receive a bunch of punches in return that have actual weight on them because of Randys superior positioning. Btw look at 12:40, if you wanna talk about elbows to the temple, imagine the kind of vicious skull cracking downwards elbow Randy could have landed there.

13:06 - If we are being generous Toney maybe had like half a second to land an elbow to Randys temple there. However he would have been doing it backwards with compromised balance, so its extremely unlikely it would have worked even if he had attempted it in that small window.

14:23 - head and arm choke, very simple white belt level shyt, and Toney taps.


In conclusion, Toney had very few opportunities to land any "street" stuff even if it had been legal, Randy on the other hand could have gouged Toneys eyeballs out and eaten them if he felt like it.

Worth nothing as well that Randy was being pretty damn nice to him. He didnt throw much GNP, didnt use elbows, and opted to go for a choke instead of damaging Toneys arms or legs. And in spite of having it relatively easy, Toney, who was one of the toughest most fearless mother****ers in boxing history, and who talked **** on MMA and "hugging" and "rolling on the floor" etc etc, tapped out, because he felt his air supply being cut off and saw the blackness moving in and shat his ****ing pants. Which should be a good indicator that the "gay hugging" is a lot more than some boxing fans give it credit for.

 

MMA is the new pro wrestling. Back in the 80s and 90s the WWF/WWE was huge despite being nonsense. MMA has filled that gap, and draws their audience from the same demographic. It's not comparable to a real sport like football or boxing.

 

WTF? Izzy Adesanya is one of the best combat sportsmen in the world. I will say that most UFC fighters lack decent body mechanics to punch well though.

 

The UFC isn't gaining popularity, quite the opposite actually. It peaked in popularity about 2008-2011. At that time every UFC PPV event was selling 750k - mil+ buys. They were getting constant coverage from all major sports networks. Rival promotions like Strikeforce were pulling substantial numbers. Even the regional and feeder league scene was booming. The UFC doesn't publish they're PPV numbers anymore but when they last did there was a period of a few years that all non-Mcgregor cards were consistently selling under 200k.

 

Khabib`s last two fights did huge PPV numbers too.

 

I use to be like this, an absolute old head, i still am, but i am much more open minded to combat sports than I was 30 years ago.

Grow up, this isn't the 80s anymore, boxing has had a clear decline the past few years (it has been slowly gaining traction this year though, really enjoyable so far). UFC is the goal of becoming a complete martial artist, even with its barbaric look and appeal, thats what the game is, who can wrestle better? Who can box better? Who can grapple better? It's becoming the complete fighter.

Not to mention, no politics, and no paying disputes, everyone fights everyone, boxing is still my combat sport at heart but so many fights killed on the horizon has really killed my drive to hardcore watch every week.

Last but not least, if you find grappling boring, learn about it, you'll appreciate the ground game much better, especially knowing had difficult it is.

 

The UFC is just fine, the average for this year was 400k but last year was an amazing year for the organization, one of the best years in the history of the UFC with ppv numbers as well entertainment

 

I dont think its gaining but its not losing either, the numbers fluctuate typically depending on whats happening at any given moment. This year has been quiet so far but last year was one of their strongest ever.

Comparing it to 2008-2011 is kind of apples to oranges really. It was very big back then but it had kind of a hot new fad novelty factor type popularity and it was much more strongly centered on one demographic (college aged American guys and/or lapsed pro wrestling fans). They were only just starting to make a real effort to expand internationally at that point and there was like half as many cards per year and way fewer divisions. Mainstream media wasnt really fully on board yet either although they were gradually starting to come around because of the boom, but you could still commonly find "human cockfighting" type takes/articles even in the early 10s.

I think at this point its just got a different vibe, it doesnt have that same white hot fad novelty value but its an established and accepted part of the mainstream sports world now, and is much more internationally established too.

Can you explain why MMA isnt a "real sport" but boxing is?

 

Low paid athletes. Low level of talent. It's more akin to the WWE pro wrestling or the crossfit games.

 

The pay thing makes no sense. So is rugby for example not a real sport either? they get paid far worse than MMA fighters or pro wrestlers. MMA is low paid because its a young sport with no Ali act and one company monopolizing it to the extent that they can set the norms on what people should be paid, simple, has **** all to do with the quality of the fighters. Btw the pay has been increasing pretty rapidly over the last 15 years. I could see the pay gap between boxing and MMA closing sometime in the 2030s at the latest and then one of the few arguments salty coping boxing fans have left will be gone.

And low level of talent compared to what? if thats the case what does it say about boxers that these supposedly talentless UFC fighters could beat the **** out of them easily?