Prefer boxing to MMA - but MMA is worth a look for free on Channel ONE. Chuck Liddell is great to watch on the MMA! Fights like a good pub carpark brawler. Just walks up continually with the right hand ever cocked, and if he connects with it - BANG! Having said that, in last night's show he was knocked cold by the biggest overhand right ever landed in any contact sport, ever! Kegsy: Wear the Green 'T' shirt under the Vic 'T' shirt, and change them over at the appropriate time during the card. (always handy to have a change of clothes if the sh_t hits the fan at the pub - witnesses always describe to the cops the 'T' shirt that the d-head troublemaker was wearing - and it's very handy if you are not wearing the same one later on)
BOXING is a dying sport once MMA establishes an amateur grass root system like boxing you will see great all-round fighters.Right now,the guys in MMA are a bunch of x-wrestlers wannabe boxers and muay thai kick boxers..
I think the one area that boxing is failing in atm, where UFC gains some leverage is the 'alphabet belts'. In the UFC there is one undisputed champ in each weight class, easy to follow and promote. Whereas we are stuck with 4 or so belts, interim and vacant titles etc. I think this all needs to be cleaned up so it is easier for all to follow and true champions of divisions are named and promoted accordingly. There are too many bs titles being fought for and claimed by sub-standard fighters. The other reason that UFC seem's to be 'taking over' is that they have only one card a month (correct me if im worng) but this allows them to stack the card and promote it well, where as with boxing we will have a number of cards all over the world on any given night.
MMA is ok, but i wouldn't buy it at home or anything like that..... Don't mind watching the knockout shows that they have on FOXSPORTS every now and then. I think UFC is abit like crispy cream doughnuts, ever ****er was buying them and now they are slowly dropping away. It's a fad and it will be interesting if it's still around in 10-20yrs. Boxing will never die :good
10-15 years from now most boxers will join MMA. BOXING is on it's last couple of breaths.You will not see as many boxers then.I think they will join MMA for money reasons and MMA I predict will be the num 1 fight sport of choice over boxing. beep---------------------------------------------------------------------- over
Amateur MMA aint gunna happen. But MMA does have huge momentum at present, and boxing could probably learn a little bit from why that's happening. If boxing wasn't so fundamentally f_cked at the top (ie too many organisations run by too many crooks), it'd be in a better position to do something towards grabbing back some market share.
So boxing is flat lining yet Floyd and Pac will both earn about 30 million in a few months time in the biggest money fight in history. Gotcha.
Amateur MMA has been running for several years. Fights on shows and also tournament events have been regulalry held - and these guys do not get paid.
Since I've taken up Kung Fu and BJJ I have a new appreciation and understanding of what's happening in the MMA/UFC ring... I always liked it (never as much as boxing of course), but for the wrong reasons up til now. I don't think most fans of UFC have any real understanding of the sport nor of it's technical/physical aspects at all though. More often than not, they purely want to see 2 guys fight it out in what they think are 'barely any rules' matches. They want to see people hurt each other gladiator style and think it's the most dangerous kind of fighting yada yada yada... They don't realise it's actually not as dangerous and in some aspects is actually less likely to ruin you physically than say Muay Thai, Boxing etc depending on your fight etc of course... They don't realise that these people are masters of their game, seeing exactly how far they can push their skills - they're in situations beyond the real world where anything could happen in -e.g. if you're going to do back spinning kicks or round kicks in a street fight you're either super talented or an idiot for not using straights which are quicker and harder to see coming. UFC a controlled environment for these tremendous athletes to push themselves above and beyond their limits. I very much doubt your average Joe UFC fan appreciates that... They see it as no holds barred, man on man slaughter. Thus the boo's when the ground work kicks in. It's popularity might be rising swiftly but it's not losing out to boxing fans or general sport fans - it's attracting people who are after the sight of 'uncontrolled' fighting... it's marketed as uncontrolled and it attracts the people who think that's what they're getting. Of course that's a generalisation to a degree, but I really do think alot of fans of MMA have little idea about what's really happening in that ring other than two guys trying to really hurt each other.
MMA has had it's grass roots system. Wrestling, Kung Fu, Karate, Jujitsu etc etc etc have had training gyms in every suburb in every major city for decades
