The UFC hits London!
A landmark for UK MMA
This October, British Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) reaches a milestone as the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) touches down in London, with four English contenders making the main fight card for the first time in the history of the competition.
Taking place at the O2 Arena, the controversial combat sports event has rocketed in popularity over the past decade, in large part thanks to the highly successful television and computer game exploits of the UFC. In its original incarnation, MMA was a no holds barred bloodbath, permitting fighters to use headbutts and even groin strikes!
With the introduction of weight divisions, compulsory use of protective gloves, and bans on various attacking moves (including the dreaded groin strikes), the UFC moved away from brawling and towards something that now resembled a sport; one that could, upon occasion, produce the most compelling moments in which violence and art became temporarily inseparable. Such moments, including numerous displays from reigning middleweight champion Anderson Silva opened people’s eyes to the potential of the sport, propelling it into mainstream culture in the USA and to a lesser extent, in countries such as Australia, England and Saudi Arabia.
As aggressive in the business world as in the cage, the UFC worked on eliminating competition to their monopoly of Mixed Martial Arts. Other promoters such as Strikeforce boast some great fighters including the likes of Fedor Emelianenko, but no other fight league can complete with the levels of global interest, ticket/ PPV sales and profits generated by the UFC. Far more than just two guys throwing down in fisticuffs, each UFC event is built up for months with ‘trash talking’, in-depth analysis and frenzied debate between loyal fight fans. The UFC is in effect a 24hour reality show, but replacing Simon Cowell, Peter Andre and Jade Goody (god rest her soul), are some genuinely interesting and diverse characters. The pick of the bunch includes UFC President Dana White, British welterweight Dan Hardy and commentator Joe Rogan, the latter of who is perhaps the most surprising member of the UFC team.
As well as being one of the most familiar voices in MMA, Joe Rogan is considered to be one of the best standup performers of this generation. Himself an avid Jiu-Jitsu practitioner and martial arts expert, he is a vocal supporter of the use of not only cannabis, but DMT: a naturally occurring hallucinogenic drug used in some shamanic practices. In addition, his increasingly popular weekly podcast is sponsored by the ‘Flesh Light’: a male sex toy that looks, feels and functions like a vagina… apparently. Bizarre then, that an organization trying to define itself as a legitimate sport in the eyes of the world would employ a commentator with so much ‘colour’, or to be more accurate, one who openly uses drugs and masturbates using a hollowed-out torch!
Whilst it might seem strange that the UFC would make the decision to employ Joe Rogan as their commentator, upon inspection, the reasoning is crystal clear. He’s the best there is. When combined with his immense knowledge of combat sports, Rogan’s pedigree as a standup has enabled him to craft a new and all together more fulfilling style of fight commentary; one that would be almost impossible to replicate given the lack of credible standup comedians with high level martial arts expertise.
Having assembled a crack team, Dana White and co look set for world domination over the next few years. The hope for MMA fans is that the UFC continues to progress and astound, but also, that other competitors in the potentially lucrative fights market make some good headway. This will be the best way of insuring a high standard of fights at a fair price for consumers in the long term.
As the media coverage and number of MMA practitioners in the UK increases, the sport will inevitably become a bigger part of British subculture. It will not be pretty, but it will most certainly be entertaining!
UFC120 featuring English fighters Michael Bisping, Dan Hardy, John Hathaway and James Wilks has now sold out and takes place on October 16th at the O2 Arena.
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