My Take Radio

I have issue with this game not because of the fight­ers involved but because EA allegedly told UFC to go fuck them­selves when the UFC wanted to cre­ate Undis­puted 2009. After a suc­cess­ful out­ing by THQ it seems EA wanted a piece of the MMA pie. Based on the trailer they seem to have a solid for­mula but I notice a rub­bery tex­ture to the fight­ers and some fight­ers do not resem­ble their real life counter parts. Of course the sell­ing point is Fedor vs Cou­ture which is a fight many have wanted to see but which has been eclipsed by the need to see Fedor vs Lesnar. Does this game have tools to dethrone the UFC offer­ing or is this just a lame attempt by EA to cash in on the hottest sport today? I have to admit that the dif­fer­ent fight­ing are­nas are nice though hahahaha

After many screen­shots and debates about this game being bet­ter than UFC Undis­puted I was begin­ning to think EA would never show us any game­play footage till the last minute. EA chose to show­case com­bat­ants from this past weekend’s Strike­force card. King Mo, Mousasi ‚Hendo,Shields and El Nino all made appear­ances in this game­play trailer. So far the pre­sen­ta­tion looks good, but will it be able to K.O  the UFC offer­ing? We’ll find out this fall

The bat­tle to sanc­tion MMA in NY state took a turn in the right direc­tion when the NYS bud­get was passed with the pro­vi­sion of MMA being sanc­tioned. If all the politi­cians agree with the bud­get and don’t cut MMA out we can see MMA approval signed sealed by 4/1. Now of course with the sanc­tion­ing of MMA in NY there will be NYS ath­letic com­mis­sion guide­lines that will need to be estab­lished as well as cer­tain safe­guards that will need to be put in place but these are things that can move rather quickly. With MMA esti­mated to gen­er­ate 1.37 mil­lion in recur­ring rev­enue it’s a no brainer for the gov­ern­ment to want to get a piece. Gov­er­nor Pat­ter­son expects NY to reg­u­late MMA before 2010 is over.

One thing to note is that the Depart­ment of State must approve the Senate’s pro­posed bud­get. Given how cash strapped NY State is I think it will be not be rejected.

What do my fel­low MMA fans and New York­ers think of MMA in the big apple?

It feels like only yes­ter­day when I watched my first MMA event - which hap­pened to be the orig­i­nal UFC Super Fight. After watch­ing, I real­ized that this sport could only be on PPV due to the sheer amount of vio­lence it pre­sented. Since those days, the UFC obvi­ously has come a long way — not only in terms of fights but also in allow­ing MMA to tran­scend the moniker of a “bar­baric” sport­ing event. While the sport has numer­ous orga­ni­za­tions and tons great fight­ers, the suc­cess of sport has always hinged on fans and it cross­ing over into the main­stream. The UFC slowly started get­ting real spon­sors like Harley David­son, Burger King and a host of oth­ers. MMA was slowly gain­ing accep­tance and com­pa­nies were embrac­ing the pro­mo­tion the sport got their prod­ucts. Com­pa­nies like BSN, which aren’t usu­ally widely heard of, are a per­fect exam­ple of MMA help­ing them become known in main­stream media. Now when I enter a GNC and see a Syntha-6 bot­tle it has a lit­tle UFC logo next to it. It is things like this that help move the sport forward.

Nowa­days, you open a mag­a­zine and you see MMA fight­ers (both male and female) endors­ing prod­ucts. Whether it’s t-shirts, sup­ple­ments or apparel, Mixed Mar­tial Arts has become a viable mar­ket­ing machine that cap­tures the key demo­graph­ics for a lot of prod­ucts across the board.

Let’s not for­get that MMA is now seen on broad­cast TV, thanks in part to the now defunct Eli­teXC, as well as Strike­Force, which broad­casts on CBS. In addi­tion to that, com­pa­nies like Fat­head are now acknowl­edg­ing MMA fight­ers as “main­stream” ath­letes with “main­stream” appeal. You can now hear names like GSP, Fedor, Gina Carano, Chuck Lid­dell and many oth­ers men­tioned in the same sen­tences as ath­letes like Michael Phelps, LeBron James, Kobe Bryant and Dwayne Wade. This shows that com­bat sports other than box­ing have now assim­i­lated them­selves into today’s sports cov­er­age and beyond. 

Here are just a few exam­ples of how MMA is now part of main­stream media.

(con­tinue reading…)

With all the talk of the Olympics, many peo­ple have been debat­ing at length about the inclu­sion of MMA in the Olympic games. Many detrac­tors feel that the “bar­baric” nature of the sport would be inap­pro­pri­ate for the squeaky clean games. As a fan, I feel that this argu­ment is really poorly researched and con­tin­ues to enforce the fact that peo­ple still need to learn about the sport. For those detrac­tors, I present the fol­low­ing cour­tesy of Wikipedia:

Mixed mar­tial arts (MMA) is a full con­tact com­bat sport that allows a wide vari­ety of fight­ing tech­niques, from a mix­ture of mar­tial arts tra­di­tions and non-traditions, to be used in com­pe­ti­tions. The rules allow the use of strik­ing and grap­pling tech­niques, both while stand­ing and on the ground. Such com­pe­ti­tions allow mar­tial artists of dif­fer­ent back­grounds to compete.

As described above, MMA is a mix­ture of a wide vari­ety of fight­ing tech­niques such as Wrestling, Judo, Taek­wondo and Box­ing ‚which are all Olympic sports. Dis­ci­plines alreadyrec­og­nized by the Inter­na­tional  Olympic Com­mit­tee — Karate and Wushu, are also prac­ticed by some MMA fight­ers. The Olympics preach broth­er­hood and equal­ity among it’s ath­letes and MMA shares a sim­i­lar broth­er­hood and desire to rep­re­sent one’s coun­try. I feel that the global appeal as well as the diverse mix of ath­letes would allow most, if not all, coun­tries to be represented.

The IOC will need to make some adjust­ments to keep the blood­shed to a min­i­mum, but with the proper safe­guards I feel MMA would do well and allow fight­ers another avenue to grow the sport on a global scale. In research­ing the Olympics, I learned that Pankra­tion at one point  was an Olympic event. Pankra­tion was the first form of MMA and was a viable Olympic sport.

I am sure many peo­ple will agree with my rec­om­men­da­tion, just as I am sure oth­ers will dis­agree, but in the end it would be quite a sight to see. Imag­ine GSP  as Wel­ter­weight Cham­pion and Olympic Gold Medal­ist. Dana White I am sure would love to that become a real­ity. We can only hope as fans that when the Olympics visit Rio in 2016, they request the inclu­sion of Vale Tudo or BJJ into the Olympic games.

Would you like to see MMA in the Olympics? Share your thoughts below:

After three oppo­nents have been denied the chance to fight Bobby Lash­ley by the Florida Ath­letic Com­mis­sion, all being called “not com­pet­i­tive” fights for the 4–0 pro wrestler-turned MMA fighter; Strike­force has finally got an approved oppo­nent for Lash­ley. His oppo­nent for Jan­u­ary 30th’s Strike­force: Miami event will be Wes Sims (22–12-1). This Ulti­mate Fighter alumni and UFC vet  is best known for his two losses against for­mer UFC Heavy­weight Cham­pion Frank Mir (one loss being a DQ due to ille­gal stomps to the head), and his antics on The Ulti­mate Fighter Sea­son 10.

Wes Sims is cur­rently on a three-fight win streak (his first round loss on The Ulti­mate Fighter does not count on his record), and is look­ing to upset the unde­feated Lash­ley. Bobby Lash­ley has fin­ished 3 out of his 4 wins, only once going the dis­tance with Ulti­mate Fighter Sea­son 8 cast mem­ber, Jason Guida. Lashley’s only other notable win is against Bob Sapp at Fight Force Inter­na­tional: Ulti­mate Chaos in June.

Strike­force: Miami will also have sev­eral other high pro­file fights, includ­ing Heis­man Tro­phy win­ner Her­schel Walker (0–0) in his MMA debut against Greg Nagy (1–1); Rob­bie Lawler (18–5) vs. Melvin Man­heof (24–6-1); Strike­force Women’s Light­weight Cham­pion Cris­tiane “Cyborg” San­tos (8–1) vs. Mar­loes Coenen (17–3) for the title; and Nick Diaz (20–7) vs. Mar­ius Zarom­skis (13–3) for the Wel­ter­weight Championship.

You can watch Strike­force: Miami on Show­time at 10pm EST on Jan­u­ary 30, or live at BankAt­lantic Cen­ter in Sun­rise, Florida. Tick­ets are going for around $50.

Fedor Emelia­nenko is a name that for the last few years has been syn­ony­mous with “the gold stan­dard” for heavy­weight fight­ers. Fast, Strong, Sub­mis­sions, Sambo and KO Power are the words used to describe this emo­tion­less phe­nom, and with good rea­son. Fedor comes into this bout poised to claim another vic­tim and show the UFC why he is the bad­dest man on the planet. Brett “The Grim“Rogers comes off a KO vic­tory over for­mer UFC Heavy­weight Champ Andrei “The Pit­bull” Arlovski, and with seri­ous KO power and Muay Thai skills at his dis­posal he has some­thing to prove.

Show­time debuts their inside look at the train­ing and lifestyles of these very dif­fer­ent fight­ers lead­ing to their clash on 11/7 on CBS. Whether you are a fan of the UFC or MMA in gen­eral this is a fight that can’t be missed and most of all it’s free.

Here is a sneak peek at the 360 spe­cial which you can watch on Show­time all this week lead­ing to the fight. Check with your local provider for show times.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W79aPABWCmA]

Here is the CBS advert for the full card as well

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NQ5Fc_EyPkA]

MAIN CARD

FEDOR “THE LAST EMPEROR” EMELIANENKO (30–1) VS BRETT “THE GRIM” ROGERS (10–0)

JASON “MAYHEM” MILLER (29–6) VS JAKE SHIELDS (28–4) — MIDDLEWEIGHT CHAMPIONSHIP

GEGARD “THE DREAMCATCHER” MOUSASI (29–2) VS RAMEAU THIERRY “THE AFRICAN ASSASIN” SOKODJOU

FABRICIO “VAI CAVALO” WERDUM (12–4-1) VS ANTONIO “BIGFOOT” SILVA (13–1)

Dana White is one guy that keeps things real hon­est and when he was inter­viewed by MMA Fan­house regard­ing Kimbo favoritism and Rampage’s blog let’s just say he han­dled it in typ­i­cal Dana fash­ion. Dana han­dles things straight up even though the deliv­ery is brash the man speaks truth. Do you agree with is comments

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KhQysipfJhY&feature=player_embedded]

Video credit goes to 411mania

Video footage credit goes to MMA Fan­house

Every few years a sport becomes the next big movie genre. It’s hap­pened with prac­ti­cally every major sport from base­ball to arm wrestling ( Over The Top Any­one?). It was only a mat­ter of time before MMA got raped and pil­laged by hol­ly­wood. Wire Kung-Fu ala Jackie Chan and bru­tal real­is­tic fights ala Ong Bak have dom­i­nated the action movie land­scape for the last few years but now MMA is pop­u­lar and looks great on film. From shitty pop­corn flicks like Never Back Down to deep sto­ries like Red­belt MMA is new cool thing to make movies about.

Which brings me to the pre­view you are about to see for the next Stone Cold Steve Austin project called Damage.

Stone Cold plays an ex-con  in a fight club like set­ting  while out on parole. Of course you can expect a trade­mark Stone Cold one liner or two and some close blur induc­ing com­bat. While I thought the Con­demned was a decent flick I see this movie being another half assed attempt at mak­ing MMA look cool on film.

Stone Cold has a cool look to him and great comic tim­ing ( Longest Yard). It’s a shame that his projects have him type cast in these piss poor one dimen­sional roles. If a bet­ter trailer comes along I may change my tune but i’m not hold­ing my breath

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=STskOfMRo0M&feature=player_embedded]

Credit for the gem of a trailer goes to the awe­some crew at Film­drunk

Update-Of course I had fucked up the date and it’s tonight instead of Sat­ur­day. This what hap­pens when you post from your iphone. Sorry folks

The UFC is bring us another great night of free fights. I am look­ing for­ward to

Huerta & May­nard as well as Diaz v. Guil­lard. Huerta v May­nard is inter­est­ing since it appears that this will be Roger’s last fight in the cage before try­ing his hand at movies. Here are all the fights you can expect. I will make some picks below which will be in bold. As always free MMA is a great time to intro­duce new fans to the sport.

MAIN CARD:

• Nate Diaz vs. Melvin Guil­lard — My pick — Diaz by Sub.
  
• Roger Huerta vs. Gray May­nard– Huerta by deci­sion
  
• Car­los Con­dit vs. Jake Ellen­berger–Con­dit by KO
• Tim Cre­deur vs. Nate Quarry–Quarry by Decision

PRELIMINARY CARD:

• Steve Cantwell vs. Brian Stann– Stann by decision
• Mike Pyle vs. Chris  Wil­son–Pyle by KO
  
• C.B. Doll­away vs. Jay Silva– I have not seen Silva fight and Dol­loway needs the win so I’ll leave this one alone
  
• Phillipe Nover vs. Sam Stout–Nover needs this win and Sam Stout is no pushover. I can’t even pick one since both are great fight­ers and it’s anyone’s game

Not sure if I have seen any of these 6 guys fight so I can’t make an hon­est pick.

• Justin Buch­holz vs. Jeremy Stephens
  
• Brock Lar­son vs. Mike Pierce
• Ryan Jensen vs. Steven Steinbeiss

On SPIKE TV in the US at 7pm CT / 8pm ET and PT