(Taken from my blog emmamay.com)

 

MMA fans sure have a lot to say. We talk excitedly with our friends about the great fight we watched and argue on message boards about who would win if Fedor fought Godzilla. And we become particularly vocal when politicians, famous boxers, or moms starts spouting off saying that MMA is not a sport or call it human cockfighting. And we digest a lot of content, which is the gas that keeps our motor mouth running. We read blog posts, listen to MMA radios shows, watch events on the computer, on TV, at the bar.

But despite how dedicated we are to this amazing sport, the truth is that MMA struggles. It struggles for respect. It struggles for recognition. In many cities, states and countries it struggles to exist. But guess what, Sports Fans? You can do something about that. Here are some ideas.

1 )  Pony up.  If you can’t afford the $50 for every UFC event then support the little guys. The cost of buying a regional pay-per-view is usually around $10. Regional promotions are the middle men between amateur events and the big show. Sure the quality of the stream may not be as good as a UFC or Strikeforce pay-per-view but what’s lacking in quality is often made up in quantity. I purchased AFC 3 on July 17th and they streamed 13 fights.

2 )  Support companies that support MMA.  It was kind of easy for me to rag on TapOut when I saw them as just a big chain in a mutually beneficial relationship with the UFC  juggernaut.  And then I noticed that they sponsor local amateur fighters. Kids putting long hours in at the gym to fight for free and to whom a little corporate sponsorship goes a long way.

3 )  Go to local shows.  I live in Vancouver where we’ve had one professional MMA event in 3 years. Fortunately, there are some well run amateur shows held periodically, which are always exciting. Sports are meant to be enjoyed live. Check out your local circuit.

4 ) If MMA if unsanctioned where you live, phone your local political representatives. Email them. Ask them their opinion on sanctioning the sport and let them know it’s important to you.  Some of the councilors who voted to allow professional MMA in Vancouver in December had said less than a year before that they were against it. People bugged them and they changed their minds. Politicians do that.

5 )  Vote. This is always important, of course, but you need to pay special attention to what is happening with your local and/or federal representatives if MMA is unsanctioned in your city, state or province. When MMA was approved in Vancouver the vote was 6-3. Nine people decided whether this city would get live professional MMA and watch Cro-Cop, Chuck Liddell and Rory Macdonald in our backyard. The citizens of Vancouver voted in those 9 people. I just don’t know how much straighter I can draw the line.

6 ) Demand local media coverage. Sarah Kaufman is the belt wearing, number one ranked 135 female fighter in the world and a life long resident of Victoria, BC. The Victoria newspaper doesn’t tell their readers anything about her, and it isn’t because the readers wouldn’t care. When I write about Kaufman for the Vancouver Sun website, her articles rank among the top read for days in a row. Email your newspaper’s sports editor and tell him you want to know what’s going on with local MMA and request they cover it.

7 )  Represent the sport. People who are afraid of MMA think of it’s fans as gang bangers and hooligans. Macho, aggressive meatheads. I’m not asking that you wear collared shirts to the bar and golf clap your approval when your man wins, just look in the mirror and ask yourself how you are representing the sport.

8 ) Understand what opponents of mixed martial arts see. They see people trying to kill each other and young people getting excited about it. Young spectators who might be influenced by the violence they see and adrenaline they feel and look to take that out on someone. They see society going to hell. They see young athletes developing brain damage and then tax payers footing the medical bills. We can cut through these concerns using logic and facts, but not without first genuinely understanding the fear.

9 ) Get involved. Find out what it takes to become a judge and see if you can’t get started. Contact your local promotion and help out in exchange for behind the scenes access to events. Get creative and find out how to put your passion to use beyond arguing on message boards about the number one pound for pound fighter.

Or don’t do anything and just keep bitching amongst yourselves on the internet. Just know that you have the power to affect the growth of the embattled sport you profess to love.

 

Follow me on Twitter @m4quinon

Promoted from the FanPosts by Kid Nate:

I wrote this up on my blog and thought I'd share the heart of it here.

 

It may shock you to learn this, but I am not the only bisexual fan of mixed martial arts. I’m not even the only female bisexual fan of mixed martial arts. In fact, many of the women who report on or participate in mixed martial arts are queer. Lucky for me, I don’t hear fighters, promoters or fans going around calling each other dykes. Instead, their homophobic statements reflect a disdain for male homosexuality.

Logic leads me to believe that perhaps these fighters wish to distance themselves from the obvious initial observation of the casual sports fan of nearly naked men entangled on the mat in positions that remind them of sex acts.  Judging by the homophobic comments I’ve heard from fighters, they would surely be disgusted by the thought of a gay man becoming turned on by watching their sweaty muscled body rub up against another man.

Assuming this is true, isn’t it amusing that they might prefer a straight man become turned on by the thought of them getting knocked unconscious?

I admire fighter’s bodies as much as any fan; male, female, gay or straight. I might even like a fighter more because I think they’re sexy and have little celebrity crushes. But do you know what keeps me hot for this sport despite the fact that I get the feeling by some that I am invading macho sacred grounds?

It’s heart. The heart we witness when fighters stand up after a knockdown, wobbly, knowing full well they could get leveled again in seconds. Fighters who are dominated, bleed like faucets, tear muscles and break bones but answer the bell for the next round because they have the heart to fight until their bodies won’t go anymore.

It saddens me that so many people who love this sport don’t appreciate the heart and courage required to live a life as an out gay man. Sexism is still deeply entrenched in our society and many people cannot accept gay men who behave on the streets and between the sheets in a way that they qualify as female. I guess they don’t consider the balls of steel required to be openly gay in a world where you are continually ostracized, a  frequent target of violence, not protected by your government and told you are a gross, hellbound abomination.

 

Source

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I wrote this up on my blog and thought I'd share the heart of it here.

It may shock you to learn this, but I am not the only bisexual fan of mixed martial arts. I’m not even the only female bisexual fan of mixed martial arts. In fact, many of the women who report on or participate in mixed martial arts are queer. Lucky for me, I don’t hear fighters, promoters or fans going around calling each other dykes. Instead, their homophobic statements reflect a disdain for male homosexuality.

Logic leads me to believe that perhaps these fighters wish to distance themselves from the obvious initial observation of the casual sports fan of nearly naked men entangled on the mat in positions that remind them of sex acts.  Judging by the homophobic comments I’ve heard from fighters, they would surely be disgusted by the thought of a gay man becoming turned on by watching their sweaty muscled body rub up against another man.

Assuming this is true, isn’t it amusing that they might prefer a straight man become turned on by the thought of them getting knocked unconscious?

I admire fighter’s bodies as much as any fan; male, female, gay or straight. I might even like a fighter more because I think they’re sexy and have little celebrity crushes. But do you know what keeps me hot for this sport despite the fact that I get the feeling by some that I am invading macho sacred grounds?

It’s heart. The heart we witness when fighters stand up after a knockdown, wobbly, knowing full well they could get leveled again in seconds. Fighters who are dominated, bleed like faucets, tear muscles and break bones but answer the bell for the next round because they have the heart to fight until their bodies won’t go anymore.

It saddens me that so many people who love this sport don’t appreciate the heart and courage required to live a life as an out gay man. Sexism is still deeply entrenched in our society and many people cannot accept gay men who behave on the streets and between the sheets in a way that they qualify as female. I guess they don’t consider the balls of steel required to be openly gay in a world where you are continually ostracized, a  frequent target of violence, not protected by your government and told you are a gross, hellbound abomination.

 

Source

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Hey kids, I wrote up an article for the Vancouver Sun on WEC 49. I'm cool like that. Anyway, some interesting bits. First let's talk about who will be officiating at WEC 49.

All but one of the officials on tap to referee the 11 card event are Canadian with Red Deer's John Braak, Edmonton's Vern Gorman, Winnipeg's Jerin Valel and Montreal's Yves Lavigne set to be the third man in the octagon along with American Josh Rosenthal. Canadians will hold more than half of the judging duties with David Bilcerkowec, Cameron Quwek, Usman Ali and Mark Edel scoring rounds alongside American judges Cecil Peoples, Doc Hamilton and Glen Trowbridge.

There's other stuff like how Edmonton is cooler than Vancouver.

It is uncommon for professional MMA promotions to deal directly with municipalities, as athletic commissions are typically operated by the state or province, but Alberta leaves the handling of combat sporting events to the municipalities and their commissions. The last time WEC and UFC parent company Zuffa LC worked with a municipality, it was in Vancouver, a city with a council that voted to sanction professional MMA for a two year trial.in December of 2009. In March, the Vancouver Athletic Commission sanctioned the city's first professional MMA event in more than three years, but the length of time it took to sort out details such as liability and insurance put the event in jeopardy of being canceled. Fortunately for Harris, The WEC has had no such issues with Edmonton.

"Our experience has been great. We haven't had any of the issues... and I guess its just because we're dealing with a different municipality who's been doing MMA shows for a long, long time. We met with Pat Reid who's the head of the commission up there about a month ago and went through our process and he went through his process with us, and we haven't had any problems at all. In fact it's been extremely smooth."

Edmonton Combat Sports Commission Executive Director Reid agreed, stating simply "Zuffa folks are a breeze to work with."

And Horodecki idolizes GSP, awww.

"I've been looking up to St. Pierre for a long time." Horodecki tells the Sun. "I started in the same organization (Montreal promotion TKO) where he started and where he was a champion. The athletic fighter that he is.. you always look up to this kind of guy.. the confidence he has... seeing the success that he had. That's drive, you know, that's drive."

 Peep the rest here

Also, follow me on Twitter y'all! @m4quinon

UFC 114 was interesting to me from a sports psychology perspective.

The pay-per-view kicked off with the weirdness of watching Diego Sanchez play counter fighter for 3 rounds. Remember what he looked like as he prepared to begin the 5th round against BJ Penn? His face was busted and he’d been thoroughly destroyed for the previous twenty minutes. And yet his posture and expression seemed to scream I can do this. Five minutes left. Miraculous come from behind victory. This is mine. I marveled at his mental toughness. Even after losing and while recuperating from surgery he seemed in good spirits. This guy can’t be broken, I thought. Amazing. But something in his mind must have shifted somewhere along the line because the brazen, confident, courageous zeal that typifies his fighting style was nowhere to be seen on May 29th.

Like many others, not Dana White, but many others, I was moved by Dan Miller’s plight. The mere facts of his personal life circumstance brought me to root for him hoping against hope that he wouldn’t be cut from the UFC. But what intrigued me come fight time was that he chose to stand with Bisping for the majority of the three round bout. It must have felt really good to tag Bisping, whom Miller had been told repeatedly was the stronger striker. And then in front of everyone to nail him, to hurt him with a punch, must have been exhilarating even if it came after getting clipped with 4 or 5 himself. I’m assuming that high must have been irresistible, otherwise why was he seduced into chasing a knock out instead of working the strongest side of his game in a fight that he had to win?

I’d heard people commenting that they thought Evans looked scared going into Saturday’s fight. But maybe what we took to be timid behavior was actually just Rashad’s typical relaxed demeanor. Clearly the man had a game plan that he believed in (for good reason, as it turned out). In the meantime, Rampage, who had amused us all with his cocky confidence, seemed to have messed up his own mental game in a vain attempt to get inside Rashad’s head. It appears that all the pressure he put on himself to win, prove that he’s still a relevant force against the UFC’s new breed, back up the trash talk, and return victorious after the controversial Hollywood layover, was too much. We’ve seen Rampage crack before so I suppose it shouldn’t have been a surprise that he scared himself frozen and sat back in the fight. But it was.

And Brilz? Everyone was so surprised by how well he took the judges decision but I think he was too busy feeling humbled by his success in rolling with Nog to be self-righteous. And Duffee? What does a young developing guy tell himself when he does everything right but loses in dramatic fashion anyway? Did Lauzon lose because his brother didn’t hug him enough as a child or because he is a lazy? And how great is Stun Gun? Ok, that broke with my theme but still: pretty great.

 

Twitter: @m4quinon

 

 

 

Source: Vancouver Sun

 

Former Canadian Olympic Boxer Manny Sobral's West Coast Promotions held the city of Richmond's first mixed martial arts event and the first caged MMA event in British Columbia's Lower Mainland area, which includes Vancouver. As Vancouver gears up for UFC 115 it seems human cock fight fever is intensifying in neighboring cities.

 

West Coast Promotions has set their sights on holding a boxing event at the River Rock Casino in April, but hopes Richmond will follow Vancouver's lead and sanction professional MMA locally so they can repeat Saturday's event in the city on an ongoing basis.

Sarah Kaufman fights Miesha Tate tonight on the Strikeforce Challengers Main Card. The article below is from The Vancouver Sun website.

Continue reading this post »

Promoted from the Fan Posts by Kid Nate.

On April 11, 2009, Christiane "Cyborg" Santos fought Hitomi "Girlfight Monster" Akano in a women’s mixed martial arts contest. Both women displayed an impressive skill set and Akano was stopped in the third round. This was the first Strikeforce card to be aired live on Showtime. A small step for mixed martial arts, a giant leap for female MMA. Too bad it was a total joke.

We watched as Santos dominated the fight. She threw Akano around the ring, fearlessly flurried her with punches and treated her to more than a little ground and pound. When Akano wasn’t desperately trying to take Santos down, she was running backwards. She worked constantly to isolate an arm or a leg in a vain effort to secure a submission. Akano displayed heart and grit and an ability to survive two and a half rounds of punishment from one of the worlds most repected MMA fighters.

It was the outcome everyone expected and no one wanted to see. At the weigh-in one day earlier, Santos tipped the scales at 152 pounds for the scheduled 145 pound contest. Akano was 143 pounds. The fight was nearly called off, but Santos managed to sweat off 1.5 pounds and behind the scenes Strikeforce sweetened the deal for Akano, who is a natural 135 pound fighter.

These women deserve better. At what could be the peak of her career, Santos deserves a proper challenge. Akano, presently at the tail-end of her trailblazing career, deserves a fair fight. If Strikeforce wishes to include female fighters on their roster, then they owe it to them to treat their matchmaking with care. I understand that it is likely difficult to find big, skilled, female mixed martial artists willing to face the likes of Cyborg. But to just pluck a star from overseas and try to cram them into a ridiculous matchup is an insult to the fighters and mixed martial arts in general.

So, thank you, Strikeforce. People like me who care about women’s MMA wish to see talented women involved in televised events. These same people also need to take a closer look at the problems with the organization, promotion and politics of the sport. Now we know what needs to change. The question is, does anyone care enough to change it?