MMA Rated's Ariel Helwani posted an interesting interview with play-by-play extraordinaire Mauro Ranallo from the Trump/Affliction press conference today in New York. In it, Ranallo talks about the Elite XC CBS show including the controversial Kimbo/Thompson stoppage, the refereeing on the whole for the night, as well as the post-fight press conference controversy.

Ranallo also talks about Affliction's plans, and hints that he may be calling the action at Affliction's July 19th debut show, BANNED.

In his piece, "CBS is now legitimizing barbaric sport" (check it out HERE), The Miami Herald’s Greg Cote had some choice words for Kimbo, CBS, and the sport of MMA in general.

As a fan of MMA, I do not personally agree with the marketing of 'Kimbo Slice' as a main-event fighter, by either Pro-Elite or CBS. If you wade through the muck of bias and outright factual errors, Mr. Cote makes some valid points regarding his 'legend', as well as the lack of skill in his professional and amateur contests. Mr. Cote also makes valid points regarding Kimbo’s opponent on Saturday, seen by him as just another “Washington Generals” to Kimbo’s “Globetrotters”. 

Unfortunately, Cote’s few good points are marred in an otherwise asinine tirade that seems to be based on his hopelessly uninformed opinion, rather than facts. Opinion pieces are important, and I would never suggest a writer does not have the right to his or her informed opinion. But as stated, Cote’s opinion is tragically uninformed, therefore making his piece a failure both as journalism, and even fundamentally as a piece of writing.

Akin to a urine-soaked barker screaming on a street-corner about the return of Christ, Mr. Cote's ramblings are both incoherent, and to anyone with even a cursory knowledge of the sport - yes, Mr. Cote, unfortunately you do not hold status as decider of what is and is not sport - laughable. 

In as succinct a manner as possible, I will now attempt to touch on Mr. Cote's more obvious errors.

Mr. Cote depicts mixed-martial arts as 'legalized criminality'. I am amazed there is a man claiming to be a sports writer who is so deficient in his understanding of traditional martial arts. Martial arts are long established in American and Western culture. That a sports writer of Mr. Cote's age is so ignorant to a world he should have some depth of knowledge of is extremely disrespectful to his readers. Football, while great, is not all there is to cover in sports. If you're going to write about something - either have some existing knowledge, or better yet - conduct some research.  

To continue, MMA is not the UFC's “rival”, as Mr. Cote states. MMA (mixed-martial-arts) is the sport. UFC is a brand showcasing the sport. Had Mr. Cote done even the most basic of research, he would have understood this. I'll follow his lead and take my own liberties here, and guess he was too busy blogging to do his job properly.

Mr. Cote writes that “Anything goes, including kicking. (I suppose eye-gouging might or might not be frowned upon).”  Kicking? In martial arts? I'll go ahead and disabuse Mr. Cote of the notion that eye-gouging is allowed in MMA. Of course, he probably knew that, and only tacked it on to either A) bait informed readers, or B) engender support for his uniformed position among equally uninformed readers. 

I would also like to add, if a hack-writer is going to evoke the names of Murrow and Cronkite in his writing that is neither researched nor-even handed, he or she should be fired and forced to travel around to journalism schools nationwide, his forced-mea-culpa serving as a sober lesson to future journalists.

In conclusion, don’t hate Cote, MMA fans. He’s just another clueless person who is bitter the world has passed him by. He sees something he doesn’t understand, and he recoils with his fears and biases. Whether you are a fan of Kimbo or not, or whether you agree with the lineup of our sport’s first big foray into network TV, we can all take comfort in the fact that this sport of ours is bigger than ever, and writers like Greg Cote are either forced to cover it as matter of editorial policy, or try to attack it in a pathetic attempt to increase their readership. Either way, its of no consequence. Let’s see what happens Saturday night – I have a feeling Mr. Cote will be among us, watching.