Total-MMA.com

by Alan Conceicao

Few weekends can quite display the tangled web of money in the fight game quite as much as the 48 hour period that went down this past weekend. In all, there were 7 televised fight cards between MMA and boxing, each displaying a variety of fashions in which the business of combat can bring together all time classics and historic unifications. Just as easily it can divebomb events, attempt to kill careers, and artificially inflate the reputations of those involved. If you like watching people hit each other, the end result ranged from embarassing to mythically great.

When Good Business Makes For Good Fights:

The two most cogent examples both took place Saturday night on some of the biggest stages available. In Las Vegas, fans were treated to a fight between the men who were almost undoubtedly the best 185 lb fighters in the world: Dan Henderson and Anderson Silva. Finally made possible with the PRIDE purchase, unification was seen in what has been perhaps one of the UFC’s weakest historical divisions, one which started with a champion blessed to be in the right place at the right time, and which changed hands in a variety of often less than enthralling fashions. The UFC’s middleweight title finally ended up in the hands of what must now be known as the greatest fighter at that weight in the short history of the sport, as Anderson Silva has now won 4 consecutive fights since winning his belt in 2006. Both casual and hardcore fans were treated to a dream matchup that only further established Silva’s dominance at the weight class. While it was not a classic fight per se, it was a highly entertaining bout for the time that it lasted, and came to a conclusive finish that left those in attendance and watching at home more than pleased.

While the fight itself was less conclusive in terms of the victor, 4 hours away in Los Angeles, a fight for the ages took place in the longest running and most maligned of combat sports. Just as Gonzalez/Carbajal and Tapia/Ayala had proven in the decade before, life below featherweight is entirely dependent on the ability of promoters to let their wunderkind duke it out rather than uselessly hold onto belts for the sole purpose of filling out pay per view undercards. With the signing of the Marquez Brothers to Golden Boy Promotions in 2006, star-to-be Rafael Marquez was finally with a promotional entity capable of tempering the generally insane ideas put forth by manager Nacho Berenstein. The push was on to find an opponent. Gary Shaw’s charge Israel Vasquez had become the kingpin of 122, and with Rafael increasingly having difficulting making the bantamweight limit of 118, the fight was made. With each of the first two fights in 2007, a larger crowd appeared, and by the time the third one was made, there was no question that it was the first major spotlight put on the division since Erik Morales had departed nearly a decade ago.

Further adding to the seemingly impossible nature of how the fights were put together, Golden Boy Promotions worked alongside Gary Shaw’s network allies, Showtime, for the first time in their history. The end result was electric. With a star studded crowd seeing Jack Nicholson front and center, the two men engaged in a war few who witnessed will ever forget, each going down in the bout, with Rafael Marquez being dropped with merely 5 seconds left in the bout. It is impossible to think that any boxing match will be able to sustain the level of talent, skill, and determination seen in Marquez/Vasquez III, short of going a route not seen in major title bouts since the late 70s. Talk of a 4th and perhaps 5th fight have already begun.

When Good Business Isn’t So Good

However, while the bright spots of the weekend were as luminous as they could possibly get in their respective sports, it would be facetious to ignore the underlying rot in both.

The UFC comes first, though its sins are nowhere near as gross. There are no shocks to readers here that MMA is a sport which, at the moment, is more interested in the promotion of the promoters than it is those competing. That it resulted in 3 top 10 fighters being scheduled off television is a saddening statement though about what the future holds. Andrei Arlovski, Josh Koscheck, and Diego Sanchez were all demoted to the undercard as a result of contract negotiations, and though Sanchez signed a new deal almost at the zero hour, he still ended up with no promotion out of the deal. Josh Koscheck did, however, make television with a spectacular KO win over legitimate contender Dustin Hazelett, however both Sanchez and Arlovski’s KO victories remained off television. Instead, the UFC offered up a career journeyman and a kickboxer who’s muscle definiton was his best selling point as evidence of the strength of their heavyweight division on TV, as well as putting gatekeeper extraordinare Chris Leben. No mention was even made that Sanchez or Arlovski had fought, perhaps because fans at home might be a little miffed that they had the option to see them, but were essentially told to pay a couple extra bucks for the privilege of seeing them in Windows Media Player format.

But to the credit of the UFC, at least the fights those men were in were competitive, and at least they took place. The world of boxing, where abject stupidity has been a rule of thumb since the days before someone thought of gloves, and corruption not just a possiblity, but a way of life, continued to out do itself. Friday saw a fairly exciting bout on ESPN2 between undefeated prospect Michael Walker and longtime contender Antwun Echols. There’s just one problem with what was actually a passable bout: Just 48 hours before, it was a showcase for top 10 super middleweight Allan Green. For reasons discussed briefly on air and on internet message boards with his matchmaker, Green decided to simply not fight. No sincere reason for it was ever given, and the fact that Green never signed contracts until the weigh-in (revealed by Tony Holden via ESPN2) shocking.

Green is nothing short of a mega-prospect; a fighter capable of elite performances against the best. His decimation of Jaidon Codrington made him a major player among the hardcore fans and gamblers, and that he even stepped in to fight monster puncher Edison Miranda just a couple weeks prior to having the majority of his colon removed due to disease admirable. But the fight game has always, always been about the almighty dollar, and though its not clear exactly what Green was thinking when he took on actions that could have him suspended from fighting in the US while he has a iron clad promotional contract lasting well through 2009, it can only be assessed that it was anything but good for the sport as a whole.

North of the border, boxing business as usual went along in Montreal. In one of the richest divisions in the sport, Lucian Bute, a rising star, was given carte blanche to commit manslaughter by being handed an old, decrepit ex-middleweight titlist to beat on. William Joppy announced his retirement after being stopped by Lucian Bute in a vile, unwatchable contest that displayed nothing about Bute that wasn’t already known, ensured further brain damage for a man who doesn’t need it in Joppy, and enriched the pockets of burgeoning promotional giant Interbox, who sold thousands of tickets for what was, in essence, a stylized near execution of a human being. William Joppy was recently instituted into the IBF’s top 15 at light heavyweight in spite of no impressive showings whatsoever.

For combat sports, the mano-a-mano structure ensures that this sort of contest will always have a place, no matter how illegitimate or without merit it may be. One cannot remove that aspect of the sport once it becomes a business, but to let business overtake the value of competition is also a recipe for immense failure. In the post fight interviews, Lucian Bute’s trainer Stephane Larouche told the Canadian Press that Joppy’s “a great champion and he has helped Lucian to become a great champion.”

One is lead to wonder: By being a greater champion, is it by making him a better fighter, or by trying to create more faith among the Quebecois that he is as great as you say he is? After all, if he isn’t, nothing kills the ability to make money like burning the fans. No one needs to take more advice about that then the people most responsible for the future of both sports.