The San Diego Union-Tribune recently published a database that details the arrests of nearly 500 active National Football League players since the year 2000 and I thought it might serve as the basis for an interesting discussion.
MMA is often heavily criticized when a member of its community gets into trouble: Rampage Jackson, War Machine, Leonard Garcia, and most recently, Tito Ortiz, have all had run-ins with the law. Those run-ins have often led to panic as fans and members of the media alike question whether MMA can afford these kinds of mistakes. Yet, the reality is that it hasn’t experienced near the problems that other professional sports have.
While MMA is in a more precarious regulatory position than other sports, the point still stands that these things happen to everyone.
That public panic happens because Dana White goes out stokes the fire. The best way to handle these things is to let them die down and fade away as fast as possible. Say it is before the courts or all the facts aren’t in and the STFU. Dana can turn any small thing into a big thing in seconds. That is his gift and his curse.
amen!
How in the world is Dana the cause of athletes being arrested being blown out of proportion? That is the silliest thing i have ever heard. What did Dana do when QJ was arrest? Nothing but bail him out. When Tito was arrested he was asked about it and said he would release Tito if it was true. The same statement any sports commissioner would have to release to the media. Fans are who blow these things up. I am to blame as many others. When something bad happens i fear the worst because i love the sport so much. I dont care about fighters no where near as much as i do the sport. I don’t panic so much about it anymore but back in the mid to late 90’s i used to make a big deal about thing like this because it could have a HUGE impact on a sport that wasn’t accepted. Now i think the sport is to the point a few things like this wont hurt. It does give some people the wrong idea of MMA but not on the level as before.
Some people want to blame Dana for everything. Its funny you guys get all tore up over your own personal hatred for someoen you have never met and never will. LOL
DW does have quite unique gifts. To witness the spectacular show that is the UFC -1st hand live is amazing. To witness his ability to connect to average Joe in a pre-event conference is inspiring. He is an incredible communicator. What I think connects him to alot of us hardcore fans is his almost need to speak his mind. Even when it polarises the community he leads. And he is our leader-again- I- just me talking -think that is what upsets quite a few of the MMA fans.
If you have never seen him hold court at a weigh-in or pre-fight function-he is good-before I saw him speak live I did not know what to make of him from TV. After seeing 1st hand his talent if we were to vote for our UFC President -he would get mine.
To go from working a door of a hotel to what he does today in a decade should inpire us all.
I largely agree with KP. My only quibble would be that so far as physical altercations go people tend to worry that a professional fighter could potentially do a lot more damage than, say, a point guard. That creates a part of the lack of tolerance the public evinces towards fighter misbehavior. It’s kind of like how the judge goes tough on Nicholas Cage at the start of ConAir for accidentally killing a dude, because Cage is a former marine who should have known his combat training was too dangerous to be used in a parking lot brawl.
The worst publicity I have witnessed for MMA in general and the UFC in particular is Koscheck’s performance against Daley.
Daley did look like an ass for the suckerpunch but Koscheck robbed the audience as far as I am concerned- what is worse is the precedent that he set: winning is more important than trying to finish your opponent. I think the rules against timidity need to applied to offensive positions or at least he shouldn’t be rewarded with a title shot and a TV show.
http://joeblo.org/daily/2010/5/12/koscheck-did-sandbag-his-way-to-a-title-shot-and-a-tv-deal-b.html
Ben,
Awesome insight and even awesomer Con Air reference.