Reveling in a Cornucopia of Combat Sports
Posted on | May 19, 2007 | 2 Comments
Ramble On: The Inaugural Rant of New FNU Staffer Charles Schmidt
Hi. Welcome to the first train wreck of an article I have scribbled for the loyal followers of Fight News Unlimited. I am excited to be a part of the team, and hope to entertain and or infuriate as many of you as possible.
It’s a good time to be a fight fan. Boxing may be doing its usual punch drunk last round waltz, but it’s safe to say that there will be plenty of good boxing for fight fans in the future. You just might have to watch it on Telemundo. The almighty casual fans of boxing—those people that make up the bulk of PPV purchases—are stampeding over to the UFC. Fed up with no name heavyweights, dull technical bouts, and no reasonable organization or rankings within the sport, MMA has opened refugee camps for all the boxing ex-pats. When it comes down to it, Floyd Mayweather’s athletic brilliance or Oscar De La Hoya’s hard left hook cannot compete with Chuck Liddell’s heat-seeking overhand right or Anderson Silva’s brutal clinch work. The casual fight fans want constant action, and that action is in MMA.
Don’t get me wrong, I love boxing. I am not one of those nerdy MMA nut huggers who think that anyone who doesn’t wear a Tapout shirt and have a nasty case of Ring Worm from rolling isn’t a combat athlete. BS. Boxing is a fine sport and I hope it returns to its full former glory and can compliment rather than compete with MMA. People waste too much time arguing over which sport is better rather than recognizing that the more combat sports we have to watch the better we are. I would love to turn on the TV and watch kickboxing matches that aren’t repeats from five years ago…reruns of irrelevant fights featuring mediocre talent that the network only shows because they bought the broadcasting rights for ten bucks and a half bag of Dorito’s…and they needed to fill a slot in between competitive coin flipping and extreme spelling contests. Unfortunately, we aren’t there yet. Hopefully the rise of MMA in this country will lead to an interest in kickboxing as well, and we will see more quality programming surrounding the sport.
Point is, don’t argue about which sport is better. Ask for more. How great would it be to turn on the TV and have to choose between MMA, Boxing, Jiu-Jitsu, Pro wrestling, Muay Thai, Greco Roman Wrestling, Full Contact Karate, etc., etc.?
Thank God for YouTube. Whether you want to watch a video of a couple white trash goons beat each other senseless with nunchuks or a high quality full length Thai match from Lumpini stadium, it is all there for you. Watch Fedor train and then watch a 15 minute highlight film of a relatively obscure MMA fighter. It’s no wonder my TV barely gets turned on anymore. It’s a good time to be a fight fan. Support all the combat sports!
I am psyched to be able to ramble about fight sports a couple times a week for FNU.
Talk soon.