IFL Los Angeles Report
The Los Angeles Anacondas defeated the San Jose Razorclaws and the Tokyo Sabres defeated the Southern California Condors Saturday night at the Los Angeles Forum. The IFL’s first show in Los Angeles drew an estimated crowd of approximately 3,500 with a significant portion of the arena curtained off.
The show felt different than most MMA events. The sports oriented concept was reflected in crowd reactions. The crowd was quieter than a UFC or Pride show, but generally respectful and enthusiastic. They reacted big to spectacular finishes, but rarely got particularly behind or against any given fighter. Overall it featured pretty good fighting with some exciting finishes, but suffered from a lack of star power that made it feel rather dull at times. It was a mistake to run a major city like Los Angeles without a main event.
In the opener of the main card, Alex Schoenauer scored a close split decision victory over Brian Ebersole. Schoenauer scored the better blows standing, while Ebersole took him down on a few occasions and controlled the fight on the ground. Benji Radach choked out Brian Foster with a guillotine just a minute into the first round. Rising young fighter Chris Horodecki outclassed Josh Odom, but had trouble finishing and won via unanimous decision. Jay Hieron submitted Donnie Liles with a guillotine choke. Finally, Krzysztof Soszynski won a unanimous decision victory over Dan Christison. That gave the Anacondas a clean sweep over Frank Shamrock’s Razorclaws.
Sabre Savant Young won the first bout of the second meet with an impressive knockout of Adam Lynn early in the second round. Sabre Antonio McKee scored the 14th decision win and 19th overall win of his career by taking down Rodrigo Ruas on a number of occasions. Condor Jeremy Williams choked out Kazuhiro Hamanaka with a beautiful triangle. Vladimir Matyushenko won the second meet for the Sabres by stopping Justin Levens with strikes. Finally, Antoine Jaoude knocked out Wayne Cole with a brutal right hand in a fight that Cole had been winning up to that point.
The show felt different than most MMA events. The sports oriented concept was reflected in crowd reactions. The crowd was quieter than a UFC or Pride show, but generally respectful and enthusiastic. They reacted big to spectacular finishes, but rarely got particularly behind or against any given fighter. Overall it featured pretty good fighting with some exciting finishes, but suffered from a lack of star power that made it feel rather dull at times. It was a mistake to run a major city like Los Angeles without a main event.
In the opener of the main card, Alex Schoenauer scored a close split decision victory over Brian Ebersole. Schoenauer scored the better blows standing, while Ebersole took him down on a few occasions and controlled the fight on the ground. Benji Radach choked out Brian Foster with a guillotine just a minute into the first round. Rising young fighter Chris Horodecki outclassed Josh Odom, but had trouble finishing and won via unanimous decision. Jay Hieron submitted Donnie Liles with a guillotine choke. Finally, Krzysztof Soszynski won a unanimous decision victory over Dan Christison. That gave the Anacondas a clean sweep over Frank Shamrock’s Razorclaws.
Sabre Savant Young won the first bout of the second meet with an impressive knockout of Adam Lynn early in the second round. Sabre Antonio McKee scored the 14th decision win and 19th overall win of his career by taking down Rodrigo Ruas on a number of occasions. Condor Jeremy Williams choked out Kazuhiro Hamanaka with a beautiful triangle. Vladimir Matyushenko won the second meet for the Sabres by stopping Justin Levens with strikes. Finally, Antoine Jaoude knocked out Wayne Cole with a brutal right hand in a fight that Cole had been winning up to that point.
posted by Todd Martin at 11:44 PM
4 Comments:
Can MMA reach its true potential without being sanctioned in New York?
Depends on what you mean by true potential. MMA will be fine and will be a big deal without NY sanctioning. It already is. I happen to think MMA has a very high true potential though, and New York would likely help its growth.
So if the answer is no, what are the major mixed martial arts companies doing to get the events sanctioned?
I honestly think MMA has only scratched the surface, their events would do far better on the east coast as a whole (attendance, ratings, buyrates) by just being sanctioned in NY. Unless it is a business ploy to string it along to the point where New Yorkers are fighting for the sport they can't have.
I can't call MMA a big deal because its not covered nationally, except for an occasional blurb or bubble in a magazine. I mean, its not on one sports channel scroll, anywhere. And a daytime appearence on Cold Pizza doesn't mean anything. The newspapers don't cover it. It's the elephant in the room nobody wants to talk about. There's gotta be a reason for that.
I think MMA is on shaky ground because of its growing nature and if they aren't able to successfully harness their current momentum, we will be talking about MMA history in an entirely different sense.
Is it exposing MMA to call it a work-shoot? Or is offensive to the guys that don't get the oppurtunity to get to that level?
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