Monday, April 23, 2007

Gonzaga-Cro Cop Piece

You can check out my most recent piece for the LA Times, with thoughts from Dana White here.

8 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Not sure the loss is a business "disaster" for UFC.

10:55 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Nice column, Todd.

I have to say, I'm really enjoying all of these "upset" wins. I don't exactly pay money to see name talent win in squash matches against people I don't know. I want to see a realistic MMA fight, where...gasp...anything can happen.

Glad to see White isn't bent out of shape about the way things are going. Overall I really think events like this will bode well for the UFC, and MMA in general.

Besides, even with the upsets, there will always be name guys out there (like Chuck Liddell, Couture, etc.) who will draw anyway.

Keep up the good work,
Ryan Rosenthal

11:18 PM  
Blogger Todd Martin said...

The word "disaster" is nowhere in the article.

Thanks, Ryan.

11:34 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Wasn't this article.

2. MIRKO CRO COP: A loss to Gabriel Gonzaga in England would be a business disaster for UFC.

11:43 PM  
Blogger Todd Martin said...

Oh yeah. That was a different article though. I didn't want the impression that I was advocating the result was a business disaster in this article because I was specifically trying to show two sides.

But if you're asking my personal opinion? Yeah, business disaster. I stand by that.

11:51 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Not in a position to second guess. Understandable.

12:36 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Speaking as someone who's seen plenty of Mirko Cro Cop, I personally wasn't that invested in the notion of him and Randy Couture for the title, but maybe that's just me.

While obviously the knockout and overall all-around loss didn't do any favors for the UFC's heavyweight title picture, I think the loss (and those of it's nature) are only short-term. Long-term I don't think it does any real damage, and you have the potential to build new stars off of their upset success against a name talent. Of course, that all depends on the MMA fighter in question, but that's to be expected. Nonetheless, upset wins in MMA are par for the course. Hopefully White and those like him capitalize and try and do the best with what the situations presents to them.

12:41 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

UFC is losing a lot of credibility with its fans by people like Dana White and Randy Couture claiming they favored Gonzaga. That's either demonstrably idiotic or, much more likely, a total lie. It's akin to favoring Warriors over the Mavericks in the NBA playoffs: everyone realizes it's feasible and you may even like the odds of the underdog more than others. But to say that he/they have better than a 50% chance of winning is foolish.

9:17 AM  

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