Wednesday, September 16 5:00 pm PT: Considering that mixed martial arts is a sport largely lost on senior citizens and boxers, you can imagine what a boxer-turned-senior citizen will have to say about it: In Voorhees, N.J., to commiserate with Philadelphia Flyers goalie and fan Ray Emery, boxing legend Joe Frazier told Examiner.com columnist Jon Marks that he is no particular admirer of any other fighting sport.
"They don’t do any real fighting, man," he said of MMA. "When a man goes down instead of going to a neutral corner they jump on him and keep beating him.”
Frazier, 65, is representative of a lot of old-guard athletes and promoters who see no sense in the sport. And since that’s subjective, there’s really no corrective behavior available. Unfortunate, since Examiner.com columnist Michael Marley just coined the phrase “mixed martial Aryans” in a rant that pushes MMA as a “fad” akin to the Hula Hoop. (Something Marley was actually alive to see, but we digress.)
“What’s the difference between a photo or video of a large crowd at an MMA event and a photo or video from a well attended Klu Klux Klan meeting?” wrote Marley. Thank God he’s not prone to hyperbole.
Brain atrophy aside, it’s a generational gap -- and it calls to mind what today’s thirtysomethings will be railing against in their sixties.
Wednesday, September 16 10:00 am PT: Is there a better diplomat in boxing than Oscar De La Hoya? Days after promoter Bob Arum stopped coughing up mold spores long enough to weigh in on the UFC, the mostly-retired boxer gave the OC Register a fair assessment of his event’s chances against UFC 103 this Saturday. (De La Hoya is co-promoting the Floyd Mayweather/Juan Manuel Marquez bout, which airs virtually opposite the UFC offering.)
“We have no problem with that,” De La Hoya said. “Look, we have different audiences. We have our own marketing plan. They have their own marketing plan. We’re almost sold out. I don’t know about them, but … look, we have the ‘24/7’ thing (on HBO) and tremendous sponsors behind us. They have great sponsors behind them. We’re in our own worlds. Let them do great, we’re gonna do great and everybody wins.”
Are their audiences really so different? While boxing can often skew older, there’s undoubtedly an overlap -- and where those viewers lean will influence who earns bragging rights for the weekend. The last shows topped by Rich Franklin, UFCs 93 and 99, sold an estimated 320,000- 360,000 buys but were hampered by a notoriously fickle attitude from fans about tape-delayed UK events; Mayweather’s last fight, vs. UK star Ricky Hatton, sold 925,000 buys domestically. His De La Hoya bout scored 2.4 million, an industry record. But the last bout against a little-known fighter, Carlos Baldomir, netted only 325,000 homes.
Wednesday, September 16 12:10 am PT: When MTV’s “The Real World” premiered in 1992, and throughout its twenty-one subsequent seasons, viewers were exposed to a wide array of personal politics, belief systems, and cultural dynamics. Cast members were locked in a living space and forced to confront their prejudices while offering exaggerated versions of themselves for cameras.
The dominant audience reaction: will someone please punch some of these people in the face?
The genius of “The Ultimate Fighter” is that someone can.
