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OT: WWE/MMA/Boxing Thread

The initial lawsuits (Le vs. Zuffa & Johnson vs Zuffa) were settled a few months and the judge rejected the settlement. He was supposed to give a writing explaining his decision, but never did. The initial settlement for both lawsuits was a combined $325M. So the Johnson vs Zuffa lawsuit is still up in the air asto what's going to happen.

The problem with this settlement, assuming it gets accepted, is that it's $375M the UFC has to pony up today, but doesn't change the structure of how the UFC does business. In the last few years, every single fighter that signs to the UFC has to agree in their contracts that they forfeit the right to sue the UFC in the future for an antitrust suit.

So, those fighters will get some money, probably a lot less than they deserve if we're being honest, and the UFC will continue to roll along without giving a fuck about their talent. As per usual.
 
I’m still high off last nights fight….there’s just something extra special about the drama of those 36 minutes elite level boxing plays out over, and the ebbs and flows the fight can take, the limits these guys push themselves to stamina wise and the added potential it brings to those final championship rounds, that no other sport can match.

Other sports have their own magic, mma included that maybe boxing doesn’t have……but the drama & intensity of being on the edge of your seat for that length of time, it’s just completely unparalleled in sports, imo.

Every sport can give you their versions of a masterpiece book or film…..but only boxing can deliver a Dostoyevsky or Kubrick level masterpiece that is satisfying on a whole other level.

Last nights scrap was such a perfect confluence of (a) a fight we didn’t know we’d ever get, (b) a little bit of that hipsterdom or a epic scrap the mainstream wasn’t quite hip to (absurd it wasn’t a massive PPV draw everyone was dying to see, (c) and a dream matchup of fast technically perfect boxing technique, against someone with only slightly lesser technique, but power that could change the fight at any moment…..and it all played out about as well as anyone could ask for.


It’s no quite on the level of these as they were all insane barnburners, but it reminded me of the feeling after Barrera-Morales, or Chocolatito-Estrada, Juan Manual Marquez-Barrera, James Toney-Jirov, Israel Vasquez-Juan Marquez….just the elite of the elite going at it, in fights that should have been massive PPV’s because of the talent involved, but were more often than not on “Boxing after Dark”, or on TSN/ESPN like last nights fight.



Anyways, incredible news today that Turki Alalshik is calling for an immediate rematch. Already my most anticipated fight of the next year….
 
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There were a few rounds that were close, but yeah, there isn't a world where Beterbiev won 8 rounds. That's insane to me.

I've long since been a proponent of open scoring. I think it's crazy that combat sports are the only domains where the participants don't know if they're up or down at any point during the contest.

If Bivol knew he was down on two of the three cards in rounds 11-12, odds are he fights differently.

I'm all for a rematch, that would be fantastic.
 
Saw this coming years ago, it's why I couldn't support it in good conscience anymore. Watching my favourite athletes retire poor with CTE so Dana could buy another fucking yacht was a bridge too far. When some of the aging stars from this generation are gone (Max, Francis, Dustin, etc), I'll have zero interest in the sport until a major change takes place. I can't cheer for a guy at 27 years old that I know will be left broke and broken by 47 especially with social media providing a window into their personal lives that we never had before. I've watched Rush grow up through Max's IG over the last ~10 years now ffs.
 
I feel the same way, to an extent. I'm not going to stop watching, probably ever.

The fighters have a way to fix it overnight, and choose not to: They can unionize. They can unionize, collectively bargain an agreement and their pay would double (or more) overnight.

However, the MMA community - both fans and fighters - is such a right wing cease pool filled with conspiracy theorists, grifters and charlatans, and unionization is seen as soft, liberal, cuck bullshit and they would never even entertain it. From Bryce Mitchell's thoughts on... everything, really, to the staggering amount of fighters who believe in the QAnon movement, to BJ Penn thinking CTE is fake, to Kevin Holland saying there isn't a pay problem, y'all just don't fight enough!... I have a very hard time feeling sympathy for them.

I've watched combat sports for as long as I've watched any sport not named hockey. When you have a good contest, there's nothing on earth I'd rather watch.
 
Yeah I’ve been a long time proponent of just how brutally UFC fighters were getting ripped off, even back before Ariel & Luke Thomas got in the scene and brought it to the main stream, just comparing it to boxing card PPV sales, and then seeing the pay breakdowns you knew there was NCAA level labor theft going on. (and I’m sure you guys ran into similar things where 10-20 years ago there was still HUGE pushback from 95% of MMA fans you’d talk to, that there was any issue)

Was obvious early on that Dana was copy pasting the Vince McMahon promotional strategy (including eating up all the territorial promotions, promo & production style, etc)…..but I kinda overlooked that he also did the same maneuver of paying out certain amounts for each fighter, but then going to his big draws after a card & based on PPV sales cutting them “big” bonus checks relative to their normal pay (probably still a fraction of their worth) to give them all the impression Dana was taking special care of them, treating them exceptionally well, and therefor who never have any impetus to join a union when Randy Couture & others tried to organize one.

I’m sure it’s no coincidence that Endeavor scooped up to the two biggest “sports” in North America that have no unions.

It’s just particularly disgusting that they don’t have medical plans for these guys & their families….even if it was just like baseball where there was a certain number of games/fights required to qualify.

It’s kinda crazy that the average Joe sees UFC sell for 4 billion, and doesn’t connect the dots that it was built off the money the fighters generated, Dana & the Fertitas pilfered, and then yes reinvested into the UFC brand to grow the company…….but they did it with other peoples money, so that when they did sell they alone cashed out.

The sad part being they could have paid fair dollar, had pensions and medical plans, and probably still sold it for a billion or two or three…..but just had to make as much for themselves as humanly (and somehow legally?) possible.


All that said, unfortunately while I agree wholeheartedly with Mindz & his distaste for what these sports are doing…..like GGpX I grew up with this stuff, it’s in my bones….watching Tyson lose to Buster Douglas via free PPV via the old giant dish satellite….its my crack cocaine and I’m hooked to this shit for life.

that Bivol-Beterbiev scrap was about as close to a religious experience as I get. 😆
 
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