Where does "TUF" go from here?

Since the first Chris Liben melt down to Ryan Bader wrestling his way into a 6 figure contract I have devoutly watch the Spike TV/ UFC program "The Ultimate Fighter" reality series. This brain child of Dana White started back in the Reality Show boom a few years back. In a wash of terrible reality shows, this show really didn't stand out at first. I think if you were a die hard UFC/MMA fan you were watching, giving support to the show to see it work. I think the mass public looked at most in the TUF 1 house as a bunch of meat head thugs that were just there to hurt each other. I would say that the first season is still my favorite, which seems to be the case in most reality show instances, there is a sense of reality that is captured on the first one. A close second is Josh Hanes on season 3, his motives for being there were truly honorable and he fought like he had to win. Many of those guys were there for the TV time. I think the show took on a life of it's own and showed that it was a cash cow then the live finale took place and we got so see Griffin Vs. Bonner in a hellfire 3 round beat down. Both men left everything in the octagon and for their efforts were awarded UFC contracts. Bonner has kind of petered out, but Griffin wound up fulfilling his and the UFC's dream of cultivating a champion from the reality series.

Lately, though, the TUF product has become something of a character clinic. Truly, I really watch anymore of the fights and the coaches. I could watch these shows like I watch Britney Spears music videos...with the sound off! Two words, Junie Browning. Junie maybe single handedly killed this shows success in the long run. Then again, maybe his Liben-wannabe antics have secured that it will be around for a long time, taking it in strange new directions.

For fight purists and those of us that actually practice avenues of Mixed Martial Arts, I want to throw up every time I see our sport depicted in this way. Even Dana White in the first 2-3 seasons said that he was out to break that street thug image that most people have of the sport. So with great anticipation and reluctance all at once I wait for this season's TUF.

The bright spot in this season has got to be the fact that Michael Bisping and Dan Henderson are the coaches. Like I said I watch now a days for the fights and the coaches. Most find Bisping annoying, but he is a damn good fighter and I like him. Hendo is always a good show, but he is so low key and soft spoken, it will be interesting to see how he translates to TV.

Who knows, maybe this batch of fighters will be great and not just in it for the TV time. It does seem like after a alcohol filled sausagefest season, Dana tones it down with an actual good, technical, clean shaving boy season. Cheers to all who still have the stomach to watch the train wreck that is The Ultimate Fighter!

The thrill of Victory and the pain associated with it

Exactly one week ago to the day I entered into my second foray in martial arts. The area's Brazilian Jiu Jitsu ProAm tournament, "The Best of the Best 9." Like I said in recent posts, this event takes place in Omaha, NE and is an open invitational competition to anyone with a submission or wrestling fighting style.
Before I give my thought about the event and the outcome of my particular divisions I would like to clear up any misconceptions of Jiu Jitsu. Loosely translated from its Japanese origin, Jiu Jitsu means the Gentle Art. This is obviously an example of Feudal humor, since the only thing gentle about the art is maybe the camaraderie between the participants. When I tell someone at work that I am studying and competing in Jiu Jitsu, most of the time I get an, "Oh, wow...what is that?" So I have to explain that it is a martial art, and what it usually entails. If you don't know what Jiu Jitsu is, this is the basic way that I explain it. If is very close to Greco-Roman Wrestling, but you can submit your opponent instead of pin your opponent. Next question I get is, "What do you mean by submit your opponent?" I mean, if I am on his back with my arms around his neck I am trying to choke him until he either taps or passes out from a lack of oxygen to the brain. I know that it sounds serious, but only the dummies let themselves go that far. If I have an opponents arm in a angle that puts pressure on a shoulder or elbow, this may also garner me the submission.
One major misconception is that we hit each other, which is false, striking is not permitted. Jiu Jitsu has in the past 10 years become synonymous with Mixed Martial Arts or MMA. In MMA, Jiu Jitsu is what happens when the two participants get to the ground, minus the strikes on the ground. OK, everyone got it?
After waiting 6 hours to finally get my matches going at the tournament, I began my quest for metal, or rather medal. I started in my Gi division, which is 221 lbs. and up, which I may add was the heaviest division at the tornement. Out of a field of 6 competitors I held my own. My first match was against a Sam Longstaff out of Topeka Jiu Jitsu, in Kansas. The match went the distance, the entire five minutes, with myself winning by points. I still am not sure how many points I was up, rumor was I had a 13 point lead over him going into the last minute. Most of the match I had his back, but to me the match seemed closer than the result showed. Sam was a hell of a competitor, and had a determination to win that rivaled my own, which was great. Because my second match was a total disaster for yours truly. Be the time my division was beginning the coordinators were realizing that this ProAm was taking way too long and needed to speed things up, so they began putting entire divisions out on all three mats. To make a long and pointless story short, guys were having to compete on one mat right after they got off of another mat. This happened to me in my second and it really showed. Luke Schollmeyer, fighting out of Omaha. Beat me soundly within 2 or 3 minutes. Which was ok, I really didn't expend a lot of energy and was no worse for wear coming out of it. There are sometimes in life when you know you can't win, considering the hand that is dealt, and this was one of those times. So I fell into the losers bracket, I was going to have to fight my way back up. I then took on a competitor, who I am not sure who he was or where he was from. To be honest, he shouldn't have even been competing, I soundly beat him, I basically drove him to the floor by off-balancing him and pushing him over, I jumped on top of him in side control and submitted him with a Kimura (arm crank). The entire match took less than an minute. This is the way you stay fresh in competition, taking out the competitors quickly to save energy. The final match I had in this division was for the Bronze medal and took place against Sam Longstaff again. Sam had won his second match, I would like to think that I helped him, I was coaching him from the side, since after his first match he befriended my and we hit it off, I thought giving him some advise was the least I could do. We squared off one last time, with intentions of winning a medal. Sam took me down quickly and landed in my guard. It seemed like all my training had prepared me for this moment, within a minute he was tapping from an armbar to Gi choke, something that we had been working on just the week before and I had never gotten anyone with it before or even tried it out. The elation of winning a medal was great, I wish we both could have felt that way, but for every win there must be a lose. Anyway if you want to see how anyone else did in their division, please check out www.bjjomaha.com. The video is of the bronze medal match between Sam and I.

Best of the Best 9

Just 2 weeks away from my second foray into the competitive Jiu Jitsu I am getting anxious to see the competition. The Best of the Best Tournament is help every few months in Omaha by Midamerica Martial Arts of Omaha. This tournament is like any other tournament, teams show up and their team members participates in matches for individual glory as well as team points that could give them the coveted championship.

The tournament in my opinion could be better, the competition is good, but the actual structure of the tournament could use some sprucing up. I don't want to throw stones, I think it is great that someone, anyone is putting together a Jiu Jitsu tournament that is available to all the schools in the region.

This BOTB is looking promising as far as depth of schools that will be competing. According to http://www.bjjomaha.com/ there are 10 schools that are sending fighters to compete. One of which is our very own Roseberry's, which I will represent.

At BOTB 8 I had 4 months of Jiu Jitsu under me and I think I put on a pretty good show, coming in 4th place in my divisions. But this time around I have really been training hard and learning the craft and am looking at getting a medal...Third or higher!

If you are reading this and live in the Omaha area, please, come check out this competition.

Best of the Best 9

Blackburn High School

2606 Hamilton St., Omaha, NE

Competition Begins @ 9am

Admission is $5

Getting back on the horse

WOW, didn't realize that I hadn't posted anything since October with this. A lot has changed since then. I had another kid, I participated in my first BJJ tournament, I got two crowns on my teeth, so some good, some not so good.

I thought I would take a minute to say that I have now decided that if I am going to blog it needs to be streamlined. Writing journal form about anything is way too taxing to do. I don't have the time or the resources and frankly I don't think many people give a damn about what I think on all issues. I know I don't care what some random jerk thinks about certain areas of life in general.

SO...This is going to become a MMA blog site of sorts. I feel that I have enough of a background in the culture of MMA that I can hold my own. After this week I feel that I should take some time and speak about a few headlines that arose.

First is the Ken Shamrock Steroid suspension. If you are an MMA fan you probably saw this coming a mile away. When I met Ken a few years ago I thought to myself, "There is no way this guy gets this body at his age by just going to a gym." I wish I could have shown you a picture of him next to me for comparison, but the dick was charging $20 to get a pic with him and I am not an idiot. But, I digress, Ken was set to face former WWE star Bobby Lashley in a few months for Roy Jones Jr.'s promotion. This obviously won't be happening due to the fact that Ken lost his fighting licence for one year. Well at least he has his own promotion "War Gods" to fall back on. Although the product that he put out there in way of a fight card left a lot to be desired. Tank Abbott is the only name in his promotion and he is about 15 years past his prime. Ken didn't strike me as a very smart guy when it comes to money, but I could be totally wrong. That meet and greet was a pretty long line and if everyone but me paid $20 for a pic with Mr. Shamrock, he probably made out pretty well. Too bad he is pissing away his money trying to put together a promotion that in his eyes I am sure "rivals" the UFC. Kids, DON'T DO DRUGS of any kind. Eventually they all mess up your brain.

Round 2, Here we Go!
UFC was sent into a PPV tailspin this week, and in my eyes for the better. UFC 98 when first envisioned by the brains of the UFC was to be the epic battle of Frank Mir V Brock Lesnar 2. This was to be for the heavyweight title, and we finally would have some kind of justice in the division. But, Mir became injured and was forced to pull out of the match. They decided to scrap the fight until Mir can get back. In it's place the UFC formulated a match for the Light Heavyweight belt between Rampage Jackson and Rashad Evans. This came off of last week's lackluster Rampage win over Jardine. The real magic happened and the hype for this fight began when Evens entered the cage after the match and Rampage peppered Evans with trash talk until Evans felt the need to swear. Evans is a cocky, but laid back guy, Rampage knew exactly what to say to get Evans riled up. GOOD FOR YOU Rampage, your cardio sucked, but your mouth works just fine...Not SO fast. Turns out that Rampage needs surgery on that trash talking mouth and now will not be able to back up his talk. The UFC had to scramble to salvage this sinking PPV and went with Evans V Lyoto Machida. Machida is a great opponent in my opinion, but unless you are a true fan of the sport, you probably have not even heard of the guy. Let me put out my prediction on this fight, since I believe the mass populous won't bother to watch this PPV. Machida wins by decision, and not split decision. He has one of, if not the best striking defences in MMA. The guy is like Teflon, you can't stick this guy. He is a Brazilian Karate Champion as well as a Jiu Jitsu fighter, extremely smart and well-rounded. Evans is a hell of a striker and wrestler, but if he can't hit Lyoto or take him down he will get flustered and a flustered fighter is a vulnerable fighter. Ask BJ Penn about that, he will talk shit about GSP forever and it is all because GSP had a much better game plan that Penn. That and Penn's ego was not as big as GSP's muscles. Sometimes bigger is better, ask Couture after fighting Lesnar. See, I am qualified to at least put in my 2 cents on this stuff.

I promise that not all my rants will be this long. I didn't even get to the 'Mask' Lewis death story. RIP Charles, you will be extremely missed.

UFC Hits Omaha

The wife and I took a trip up to Omaha yesterday to catch the UFC Ultimate Fight Night, and boy I have to tell you it was good. Solid action by some veteran and up-and-comers. The UFC decided on having it at the Civic, which was somewhat strange I thought at first, since the Qwest is just down the road. I think they did this to test the demographic, see if the midwest was willing to sell out a moderately sized venue. I believe this did happen last night and hope that Dana White is wise to the fact that we have some great fans in this area who are hungry for sports action.