Lesnar The Real Deal With Win At UFC 87

Lesnar's win over Heath Herring at UFC 87 puts him on the map in the heavyweight division

Inexperience and impatience did Brock Lesnar in at UFC 81 when he took a submission loss to Frank Mir in his first contest with the Ultimate Fighting Championship. At UFC 87: Seek and Destroy, we saw a much different Lesnar, as he remained calm, cool and collected in his unanimous decision victory over Heath Herring. With the win, Lesnar avoids being called a mixed martial arts bust and solidified himself as one of the best up-and-coming stars in the entire sport.

From the beginning of the first round, Lesnar was dominant against Herring. It took only seven seconds for Lesnar to connect a right first to Herring’s left eye and bust him open. Right after that, Herring hit the ground, where he spent a great deal of the three rounds in the fight. Throughout, Lesnar did a good job of smothering Herring while using his brute force in combination with sick fists, elbows and knees. In the end, Lesnar was a more confident fighter who knows he has something to offer in MMA.

Lesnar needs to be weary of getting too over-confident. His first win in the UFC definitely puts him on the map in the heavyweight division, where there aren’t entirely too many top-notch figthers. However, even in his impressive showing against Herring, he didn’t take advantage of several opportunities to relentlessly pound away at Herring or put him away with a submission. While Herring is a smart veteran fighter who was undoubtedly solid competition for Lesnar, there is much better talent out there that won’t allow Lesnar to get away with laying his bulky body on top and allow the seconds to tick away toward a decision. If a rematch against Mir is in the cards, I have to think Mir is one of those guys that just won’t stand for that.

But for now, Lesnar erased that loss at UFC 81, chalking it up to being new to the game. At UFC 87, he proved to be the real deal with immense potential to take his talents to the top of the heavyweight division in the UFC. It’ll be interesting to see who Dana White lines up next for the Minnesota native. Whomever it is, he just better be sure not to make Herring’s mistake of arrogantly looking past Lesnar. That didn’t work out too well for Herring.

Heath Herring took a beating at the hands of Brock Lesnar

Must Win For Lesnar At UFC 87

Looks to rebound off loss to Frank Mir at UFC 81

Brock Lesnar has only two professional fights under his belt but his hype in the mixed martial arts world is matched perhaps only by EliteXC’s Kimbo Slice. Like Slice, Lesnar is a newcomer to the industry after making his name in another arena. Lesnar, however, isn’t being dealt mediocre competition like Slice. Instead, the Minnesota native has been thrown to the wolves by Dana White and the Ultimate Fighting Championship.

After handling Min Soo Kim at K-1’s Dynamite!! USA a year ago, Lesnar attracted quite a bit of attention as a legitimate MMA talent. I’m sure many offers came his way. But his physique, credentials and desire landed him in the big house of the UFC. And instantly, he became an MMA superstar and was forced into proving himself as a real heavyweight competitor in the sport.

His first fight came at UFC 81: Breaking Point against former UFC Heavyweight Frank Mir. Lesnar looked impressive against Mir, doing a good job of pounding away in much the same fashion that forced Kim into submission in the K-1 event. Mir, however, is a veteran of the game and caught Lesnar. He locked in a kneebar and Lesnar’s UFC debut came to a close at 1:30 in the first round via submission.

Unfortunately, such a result is possible when an organization chooses to throw top fighters at newcomers ran than soft competition like what EliteXC has mostly done with Kimbo Slice. Such a strategy also opens the possibility that a string of just two or three losses can cost a once heavily-hyped prospect almost all his credibiltiy in the industry.

This is what Lesnar now faces. Tonight, he enters the octagon for just the second time and will stare across the cage at another veteran heavyweight. Heath “The Texas Crazy Horse” Herring has suffered his fair share of losses to big-name fighters. But he also has 42 fights to his name with a 28-13 record and would love nothing more than to piece together two straight wins after defeating Cheick Kongo via split decision at UFC 82.

I don’t think there’s any doubt that Lesnar has the ability to defeat Herring. Lesnar more than has the skills. But if he doesn’t think before he acts like he did against Mir, Lesnar will once again open himself up and Herring will pounce on that. Can Lesnar, then, enter the octagon with both an offensive and defensive strategy?

If he can, then I think Lesnar will be on his way to putting his first UFC loss behind him and get on track to climb the ladder in a very thin heavyweight division. If Lesnar comes into this fight with guns blazing and doesn’t protect himself, then he might be staring at an 0-2 UFC record and the loss of all the momentum and big money opportunities that came his way when he first signed on.

I hope Lesnar does score the win and moves on to be one of the UFC’s top heavyweights. He just needs to stay smart, which is a difficult thing to do when thrown to the wolves at such an early stage in his MMA career.

Dana White’s Fear Of Competition

Dana White hides his obvious fear of competition.

Competition is always a good thing. Just ask fans of professional wrestling. Ever since Vince McMahon, Jr. laid his fingerprints on the industry, he has caused the extinction of territorial wrestling and eliminated any semblance of reasonable competition to World Wrestling Entertainment. He’s also changed the landscape of the business to one of “sports entertainment,” which is more difficult to create and present than traditional pro wrestling. Sure, other promotions were developed and have made their presences felt, such as Total Nonstop Action Wrestling and Ring of Honor. But nothing comes close to the WWE and it’s likely to be a very long time before any promotion ever does. Fans yearning for options and wrestlers searching for various arenas to apply their craft while earning a good buck are negatively affected by McMahon’s success in making his brand leaps and bounds more significant than any other around the globe.

 

Dana White is now trying to apply that mentality of domination to the world of mixed martial arts. Rather than co-exist with other companies in the country’s newest athletic phenomenon, the president of the sport’s most well-known organization, Ultimate Fighting Championship, is determined to make his company reign supreme and keep everybody else miles away. One must only look at MMA’s events over the month of July to realize that White’s sole goal is the growth of UFC and not of the sport as a whole, which is what he should be striving for. White has proven that while no other company is currently on the same plateau as UFC, he’s afraid of his competitor’s ability to one day get there.

 

Affliction Clothing branched off its fashion line popular in the MMA world when it developed an actual fighting promoter. With financial backing from billionaire real estate tycoon Donald Trump and in conjunction with Adrenaline MMA, Affliction held its first event on July 19. Titled “Banned,” the exhibition’s immediate draw and marketing centerpiece was a heavyweight fight between former UFC Heavyweight Champion Tim Sylvia and a man many consider the best pound-for-pound fighter in the world, “The Last Emperor” Fedor Emelianenko. Fighters like Andrei Arlovksi, Ben Rothwell, Pedro Rizzo, Josh Barnett and Renato “Babalu” Sobral were also used to sell the card. But the main attraction was Fedor, who would be making his first United States appearance since October 21, 2006, when he defeated Mark Coleman via submission at PRIDE 32: Real Deal in Las Vegas, Nevada. A knock on Fedor was his lack of legitimate competition for quite some time, facing opponents well beneath his level. Though criticized by some, Sylvia was a formidable foe. If he could defeat Sylvia, Fedor would earn instant credibility and continue on the path toward an inevitable showdown against Randy “The Natural” Couture.

 

Having the makings of a great night of fights, Affliction ran into a problem. Banned wasn’t the only MMA show that evening. Not willing to allow Affliction to garner any spotlight for itself, White announced UFC Fight Night Live 14 for free on Spike TV on the same evening of Affliction’s debut event. And if free wasn’t enough of a selling point, the main bout of UFC’s show pit the man perhaps perceived by most as the best pound-for-pound fighter, Anderson “The Spider” Silva, against James Irvin in a battle at light heavyweight. While given a choice, the option dealt to fans was extremely lopsided. Catch a great looking card for $40, or read about it while watching another great looking card for free.

 

It’s also quite contrary to White’s previous stance on Affliction that it really wasn’t a threat to the UFC, and that Fedor didn’t exactly meet the hype that preceded him. While White changed his tune on Fedor after the Russian demolished Sylvia in 36 seconds, he believes the promotion is well on its way to going out of business. If true, I don’t doubt for a single second that White would be first in line taking credit for it.

 

Not satisfied in his attempts to ruin Affliction’s debut into the MMA world, White needed to take part in ruining ratings for another organization – EliteXC.

 

EliteXC did one thing White will never be able to claim the UFC did. It was the first MMA promotion to land a primetime network television deal, signing an agreement with CBS to broadcast shows every other month. If proven successful, it could mean big things for an MMA promotion that’s not the UFC. White has to find that pretty tough to swallow.

 

Initially, he did allow EliteXC to run a show without any opposition. On May 31, the first primetime airing of MMA in the United States took place with EliteXC: Primetime shown live from the Prudential Center in Newark, NJ. Internet street-fighting sensation and MMA newcomer Kimbo Slice headlined the card with a heavyweight bout against veteran James Thompson, while the other highlights of the night featured Robbie Lawler defending the Middleweight Championship against Scott Smith and the face of women’s MMA, Gina Carano, taking on Kaitlin Young in a bantamweight fight. A good looking card, EliteXC managed to botch the night incredibly. The women’s fight was good. But Lawler vs. Smith received a questionable no contest ending because of an eye poke to Smith, who wasn’t given his full allotted five minutes to recover before the fight was called by the doctor. In the main event, Slice was clearly protected and was handed a controversial TKO victory in the third round despite Thompson still looking like he could go. On top of the final decision, Kimbo was also exposed for a poor ground game in the second round. To say the least, the show was disappointing.

 

EliteXC had an opportunity to redeem itself, though. Not nearly as stacked a card, Unfinished Business on July 26 called for a rematch between Lawler and Smith with the Middleweight Title on the line. Nick Diaz, a hometown boy from Stockton, California also received some hype as he took on Thomas Denny in a lightweight fight. This event was sure to draw a lot of interest.

 

Thanks to White and the UFC, it wasn’t the only source of MMA action for the night, however. Over on Spike TV, the UFC presented a special replay of UFC: 84 Ill Will with added behind-the-scenes footage in addition to top-tier fights like BJ Penn vs. Sean Sherk for the UFC Lightweight Championship, Wanderlai Silva vs. Keith Jardine and Tito Ortiz vs. Lyoto Machida in what was Ortiz’ final fight with the UFC. For folks that already caught UFC 84 a few months earlier on PPV, I’m sure this wasn’t a big deal. But I’m also sure there was a great deal of fans that didn’t see the show previously and were much more enticed by UFC’s offerings as opposed to EliteXC’s new, live MMA.

 

For somebody so adamant about the UFC being untouchable and other MMA organizations well on their way to going out business, White sure went out of his way to block what has to be considered the two top competitor’s to the UFC from having their night in the spotlight. If White truly believed the UFC was the be-all and end-all of MMA, he would let PPV buys and television ratings from regularly scheduled programming tell that story. He wouldn’t have to interject rushed shows and replays at all-too convenient timeslots opposite other MMA programming.

 

Don’t get me wrong. I realize why White is doing what he’s doing. I’m not completely naïve to business, even if I’m mostly so. He has to look out for his interests, which is the UFC. And it’s certainly within his rights to do whatever is necessary to make sure business is booming at Zuffa.

 

There is, however, a point where he steps over the line and is callous in his approach. Instead of promoting the growth of the sport, he worries simply about ultimate fighting – terminology he’s been somewhat successful in having substituted for “mixed martial arts.” White is determined to aid in the dismantling of any organization that even resembles a formidable foe, which I’m sure he wouldn’t hesitate convincing the Fertittas to buy up shortly thereafter.

 

While great for one company, this is bad for the industry. Fans and fighters alike need options. Fans with only one top organization to follow inevitably find it stale. And fighters aren’t given enough opportunity to make it when there aren’t enough high-profile arenas for them to succeed in. There should always be at least one other big player that can offer top quality fights with top quality fighters.

 

Out of a fear of competition, this is something White clearly doesn’t want.

 

But for as malicious as he’s been, I wonder what White could possibly have up his sleeve when the day comes that Couture is a free man and can finally go face-to-face with the only opponent he wants to take on – Fedor. Unless White is ready to sign a superfight between Chuck Liddell and Anderson Silva, he’s going to be hard-pressed to find anything, free or not, that can turn people away from the heavyweight battle of the century – one White could have very well booked in the octagon had his ego and stubbornness not gotten in the way.