Everyone gets evaluated. Your boss? Evaluated. The guy that sold you your new Maytag washer last week? Evaluated. (And reprimanded, if you didn’t buy his crummy extended warranty.) Only two people have no one to answer to: God, and Jeff Sherwood.
But this shouldn’t stop anyone — like, say, a desperate, deadline-sweating columnist — to inflict the horrors of academia upon the industry. Unfair generalizations appear below.
*No, forum member throwdown59, your assertion that “GSP rulz lol” is not a viable critique.
Ultimate Fighting Championship
Description: North American leader in mixed martial arts and Xyience consumption.
Demographic: Raucous young males with attention deficit disorder and the IQ of the recently concussed.
Combatants: Cards are usually top-heavy with three to four recognized, established performers and 13-14 mid-ranked unknowns with all the fan appeal of Frank Stallone.
Organization: Title bouts are normally based more on availability and box office potential than any legitimate rankings system; despite deep talent pool to draw from, perennial under-achievers like Patrick Cote (Pictures) (1-4 in the promotion) and Elvis Sinosic (Pictures) (1-5) are granted repeat engagements.
Demerits: Allowing top middleweight contender Matt Lindland (Pictures) to drift away on a technicality; spending six-figure sums for vaunted heavyweight Mirko Filipovic (Pictures) to face the likes of Eddie Sanchez and Gabriel Gonzaga (Pictures); using veterans Royce Gracie (Pictures), Ken Shamrock (Pictures), and Randy Couture (Pictures) as chum for their next-generation talent.
Production Values: Smooth transitions from broadcast booth to ring and back again. Impressive pre-fight promotional material, including well-produced barker shows before major events, are often successful in getting fans to choose between buying the card and procuring imported beer.
Consumer Relations: Between the live broadcast and the DVD release, events can cost fans upwards of $70 each, virtually a week’s salary at Hot Topic.
Overall Grade: B
International Fight League
Description: The world’s first team combat league … which does not mean champions have to fight multiple opponents at once, as some had previously hoped.
Demographic: The media-crazy pop culture sponges who debate the finer points of Superman’s reproductive system.
Combatants: Talented up-and-comers (Ben Rothwell (Pictures), Rory Markham (Pictures)); aging athletes (Mo Smith, Marco Ruas (Pictures)) whose best days are so far behind them that their highlight reels are in black and white.
Organization: Stringent, with team meetings based almost exclusively on a structured season schedule.
Demerits: Lack of live television hurts any sport; team concept tends to dull once the winners are up 3-0 in a best-of-five series.
Production Values: Solid, though the aforementioned tape delay prompts in-fight editing and fractured televised cards.
Consumer Relations: Product relies on sponsorships to offer content at the low, low price of free; attractive Web site made all the better by the inclusion of “Ask Don,” a dating and relationship column by grizzled old boot Don Frye (Pictures).
Overall Grade: B-
PRIDE Fighting Championships
Description: Wildly inconsistent Japanese promotion that mixes epic bouts like Fedor vs. Cro Cop with sideshow acts like Giant Silva vs. Minowa and Butterbean vs. high blood pressure.
Demographic: Anime fans; future epileptics who enjoy the pretty lights.
Combatants: A disparate army featuring the best of the best … and Zulu, Jr.
Organization: Total chaos. Non-title fights are the norm; genetic misfortunates are slotted in marquee bouts; matches sometimes decided only days before an event. The car wash at your local middle school is more carefully planned.
Demerits: Holding bouts under different rules depending on the country hosting the event; giving pro athletes little notice; Takada’s diapered buttocks.
Production Values: Sensational. Athletes are presented as larger-than-life icons; staging, with its elaborate decor, is missing only a John Williams score.
Consumer Relations: Talent-heavy Bushido events are a steal at $8-$10 per DVD, though plans to air overseas events “live” in the U.S. would presumably appeal only to insomniacs and serial killers.
Overall Grade: B
K-1 HERO’S
Description: Oddly punctuated spectacle from Japan.
Demographic: Tape hoarders and Bob Sapp (Pictures) devotees; pay-per-view customers who missed the first half-hour of “Girls Gone Wild” and feel they’d be lost in the narrative.
Combatants: Japanese superstars “Kid” Yamamoto and Kazushi Sakuraba (Pictures); acromegaly sufferers.
Organization: An even bigger mess than PRIDE, if that’s possible. Matches are arranged regardless of weight, skill level, experience, or medical history.
Demerits: Willfully subjecting the battered Sakuraba to further punishment, virtually guaranteeing his future need for assisted living.
Production Values: Events tend to be in color and in focus.
Consumer Relations: Poor. Events land on U.S. outlets weeks or months after the fact. DVDs are non-existent, forcing fans to visit Japanese video stores and wade through shelves of tentacle fetish videos to find wares.
Overall Grade: C
BodogFIGHT
Description: Self-indulgent ego stroke of billionaire online gaming mogul Calvin Ayre, who resides on a Costa Rican compound guarded by former Gulf War snipers. (Any similarities to “Enter the Dragon” are purely coincidental.)
Demographic: Religious zealots who have mistaken upstart network Ion for their beloved PAX programming.
Combatants: A mix of familiar faces (Yves Edwards (Pictures), Chael Sonnen (Pictures)) with stern-looking refugees from Russia. And bizarrely, Fedor Emelianenko (Pictures), a conceit akin to shoving Tom Cruise into a movie starring Clint Howard.
Organization: Bouts are based on the moldy concept of the Cold War, with American freedom fighters opposing the Russian automatons.
Demerits: Childish regard for opposing promoters — subtitles once had PRIDE brass talking about their “shameful behavior” in Costa Rica; throwing piles of money at Matt Lindland (Pictures) to risk his neck against Emelianenko, a fight I will watch in spite of myself.
Production Values: Surprisingly effective commentary is diluted with cornball vignettes featuring “player” Ayre romancing bored-looking women he picked up from central casting.
Consumer Relations: Bulk of their product is on free television, with the odd pay-per-view thrown in when Ayre feels like hemorrhaging cash. Makes no mention of its airdate or timeslot during commercial or print advertising, effectively making it the “Where’s Waldo?” of MMA programming.
Overall Grade: C-
EliteXC
Description: First premium-cable MMA offering from Showtime, the minds behind the Seymour Butts reality show and the lean years of Mike Tyson. You pick which is more embarrassing.
Demographic: Cable subscribers who don’t feel their bill is quite large enough every month; those who absolutely need “2 Fast 2 Furious” playing every four hours.
Combatants: Marquee names (Shamrock, Gracie) intertwined with mid-card talent and a future star in Gina Carano (Pictures).
Organization: No titles under contention at the present time; presence of Frank Shamrock (Pictures) virtually guarantees parade of “He’s fighting who? I thought that guy was retired/injured/dead” reactions.
Demerits: Kitschy fire-breathing dragon serves to introduce fighters; lame ticking clock on the ground further promotes the Chuck Norris-ization of the sport.
Production Values: Crisp HD presentation; inaugural event had awkward pauses with Mauro Ranallo staring wistfully into the camera.
Consumer Relations: Live undercard was free to visitors of the Web site.
Overall Grade: B-
For comments, email jrossen@sherdog.com