Tapping Out With TBerg 07.03.09: Episode XXXVIII: The Next 100

Posted by Todd Bergman on 07.03.2009

The first 100 UFC events have changed and shaped the sport of MMA forever, but what do the next 100 have in store for MMA fans? 411’s Todd Bergman takes a look at the Top 5 possible headlines that could dominate the next 100 events along with last week’s reader feedback in this edition of Tapping out with TBerg.

With UFC 100 one week away, there is a lot of talk concerning how the first 100 events played out and how they have changed a once barbaric sport into a defined sport of science and logic. Reading the countless amounts of article chronicling the first 100 got yours truly thinking about the next 100. It's safe to say that the next 100 events won't have the same impact as the first 100 events. The sport grew from an Open Weight style bloodbath to a more reasonable sport that, for the most part, is accepted by the general public in most places. With that transition having already been made, what transitions will take place in the next string of 100 events? Is there anything left to evolve the sport into other than just newer fighters with different skill sets? Answering those questions can be pretty tough, but I think that it's safe to assume that MMA will undergo some cosmetic rule changes, like every sport does, in next couple of years. It seems like each year the other four major sports add and subtract rules during the off season, so I see no reason why MMA, and most importantly the UFC, can't do the same thing. While many of you will list countless other things that can change, I've decided to take a look at what I believe will be the five biggest stories that we, as fans, will be talking about over the next 100 UFC events.


5.) Bobby Lashley Joins the UFC

You know that it's going to happen. Regardless of who Lashley has or has not fought, he's going to debut in the UFC with a perfect record. MMA fans want to crap all over him because he's a former Pro Wrestler, but so is Josh Barnett, and you hear nothing about that when people address Barnett. Lashley won't get the benefit of easy tune-up fights, so it's really hit or miss if you believe he can dominate inside the Octagon. I'm going with my instincts and am going to say that I think that he can beat any Heavyweight in the UFC not named Lesnar or Carwin. Yes, that means that Cheick Kongo and his questionable wrestling could be in a lot of trouble when it comes time for Lashley to debut in the UFC. Dana White stated previously that he wasn't following Lashley, but he will have no choice as he doesn't want to lose a cash cow to an opponent like Strikeforce or what's left of Affliction. I could also see the UFC playing up the former pro wrestler angle in order to hype a potential showdown between Lesnar and Lashley. While Lesnar is much more popular than Lashley, there is still a good following when it comes to Bobby. Whether it's old wrestling fans or just fans of an explosive fighter, Lashley has the skills to compete inside the Octagon. This, of course, could all be made null and void if Lashley appears on the new EA Sports MMA game, which Lashley is strongly rumored to be apart of.


4.) Kimbo Slice vs. Chuck Liddell

Would there really be any other purpose for Slice fighting in the UFC? His initial purpose was to promote The Ultimate Fighter Season 10, but word has already surfaced that Slice lost his first fight in the house and stormed out afterwards. At least that was the rumor that Wes Sims posted on one of those dreaded MMA message boards. The deciding factor will be when the The Ultimate Fighter cast is announced at the upcoming UFC 100 Fan Expo. If Slice shows up then it would be safe to assume that he will get at least one or two fights inside the Octagon. The first, of course, being a complete throwaway fight on the finale show. After Slice is able to win that one, he can then face a returning Chuck Liddell in what could be billed as Chuck's last fight. Who the hell knows if it actually will be his last fight, but just the thought would get more buys for the almighty Zuffa. Liddell would be fresh off of trashing of someone the caliber of Houston Alexander, so that Chuck will appear back to his old self. Like it or not, fans everywhere will buy this show just to see this fight. The casual audience will eat this up like a Sunday brunch at Grandma's house. This, and I use the term very lightly, dream match could quickly turn into a nightmare if Slice is able to dethrone Chuck. Again, I want to state that I don't think that this is a great match up, but the pairing of these two gladiators would be the talk of the MMA world. Simply look at the publicity that Canseco got from running around in his sweatpants for a few minutes over in Japan.


3.) Anderson Silva vs. GSP

While this fight is bound to happen at some point, I see MMA going the way of boxing and incorporating more Superfight-style showdowns instead of fighters taking on weaker challengers just to defend their title. This trend is already slipping more and more into MMA without much objection. I know that I never again want to see Silva play around with an opponent who was clearly out of his league. GSP is pretty close to cleaning out the Welterweight Division and arguable could do so with a victory over Thiago Alves next week at UFC 100. Moving up to 185 lbs. would be a good move for GSP as this will allow for the 170 lbs. division to build new contenders and legitimate stars to challenge GSP when the time is right. The same could be said for Anderson and the 185 lbs. division. The reverse side of the argument begs the question: how many real Superfights can their be? That would be the point, of course: every so often have two big names meet up instead of trying to hit a homerun with every show. As far as the fight goes, I've got Silva by TKO in the 3rd round to retain the Middleweight Title. I think that his ability to stop GSP's takedowns along with his dangerous strikes would be too much for GSP. I could also see GSP taking down Silva and frustrating the Spider for five rounds on his way to a decision victory. I just think that Silva can finish the fight in more ways and that his probability of winning is higher because of his striking. What UFC Superfight do you want to see? Let me know below.


2.) UFC Revives Japanese MMA

While the American perspective of MMA might fall a great deal over the course of the next 100 UFC events, I think that it would be safe to say that the Japanese will profit the most from this. It's been a long time since the UFC has visited the Land of the Rising Sun, and I think that it would be a good time to venture back to the once prominent MMA hotspot of the world. The move to Japan would also move up ventures to other locations like Brazil and Korea, just to name a few. The UFC already has a steady roster full of fighters with Japanese or Korean descent, plus the fans over there would fall in love with the likes of GSP, Forrest Griffin, Diego Sanchez, et. al. This looks and feels like a solid move for the UFC as business will slowly begin to falter here in the US as the casual fans move on to something more compelling like Twitter. Who the hell cares about that site anyway?


1.) MMA Peaks

It's a pretty sticky situation to talk about especially when writing an MMA column, but the day is coming when MMA will reach its peak. I, along with a great many of you, won't actually be affected by MMA hitting the wall, but the financial side of the sport will be. In every sport, there seems to be a point in time where the product becomes rehashed and boring. I can easily see that happening with the UFC if they aren't able to generate new stars who can relate to the audience. I know it sounds more like a pro wrestling reference than MMA, but as fans right now, we were spoiled with Ortiz, (Ken/Frank) Shamrock, Liddell, Couture, Big Nog, Fedor, and Mir, just to name a few. Who can you say of the supposed new stars can actually reach those levels? I'm a huge fan of Anderson Silva, Lyoto Machida, and GSP, but none of those guys can hold a candle to the drawing power of the above said superstars. The only true hope is in Brock Lesnar, but he isn't going to be fighting for too much longer. You can tell that Lesnar has no intentions of becoming a used-up fighter, similar to what Randy Couture has become. While, I think that it's questionable to name who can possibly become the next huge breakout stars in the UFC, I've provided a list below.


Top 5 Rising Stars For Tomorrow
5.) Anthony Johnson
4.) Shane Carwin
3.) Jon Jones
2.) Sexiyama
1.) Damien Maia


It appears that it's now mandatory for every column on 411mania.com to feature a section focusing on previous reader comments. I would like to think that I started the trend here in the MMA Zone with my weekly Talking T-Bags section. I'm sure that someone else was doing this previous to me, but I've decided that I'm taking the credit. Here's what a few of you had to say about last week's article that focused on MMA judging or lack thereof.

Kyle started us out with: I agree with the the takedown thing. Too many judges rewards guys for laying on top of a fighter for a whole round while the guy on bottom is looking for submissions and using elbows effectively. Nothing angers me more when one guys lays no top of another a guy without ever trying to improve his position. They should not he rewarded for such.

Clay Guida and Joe Stevenson disagree with your statement Kyle; however, I don't.

Guest #1801 likes the old school approach: eh, i'm pretty much fine with the system as is. the bigger issue for me is getting judges that have been "broken in" by mma. most of the current judges to the best of my knowledge started out judging boxing (could be wrong, but let's say i'm right for the sake of argument). once we start getting judges that have grown up watching mma, learning about mma, and judging mma i think we'll start to see better results. kind of like how we started out with say boxers that picked up wrestling but now have fighters that actually train in mma explicitly. i don't think we'll have too many issues once we start farming up mma judges.

Are you Canadian? Minus that strike against you, I like what you had to say here. I agree that most of the judges are corrupt boxing officials who are secretly waiting to give Evander Holyfield another terrible decision victory. I've already begun to water my patch full of MMA judges, Any chance that you can help me farm them?

Apex103 says: i really like the hypethetical scoring system, i think that would be superb, i like phil baronin but i dont think his record would be that different 2 fights maybe, ill still give him a decisive win over dave menne, ha !

If your name has anything to do with the old band Apex Theory, then I'm scoring this round for you. If your name has something to do with the shitty Wal-Mart Apex brand products then it's back to a third-world country for you. Anyway, I think that Phil's comments were awesome. It's rare when a fighter will actually be real with you. Most of the time it's a fighter only promoting whatever company will put their name his ass: lots of smoke and mirrors to make a long story short. Phil gave specific reasons as to why he thought that those fights should be scored in his favor.

Samer Tenay professes (see what I did there): Very, very interesting column Todd. I think the 10 point must system can work as long as there's a clear criteria on how to judge grappling. Does a close submission attempt weigh as much as a clean jab? A takedown as much as getting a few good strikes from the clinch? What about passing the guard? It's a bit complexe, but I noticed that most controversial decisions have come in a fight that at one point or another went to the ground.

A close submission attempt should count more than a clean jab. There's a huge difference in those two. A jab is essentially a weak punch thrown to find range. Sure, sometimes people get dropped from a jab, but it's more rare for that to happen than anything else. A close submission is a fighter trying to actually finish a fight. A few good strikes in the clinch should be weighed more than a takedown. If the fighter can do something with a takedown then award them points. Again, passing the guard should be weighed on position but only if the fighter does something with it. Just because a fighter gets into an offensive mount position doesn't mean that he should be awarded the fight. The fighters have to be proactive in trying to finish the fight or at least doing some damage. You do make a great point when you mention that most controversial decisions come from fights going to the ground. Then again, it's extremely rare that MMA fights don't go to the ground at some point.

cyks proclaims: eh... 2 quick changes and all problems are solved. Move Aggression to the most important scoring criteria and change their weak definition so it's:
Aggression- a fighter attempting to finish a fight via striking or submission and add a new category... 'damage inflicted' Granted, under my scoring, Bisping would be completely fucked and Lyoto may actually lose a round, but overall- the idea seems fairly straightforward to me. The fighters are there to fight... not to win points for the decision. The fighter who's actually trying to finish the fight should be rewarded- while a fighter who is content with simply stalling, shouldn't be.

Aggression should be the most important thing that judges look at. Your definition is spot on. I don't think that Bisping would be hurt by your rules, because in all of his fights, he is actually trying to end the fight. Hamill and Evans really did nothing but take him down and lay on him. That's about the only way that you can beat Bisping in my book. I still don't see Lyoto losing a round. The dude drinks his own pee, so that means that makes him an official hard ass in my book.

AdamS is keyboard warrior of the week: I notice that a lot of people are real big on giving people points for attempting submissions, but none of them mentioned giving people credit for stuffinh those submissions. Why would this be? After all, almsot everyone mentioned giving credit for stuffing takedowns and implications have been there for defensively cutting your opponent's striking. So why not the stuffing of submission attempts? Well, I belevie its because you'd be right back here. Becuase a lot fo epople like to compalin and say "So and so jsut laid on Dan and Dan tried 25 submissions". They don't want to give So and so credit for blockign thsoe 25 submission attempts and thus....he just laid there...and further thus...no mention of it in anty of the new fangled "fair" scoring. Also, its no surprise that Leonard Garcia hates the system. He's never won a fight that went to decision.

Sure, points should be awarded to a fighter who defends against submissions, but that fighter can't just be laying on top waiting out a decision. The problem with your statement is the fact that if a fighter is being aggressive and trying to finish the fight, I doubt that he is going to get caught in many submissions. If he or she does, and if they are able to defend them successfully, then, by all means, award them some points. It doesn't have to go back to the traditional MMA scoring. It's just recognizing and understanding positions when it comes to MMA. Also, don't insult Leonard Garcia. He actually had a logical point there regardless of his record when going to decision.

That does it for this week's article. Let me know below what headlines you think will dominate the next 100 UFC events. Don't forget that 411mania.com is a great website and you should make it your homepage as well. If you can't part with the porn homepage, then at least bookmark the site for easy internet accessibility. Remember to support your local MMA and keep your tapping hand strong.