Is it me or has MMA been boring lately?

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I want to start out by saying that MMA is my favorite sport behind American Football. I have been watching since I worked at Movie Mania and borrowed/stole all the stores UFC vhs tapes, watched all of them over and over again showing all my friends how awesome this shit was. I have enjoyed watching the old Pride fights. I have enjoyed watching the first few seasons of TUF. I have enjoyed watching Matt Hughes, Franklin, Tito, Randy,Bj, introduce the general public to the UFC. I enjoyed watching GSP dethrone the long time champ in Hughes. The Spider destroying Franklin. And of course Chuck Liddells run as baddest man on earth. Then something happened……….

It seemed to be a good thing. MMA/UFC was bringing the sport mainstream. I was excited, still am excited. But now guys seem to be afraid to fight. Make that they r afraid to lose. It has become all about out pointing the opponent. Greg Jackson’s camp is the one who has become the leader of game planning and doing just enough to outpoint the opponent. Now is it smart and does it work, hell fucking yes this shit works. I get why u would do it, cause a win is a win and another win moves u up one more notch in the division. But damn this shit is getting boring!

I am also sick of the scoring debate. 10-9/ no it was a 10-8 round, Diaz was robbed, Bisping won not Chael. The scoring is just flat out STUPID. A 10-9 system was designed for boxing, not MMA. When r we gonna come up with a solution.? Im also sick of oh he was the aggressor, he walked him down. Dude, just because one guy stalks and initiates does not mean he is controlling the octagaon (Lenorard Garia comes to mind for this point). Im also sick of, oh he got the takedown he deserves to win that round. Even though the guy got up a half a second later after the takedown. U have to do something with the takedown. Also tired of guys gassing. Penn, Hendo, shogun, wiedman, Johnson, etc. I don’t care why u r gassing, don’t gas, u r a professional athlete.

I also feel there r to many cards. The top talent is spread out to thin. Don’t get me wrong I love watching MMA all the time. Recently we got like 4 weeks str8 with MMA on tv. But that has made the cards weaker. I miss the old days of stacked cards. I miss watching cards like 112. That card had the Spider, Maia, Penn, Edgar, Hughes, Gracie, Story, Phil Davis, Munoz, all on that card. The cards now have questionable Main event fights. Anyone else getting fed up with all this stuff?????

I don’t have the answer but here are some suggestions, feel free to tweak, discuss, make fun of cause I know there will be people who will.

First, how about making fights 5, 3 minute rounds. The fight will still be 15 minutes, but making rounds shorter would make guys less hesitant to go for something big. For example, A really good striker can let loose not fearing a takedown, cause in a 5 round fight they can afford to lose a round or 2 because they got aggresive and maybe got taken down and sat on for the entire round. The BJJ guy can throw a slick risky sub attempt not having to fear again getting put in a bad position and losing round cause guy just sat on them for rest of round. In a 3 round fight if u lose 1 round cause u went for something and then got stuck being on your back, well now u have to post a shutout the last 2 rounds just to win the fight. Or heaven forbid u get a point taken away for something. Damn your fight is pretty much over in a 3 round fight. I think 5 rounds will help some of these issues. Not to mention a few more rounds means a few more minutes in a fight between rounds to catch a blow.

2nd, we need to figure out how to score and judge fights. Just cause a guy is the aggressor does not mean he is winning a close round. Leonard Garcia is a perfect example that just because u r aggressor u should be win a close round. Some guys r counter fighters, its not their style to walk down an opponent. They should not get penalized for for proper footwork and using angles to manuver around the cage. Scoring also needs to be tweaked. Judging takedowns, leg kicks, sub attempts, improving position, etc. How do u score it? Everyone scores it different and that leads to the huge problem we have now with all the inconsistent judging. I don’t think the judges r stupid, I think they like all of us don’t have a correct way to score a fight, therefore must make guess work out of close rounds. Look on this website, the message boards r like 50-50 on who wont the Condit-Diaz fight. Does that make us stupid or does it put us in the same boat as the judges. Meaning different eyes or mindsets dictate who wins a close fight. The 10-9 does not work and taking points away in a 3 round fight is also stupid. U cant make it up in 3 rounds. In a 12 round fight like boxing a point deduction does not mean as much. So as far as taking points needs to be looked at as well.

I also want the TUF shows to concentrate on the talent in the house. I don’t care who is coaching if the guys in the house blow. I want to see ready to fight in the UFC prospects on the show. That means paying more money to guys on the show maybe. Giving the winners bigger than that bullshit 6 figure contract spreadout thru like 6-8 fights. Last season was better and I hope new the format changes help this next season.

The last thing I don’t have a suggestion on how to fix. So I will just say I miss, the all out wars in the cage. I don’t care to watch the point fighting that has become the standard lately in the UFC. Maybe this is just due to lack of top notch fighters fighting on every card. Or maybe its that the talent is so much better these days that they just offset each other in the cage. Whatever the reason, I just hope these kind of fights find their way back to MMA more often.

There is so much more I would like to discuss and debate. However I don't want to ramble on anymore than I just did. So I will leave it up to u Mania, to discuss and debate how we can make one of our favorite sports better. And if u r gonna get on here and pick apart my writing flaws and poor grammar, save it, I dont care. I just want to discuss ways to make MMA better.