Longing for the Good Ol' Days of MMA

I used to love mixed martial arts. I would watch all the fights. It didn’t matter if it was in America, Japan, Russia, or Poland, I could find interesting things on cards all around the world. And now, it seems as there are maybe two fights a month that I even bother watching. If anything, there should be more talent in the sport which would lead to a better product. So why am I not into it? Ultimately, I think the talent is the problem.

It seems the greater the talent, the less exciting the fights become, and you just can’t match the excitement of early UFC cards. I’m a bad fan in that I love the Royce Gracie era as much as anything that has happened in mixed martial arts. Those fights were memorable. I remember him taking on the one-gloved boxer, Art Jimmerson and Jimmerson tapping out even though Royce didn’t even do anything to him on the ground yet. I remember Ken Shamrock tapping out but then trying to continue the fight. And I remember Royce Gracie holding his choke just a little bit long on Gerard Gordeau because that dude was a nasty son of a bitch.

I think about the best fighters of today, and although they are head and shoulders above that original crew, how many have truly memorable fights? I loved GSP, but honestly, his two most memorable fights are his two losses where he got caught in an armbar by Matt Hughes and caught with every punch imaginable by Matt Serra.

Jon Jones is the greatest fighter in the world, but I don’t vividly remember any of his fights. I remember the elbows he dropped on Matt Hamill, the armbar he escaped from Vitor Belfort, and that nasty ass choke he put on Lyoto Machida, but are any of his fights actually memorable? I know the Gustaffson and second Cormier fights were close (until Cormier got caught), but it’s not like I remember much of the back and forth.

Heck, I’m not even sure if I can name all of the champions, without looking, I think it’s Cejudo, Cejudo, Volkanovski, Khabib, Usman, Adesanya, Jones, and Miocic. For women it’s Zhang, Schevenko, and Nunes. Now there are more champions these days, but I could have named them in UFC, Pride, and Strikeforce back in the day. I think Horiguchi and Bader are Bellator champs but have no clue of anyone else.

It’s just not as much fun anymore. When I think about all the fighters I would love to see on a dream card, none of them are active today. Let’s just put out ten guys that would be super fun: Cro Cop, Wanderlei, Royce, Pudzianowski, Sakuraba, Mark Kerr, Hong Man Choi, Minowaman, Lesnar, and Akebono. Now, I’m going to use a random number generator to make the fights:

Cro Cop vs. Royce Gracie
Hong Man Choi vs. Akebono
Sakuraba vs. Wanderlei Silva
Mark Kerr vs. Brock Lesnar
Pudzianowski vs. Minowaman

Good God, I would not only watch that card with everyone in their primes, I would watch that card today, and consider it the greatest gift of entertainment in this world. The one exception is Kerr/Lesnar which, in their primes, maybe the hypest I could be for any fight in MMA history, and if it were to happen now I would pay money to make sure that doesn’t happen. Also, sorry to not put a women’s match in there, but I did not need to see the man vs. woman dynamic, and the greatest women’s fight has already happened so there is no point to ever try topping it.


I know, it makes me a terrible person to yearn for the freakshow matches, but the heart wants what the heart wants. And it’s not like I could make a better UFC card with current champions facing top contenders in fresh matchups.

155 - Khabib vs. Gaethje
170 - Usman vs. Masvidal
185 - Adesanya vs. Romero
205 - Jones vs. Johnny Walker
HWT - Stipe vs. Curtis Blaydes

Okay, so Khabib/Gaethje would own, obviously, but it’s a significant dropoff from there. I even put in Johnny Walker just for funsies. Hell, I couldn’t do it with classic champions taking on current champions.

155 - BJ Penn vs. Khabib
170 - Matt Hughes vs. Usman
185 - Anderson Silva vs. Adesanya
205 - Chuck Liddell vs. Jones
HWT - Tim Sylvia vs. Miocic

That list of fights isn’t nearly as exciting, and that’s even with me putting in Tim Sylvia in the main event.

I don’t know. Clearly the skills are much better, and it’s not like there aren’t a ton of exciting finishes, but I feel like the UFC has made itself the star, and it’s really hard to care about personalities in today’s world of mixed martial arts. Even though guys got like 30 seconds to explain themselves at early UFC events, you actually saw a personality, and I guess it was wonderful to see how delusional they were to think people would believe that they were 400-0. Now I feel like every fighter is varying degrees of Cowboy Cerrone, kind of stupid, tougher than I could ever imagine to be, and thinking that they are the best in every area but taught well enough to give their opponents respect instead of speaking their truth. Why should I care?

But damn, thinking about that Kerr/Lesnar fight in their primes, now that is something that I would very much care about.