Rich Hansen's Take
THE MMA BLOWTORCH: Introduction to a nine part "MMA Primer" for the Open-Minded non-fan
Jul 5, 2010 - 6:00:12 PM THE MMA BLOWTORCH: Introduction to a nine part "MMA Primer" for the Open-Minded non-fan

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By: Rich Hansen, MMATorch Contributor

So, my boss at my day job (you know, the job that actually PAYS me, Jamie) has repeatedly expressed some interest to come and catch a UFC PPV at my house someday. He's never seen a show (as far as I know) and doesn't know who anyone in the UFC is, but he is the type of guy who could easily be cultivated into becoming a fan, seeing as how he's Satan* and all.

*- Of course, when I write that he's, you know, Satan, and all, I mean it in a really really good way.

While talking about the UFC with him one morning, it came up that I write for this site, and he was very impressed that I write for an established MMA site. He's not an MMA fan, so he doesn't really know that it's an 'established' site, of course. For all he knows, this site gets 3 hits a day, all from relatives of mine. Either way, he seems intrigued by this fact.

Intrigued enough where he jumped into one of Ted Stevens' series of tubes and came to mmatorch.com, live on Al Gore's interwebs. He found the link for my stuff, started reading, got about two paragraphs in, and then realized something.

Essentially, he had no idea what the hell I was writing about, nor did he have any idea who these names where that I was writing about. The concepts and the history I've been covering were completely foreign to him, so he then hopped into a different tube and off he went to www.evildarkoverlordoftheuniverse.com*, or wherever the hell else he trolls.

*-Again, I mean this only in the best possible way.

That got me to thinking. I doubt that he was the only person intrigued enough by MMA to visit our site, but then leave the site due to confusion from not knowing what the hell we're writing about. But instead of chalking all of this up to me just being a piss-poor writer who is unable to write content that is able to be understood by all English-reading life forms (perish the thought!), I realized something important.

There is a two tier caste system among MMA fans. There are Hardcore Fans, and there are Casual Fans. If you frequent this, or any other MMA site, then you likely fall into one of those two categories. Today, and for the next few weeks, I'm going to be writing directly to a third tier.

The Open-Minded non-fan.

This article serves as the introductory piece to a nine part series, designed to introduce the sport to the people who are willing to follow the sport, but don't know Rampage Jackson* from Chris Rock; Brock Lesnar* from Mark McGwire, or Clay Guida* from Shaun White.

*-To the Open-Minded non-fans: Jackson, Lesnar and Guida all fight in the UFC. I'll get to them eventually, don't you worry.

I also have a personal motivation for doing this series that I am about to embark upon.

A large percentage of MMA fans became fans in 2005. That was the year the UFC produced their reality series, The Ultimate Fighter. I didn't watch one second of it. Back then, I was a former pro-wrestling fan, but I still read Dave Meltzer's website from time to time. Back then Meltzer wrote almost exclusively about wrestling, but would occasionally drop a name or two from MMA in there. That was my first exposure to MMA. It took about a year of seeing random names being mentioned before I finally started trying to make sense of them. That is what originally led me to this site.

After seeing more mentions from Meltzer, I started watching Season Three of The Ultimate Fighter, and really enjoyed it. I wasn't going to spend $39.95 (those were the days) to watch UFC 61 where Ken Shamrock and Tito Ortiz rematched, though. Fortunately, an acquaintance of mine let it drop that he was a UFC fan, so I invited myself over to his house to catch UFC 61 on Saturday, July 8, 2006.

Looking back from today, UFC 61 was the worst MMA show I have ever seen. But it didn't matter, as by the end of that night I was hooked. I was at a party with several guys who were all hardcores, and I just soaked in as much as I could. Despite their best efforts, I still felt out of place. This was the card where Dana White (UFC President) announced that Chuck Liddell (then the UFC's biggest star and Light Heavyweight Champion) would be fighting Wanderlei Silva (Brazilian, fought in Japan) at the end of 2006 if Liddell were to successfully defend his title at UFC 62. The hardcores in the room went nuts by this announcement. I knew the name Wanderlei Silva, but it didn't resonate, so I was again left feeling somewhat out of place.

So that's my personal motivation for starting this series. I'm planning on touching on everything you, Mr. (or Ms. (purrrrr)), Open-Minded non-fan, need to know in order to get up to speed on MMA. Between now and the next UFC PPV on August 7, I plan on hitting the following topics:

• Rules and techniques (I don't fight, nor do I train, so this will NOT be comprehensive or detailed)

• Zuffa (Parent company that owns the UFC, and their sister organization, WEC)

• Other MMA based in the USA (Strikeforce, EliteXC, and Bellator)

• MMA in Japan

• Lightweights

• Welterweights

• Middleweights

• Light Heavyweights

• Heavyweights

The series will be a primer, not an encyclopedia. I'm nowhere near the level of historian needed to write an encyclopedia, nor is that what I wish to accomplish by writing this series. The goal here is just to cover information that the Open-Minded non-fan needs to know, so that they can watch a PPV with several hardcore fans and not be overwhelmed by it all. Since it took me forever to become a fan just by reading names, I plan on linking to or embedding photos and videos. This should help prevent the content from becoming too dry.

Hopefully at the end of this series, a few more people will become fans of my favorite sport. And hey, if you wind up reading my stuff regularly after I'm done, I suppose I can live with that consequence.