Do you recall a BLSays gem a year or so ago entitled “White Boy Football”. It discussed the booming popularity of Lacrosse among a certain athletically disenfranchised ethnic demographic. This is a companion piece …. Ultimate Fighting is “white guy boxing“.
That Lacrosse analysis was quite brilliant !! Here comes another one that will give lots of reasons to say “uuummmm”.
According to well-known boxing promoter Bob Arum – UFC (aka MMA aka Mixed Martial Arts) is nothing more than “white boy boxing”. Bob Arum for those who don’t follow boxing (which is most people these days) is “a white Don King without the Buckwheat hairdo”.
Bob’s comments are linked up top in NEWSFLASH.
Arum makes his living promoting endless bouts between “some 145 lbs black guy you’ve never heard of vs some 144 lbs guy from some obscure South American banana republic you’ve never heard of either”.
Arum has been around forever and a day. He got his start booking opening acts in the Coliseum in Rome between “a lion and some 145 lbs glass-jawed pug from Gaul.” He co-promoted the events with Caligula.
My exposure to UFC / MMA is limited to how far away the remote is and if women’s basketball is my only alternative. I’ll take The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills over either one.
I imagine Andy Griffith seeing his first Ultimate Fighting / MMA event would be a bit like “What it was was Football!” without the big orange drank. From what I have glimpsed it’s:
…. two drunk Marines in bathing suits blowin’ off steam in a chicken coop over who insulted whose girlfriend. Most of the Marines do seem to be “white guys”.
Most Marines in general are “white guys” so I never thought much about it until I read Arum’s recent complaint.
I recall seeing the original version of this forty years at “da beach”. The beach I visited was within an hour of Camp Lejeune so drunk Marines were never in short supply. Back in the day, they could fight and never dislodge the pack of Luckies rolled in the sleeve of their t-shirts. I guess “the pack of Luckies” was taken out of the sport as a negative influence on American youth.
The Sport of Ultimate Fighting was started a few decades ago by The Gracie Family in Brazil. I met the Gracie patriarch a few years ago at The Arnold Classic. He did not have a pack of Luckies in his shirt sleeve. I did not insult his girlfriend so our meeting was amicable.
Other than both sports look like they hurt, the other similarity between Arum’s “sweet science” and UFC / MMA is that all the contestants are (First Name) The ______ (Last Name). Everybody has to be nicknamed something fierce.
Bob Arum whining that there aren’t enough blacks in UFC is not as news-worthy as one of the Justice Brothers whining it. That’s Revs Jesse and Al. Bob Arum lacks skin-cred when dealing the race card.
Apparently UFC / MMA bouts fill armories and arenas every week all across the country. Bob’s ballyhooed fights between “the little black guy & the little Uraguain” don’t draw like they used to. Mob bosses, obscure comedians and their enhanced arm skanks still show up at Vegas fights but they’re all freebies. Otherwise Bob’s caddy Eldorado would blow up, with Bob in it.
PPV (Pay Per View) of Arum’s fights ran out of marketing gas when Leon Spinks lost his last tooth and Evander Holyfield ran out of ears.
Evander ran out of ears …
Bob wants to make folks stop watching “white guys fight” so he will have the only fights to watch. Can’t blame him for wanting that.
Speaking of skanks, hot-bloodied biker chicks like UFC / MMA fights too. The no-holds-barred nature of the whole thing sends all sorts of hormones into overdrive.
I never discuss a problem without offering a solution. Listen up Bob.
Baby boomer babes are where the future lies for boxing. ….. Blondie’s personal trainer Nikki “The DI” Armbruster started Blondie on a boxing regimen several months ago. She loves it. She’s forever running around the house throwing jabs and crosses. Learning the difference between a hollow-core door and a solid-core door was a painful experience….. but the best learning experiences usually involve some pain.
