Apologists push positive spin after horrible Kimbo Slice TUF fight
We’ve seen brutal fights before in the UFC in their heavyweight division, but Kimbo Slice vs. Roy Nelson was a terrible fight to watch and probably did more damage to Nelson’s image than Kimbo’s.
However, you wouldn’t know that given the spin that’s being pushed on the MMA forums, the blogs, the various web sites, and even in the mainstream media.
“I thought that it was um what was really impressed me the entire show was that they really were brilliant about how they handled Kimbo Slice given you know the fact that you know he didn’t do much in the fight, they completely you know changed his character,” exclaimed a happy Dave Meltzer on Wednesday’s fight Wrestling Observer Radio show.
“You know I mean like the old Kimbo Slice that got over was this street thug, street fighter, meanest man, scary-looking man, and I mean they have turned him into this soft, um, you know um, family-man with the six kids whose you know just the nicest guy in the world and you know, no illusions that he’s the world best fighter but you just they try to make it now so you just like the guy a lot and I mean that was the whole key to this show is like win or lose, you just like the guy and then it was over, I thought that was so awesome when it was over because you know here it is it’s like it’s he lost, he’s out, and the first thing they do is like go to a commercial teasing, ‘Maybe he’s going to come back next week and be back in the tournament!’ That was really clever to you know keep people you know kind of hooked on the season with the idea that, ‘Oh, maybe he’s not eliminated and things like that,’ so I thought UFC did a great job, I didn’t think it was much of a fight.”
If people pay to see good fights on UFC shows, then the fight between Nelson and Slice was a total dud. Nelson didn’t get the spectacular knockout nor did he do much damage at all on the ground. He smothered Kimbo for two rounds and Herb Dean eventually stopped the colossal waste of time. For a fight that UFC hyped as the biggest fight in the history of The Ultimate Fighter, it sure sucked. There’s certainly some question as to how much damage, if any, this will inflict on UFC’s credibility with mainstream fight fans given how lame the fight performance was.
If you didn’t watch the fight, then reading the media coverage of the fight would lead you to believe what a rousing success it was. Instead of the media focusing on what a rip-off the fight was, we ended up getting constant spin from big and small media outlets talking about what a great hype job UFC did and what great ‘damage control’ they did for an hour on Spike TV. Meltzer led the media charge on this front.
“He couldn’t do a thing on the ground, but I mean that was the other thing is that they’re not marketing him, they make it really clear he’s not a great fighter, he’s a street fighter, it’s completely different, and he’s like a complete rookie on the ground so it was like no disgrace that when it went to the ground, you know, he couldn’t do a thing, and you know Roy Nelson’s a great grappler anyway, so it was you know that was bound to be there and I mean he tried, he kicked off the fence once, he almost you know got away but he didn’t and he was saved by the bell in the first round, you know, in that crucifix position and in the second round he you know Roy Nelson got him in it again and you know, I mean, the thing was is that Roy Nelson didn’t hurt him, you know he didn’t knock him out like Brock Lesnar did to Frank Mir, you know, he just the guy just couldn’t move, he was trapped.”
“You know, they were doing everything, Dana completely was out there trying to um you know do I guess the word is damage control, I think that’s kind of the term, but you know, protect Kimbo because Kimbo’s you know I think he recognizes you know obviously always you know that Kimbo is the money and you know they’ve got to keep him alive and you know I mean I like the change of um you know it’s very different from the Elite XC Kimbo, this was a different guy, the Elite XC Kimbo was with all the jewelry and the chains and he was the world’s greatest striker and this and that and this Kimbo is just you know a personality that you like and you watch him like you know train really hard.”
“It’s like he’s a rookie climbing, instead of being a main eventer, he’s a rookie climbing the ranks and you know it’s OK that he loses because you just are trying to like like him, it’s kind of the Japanese deal so I just thought that it was you know I mean all the things that I’ve kind of heard about the season and everything with Kimbo it’s it was like God, how are you going to you know I mean how you going to make money out of him in the long run although obviously we’ve seen so many times that if you’re over as a personality you know you can lose and you know, I mean obviously I think it’s going to be very interesting the rating.”
“If he was going to lose, the other thing is, if Kimbo was going to lose, OK, this was the way to lose. You know because he had gotten, he stood there and gotten knocked out, that wouldn’t have been good. If he would have gotten his ass kicked on the ground like pounded, that wouldn’t have been good. As it was it was like he couldn’t wrestle and everyone kind of knew going in that Kimbo’s not a wrestler.”
“I was, it you know I was just so impressed because I kind of figured you know that Roy was going to win this fight and it was just kind of like, OK, now what do they do, and I thought the whole it was like a hour of great damage control.”
If all of this talk sounds bizarre to you, it should be. The media apologists for this are out of their minds. It’s the equivalent of you paying for a concert ticket and going to the event and realizing that the performing artist is lip-syncing the entire time, only to read the next day in the newspaper or see on the local telecast the critics praising the artist for screwing over the fans and taking their money by ‘working the marks’ over.
If the UFC apologists in the media want to get all Southern Fried Carny on us, then let’s use an appropriate wrestling term to describe what we saw on Wednesday night. Screwjob seems like a tame phrase. We could use the term fuck finish but realistically speaking, the finish was ‘perfect’ and it was the fans who get fucked.
Of course, what do the fans really know? Darren Rovell of CNBC is bragging about how Kimbo Slice’s star appeal will never die. Ariel Helwani is pontificating that Kimbo Slice could perhaps do K-1 and that Kimbo’s fight performance against Roy Nelson showed some good signs. The Los Angeles Times described Kimbo’s defeat as an impressive loss.
Watching the media act as UFC apologists here reminded me of an old rule from Saul Alinsky’s Rules for Radical book. Alinsky’s book is considered the holy grail of grass roots protestors fighting The Man. In the book, Rule 10 states that “If you push an negative hard enough, it was push through and become a positive.” Little did Saul imagine that this rule would have more than one meaning and application in life in terms of spin control. See, if you thought the Kimbo Slice/Roy Nelson fight sucked and that UFC conned you, you shouldn’t feel bad about it. In fact, you should be celebrating the fact that the promotion conned you into actually believing what they were selling with the Kimbo Slice fight. You should really praising Dana White and Lorenzo Fertitta for working you over as a mark.
Ivan Trembow missed that message when he posted an article about the fight on his web site on Wednesday night.
“The problem is the con-men who have pushed Kimbo far more than his talent has warranted, from the beginning of his career to now and well into his future career in the UFC.
So, what’s the over/under on how much money it would be worth for the UFC if one of the other contestants on the show just happened to come down with an injury that caused them to have to withdraw from the competition, which would lead to another contestant coming back (like, I don’t know, maybe Kimbo Slice). They already hinted at that in the preview for the next episode. Let the “farce” continue.”
If you’re a more sane and rational fight fan who’s annoyed and irritated by what you saw on Wednesday night, maybe Rule 5 from Rules for Radicals might give you some inspiration. “Ridicule is man’s most potent weapon.” Follow that up with Rule 12 which states: “Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it.” Well, if there was ever a time to rip a new one into a bunch of media marks who can’t see the forest from the trees, now would be the time to do it. In other words, if you read a media personality trying to hawk to you the virtues of what UFC did on Wednesday night with the ‘damage control’ for the Kimbo Slice/Roy Nelson fight, slap them around (figuratively speaking) and mock them endlessly until they shut up and realize how idiotic they sound to the general public.
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