Outside the Octagon: Is the Dominance of Brazil over in the UFC?

Brazil has been dominating the UFC for years. This has been from the very beginning of UFC back when Royce Gracie use to beat fighters double his size. There have been points when over half of the UFC champions have been from Brazil. Now Jose Aldo is the lone remaining champion.  I believe there are two main factors that have led to the recent spur of American champions, growing popularity of the UFC and the evolution of the sport as a whole.

Outside the Octagon: Team MMA, The Next US Sport?

About a week ago Deadspin posted an article about Team MMA.  If you have not seen the video I highly recommend you click on the link and check it out.  To summarize the video, it is a 5 on 5 match between Poland and Sweden.  Each person fights one person on the other team.  When someone wins they are now free to help out any of their teammates.  You can imagine that this is when it starts to get pretty insane.  

Outside the Octagon: Crowdfunding in Professional Fighting

Professional athletes are always trying to find new ways to make money to help them personally and to allow them to commit to their sport full time.  Some of the past ways include sponsorships and endorsements, autograph signings, personal appearances etc. MMA athletes have added a new one to the list, crowdfunding.

Feeding the Soul: Displaying Courage when Most Vulnerable

Violent, barbaric, and disgraceful, are three adjectives often used to describe Mixed Martial Arts. Many people believe that MMA is not a sport, rather an excuse to beat the crap out of someone. These people argue that MMA displays the militaristic and non-classy characteristics of our society.

What's next for the UFC and Anderson Silva?

This past weekend was UFC 153 who’s main event was Anderson Silva moving up to the 205 pound division to face Stephan Bonnar.  Bonnar had never been knocked out before and Silva quickly changed that in the first round.  Silva made quick work of Bonnar while at the same time toying with him for most of the fight.  This is the third time that Silva has fought at 205 and none of those fights have ever made it to the second round.  He has also dominated his own division of 185 pounds for years.  The only logical thing to do next, in my opinion and most other UFC fans’ opinion, is to set up a superfight between Jon Jones and Silva.

This fight has been talked about within the last year and a half ever since Jones started to dominate his weight division.  Both of these fighters are 1-2 in the pound for pound rankings of current fighters.  Not only would this fight be amazing for the fans to see it would also be great for the UFC.  The financial potential for this fight would be through the roof.

The highest gate revenue ever at a UFC event happened within the last couple months at UFC 148.  This event included Silva and had a revenue of almost 7 million.  The fight between Silva and Jones could easily surpass this no matter where the event is held.  The event could exceed the highest grossing Pay Per View total as well.  The current record is held by UFC 100 which featured 2 title fights and a matchup of Ultimate Fighter coaches.  The Silva-Jones fight could beat this just on its own so adding one other great fight could destroy the old record.  Finally sponsorship sales would be at record levels because of the potential record amounts of people viewing the event.  

Everyone who is a fan of the UFC hopes that this fight may one day happen but I doubt that it ever will.  After last weekend Silva said that he is done fighting at 205 forever.  If this fight were to happen it would not be until after Jones fights Chael Sonnen in April of 2013.  We are realistically looking at this fight at the earliest of July 2013, which is if the fight even happens at all.  As a fan I will continue to dream that this matchup happens one day in the future but I will not get my hopes up to high.     

Co-Op Confidential - Greg Monforte

Name: Greg Monforte
Year: Sophomore
Company: Daddis Fight Camp
Location: Cherry Hill, NJ

What does Daddis do?

Daddis is one of the best Mixed Martial Arts schools in the area.  They offer lots of martial arts training including Muay Thai and Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. 

What are you doing?

My coop so far has consisted of mostly the regular gym maintenance and greeting and helping students when they arrive.  Gym maintenance includes the everyday cleaning and helping with side projects that need to be done around the gym.  This week I started making cold calls to potential clients who took a free lesson before but never signed up.  I am offering them a discounted deal to try to help boost enrollment.  Another part of the job that I have been working on so far is sales training.  Once the sales training is complete, I will start doing the introduction lessons for new students.  The final aspect that I have done so far is helping with in-house events.  This past weekend Daddis held a Family Fun Day.  My responsibilities for this event included making the schedule of events, setting up these events the day of, working the event, and the clean up after the event was over. 

What will you be working on?

As my coop goes on my job responsibilities will continue to grow.  I will be done the sales training soon and will start selling their program to perspective students.  At Daddis we are working towards the goal of getting forty five new members to sign up in the month of May.  Doing cold calls every day will help us reach and hopefully surpass this goal.  As summer gets closer there will be more events held in-house and at their Philadelphia location that I will be helping with.  These events include tournaments, staff meetings, and kids’ summer camps. 

Do you like it so far?

So far my coop has been a great experience and I have enjoyed it a lot.  One of the best aspects about my particular coop is I get to do experience many different areas of the job.  When my coop is over I will have experience in sales, marketing, and event management which gives me a better idea of what I will want to do later in my career.  My personal favorite part of the job is that I get to train for free.  This may not interest a lot of students at Drexel but I have always been a fan of MMA and use to train Brazilian Jiu Jitsu in high school.  As I got older it became harder to train because of the financial burden and time management between school, work, and training.  Now I have more time and can train for free at one of the best MMA schools in the area. 

Be honest, are there any downsides?

Even though I really enjoy my coop there are always cons at every work place.  The biggest con is that the job can be slow and a little boring at times.  When I am not training or helping around the gym my job is to sit at the front desk and greet students as they come in.  This can be boring because most of the time I am the only one at the desk.  Another con is that since I am the intern and new at the school I have to do a lot of the jobs that no one else wants to do.  This can include cleaning the bathrooms, weeding outside, and organizing the equipment. 

What are you looking forward to? 

When my coop is complete in September I would have learned many skills that I can use in my career.  One of these skills is cold calls.  If I get into sales for a career this will be of the main parts of my job.  I can practice at Daddis to get use to making calls to people I do not and get use to people rejecting what I have to say.  Networking will be a huge advantage that I will get from my time at Daddis.  They have many connections with Bellator and the UFC which could help me get a job at either one of these organizations later.  Finally if I wanted to get into Event Management I will have a lot of experience in that area when I am done.  By the time my coop is over I would have helped run close to five tournaments, summer camps all summer, and countless other events including staff meetings.