UFC Mailbag: Is UFC 330 the beginning of the end?

UFC 330 goes down this Saturday, and it’s an interesting card, because it’s not very interesting at all. The main event between Islam Makhachev and Ian Machado Garry is sensational, and the co-main event is a title fight, but the rest of Saturday’s card is lacking both in names and interest. As Sean Sheehan put it, the UFC has become boxing: a big headliner, a co-main event title fight that people don’t care about, and then mostly squash matches and filler.

So, does this portend bad things for the future of UFC fandom? Let’s discuss.

The Future (pun intended)

Dana has checked out, stars are vanishing. Is Islam vs Ian the final card before entering the worst UFC era of all time?

Entering? Buddy, we’ve been living in it all year.

I’m being a little hyperbolic here, because for as much as we might complain about things today, this is not the worst UFC era of all time. That stretch after the first 10 or so events until Zuffa purchased the company was mostly bad. Just go look at those cards; there’s a reason the company was on the verge of bankruptcy.

Even after that, the early 2000s weren’t exactly the best UFC era either. It’s the same thing with anything in the past: it’s easy to look back on things fondly and not remember the parts that sucked. High school wasn’t all parties and sports and chasing girls, just like the Good Old Days of MMA weren’t all bangers all the time. There were plenty of duds back then, too, and arguably even worse, it was harder to be a fan.

While I believe there are too many UFC events these days, my fandom started when there were hardly any, and you didn’t always get to see all of the fights. I have real memories of scouring the internet for prelim bouts from PPV events because there was no way to see them other than buying the tape. Some of you won’t believe this, but it was once a big deal when you could watch prelim fights on Facebook. That is definitely worse than the oversaturation we have going on right now.

But to get to the heart of your question, yes. This is the inevitable stage of all such things. The UFC was previously in the “customer acquisition” phase of a company, trying to get people to buy their product. Now they’re in the “maximize profit” phase, which means we aren’t their customers anymore. They’re selling to broadcasters and sponsors, and milking value from the viewers. They simply don’t have to care about trying anymore, and who can blame them? If you’ve risen to the top of your company, would you then work hard for no benefit?

Until the UFC has some competition — and they will never have competition — this is the quality of event we’re getting. But that’s OK. The main event this weekend is awesome. Let’s enjoy it.

Welterweight

Who should get the next crack at the welterweight title? Morales, Prates, or someone else entirely?

This answer to this sort of depends on the outcome on Saturday. If Ian Garry wins, there’s no need to give Carlos Prates another crack at him so soon, so in that case, Michael Morales should be next up (though I bet they’d give Islam an immediate rematch). Heck, even if Islam wins, I’d still rather Morales get the next shot at him. But the simplest answer seems to me to be the best one: neither Islam nor Garry are likely to fight again this year, so have Prates and Morales fight in a No. 1 contender bout. Winner gets the title shot. Problem solved.

Gatekeepers

Elkins just retired. Barboza is talking about possibly hanging them up after his next fight. In honor of their careers, who is the best UFC journeyman? Long tenure, put on exciting fights, but never even sniffed a title shot. I’m a Jersey guy, so I’ll always be biased towards A-10 (Jim Miller). What’s your unbiased opinion?

First, I’m gonna quibble with your choice of words here. Journeyman is a term for a fighter who moves around from organization to organization, picking up paychecks without ever making much of a mark — basically he’s a hedge knight. Darren Elkins, Edson Barboza, and Jim Miller are not journeymen; a more apt term for them would be gatekeepers. Did they fight for belts? No. But they also didn’t roam the countryside and not know where their next meal was coming from either.

Now, to answer the spirit of your question: the best UFC gatekeeper might well be Jim Miller. The man holds several records for his longevity in the promotion, and for most of his career, he fought real opposition, turning away the lesser and getting beaten only by the top-tier fighters. Miller has a substantially better career than dozens of fighters who actually fought for UFC titles, but he never had the opportunity, both because the weight class was so good and he was a little unlucky.

Other contenders for the title would be Martin Kampmann, Din Thomas, Kid Yamamoto, Melvin Manhoef (though he might be more in the Journeyman camp), Arnold Allen, Chris Leben, and I’m sure I’m forgetting a ton.

But yeah, Jim Miller is very likely the greatest fighter to have never fought for a major organization title (unless you want to count Megumi Fujii, and that’s a whole other thing), so I’ll echo your pick.

Create-a-fighter

Throughout MMA history many fighters have had signature strikes: Pereira’s left hook, Hendo’s H-Bomb, Cro Cop’s left leg, Ben Askren’s spinning backfist of doom.

If you had to go full Frankenstein and build your all-time offensive weapons fighter, what would said fighter look like?

First, I see what you did there.

Second, you’ve already spiked a few of the most potent offensive weapons in MMA history. If I’m Frankensteining a fighter, I’m definitely taking Cro Cop’s left leg and Alex Pereira’s left arm. Here’s the full inventory for my creature of pure violence

• Head – Max Holloway
• Brain – Alexander Volkanovski
• Left Arm – Poatan
• Right Arm – Francis Ngannou
• Hips – GSP
• Left Leg – Cro Cop
• Right Leg – Shogun Rua
• Chest – Merab Dvalishvili (I’m not sure where the power source goes, but chest seems like this would be the place)

That’s one goofy-ass fighter.

Thanks for reading, and thank you to everyone who sent in questions! Do you have any burning questions about things at least somewhat related to combat sports? Then you’re in luck, because every week I put a prompt into The Feed for your questions. Fire them there, and I’ll answer the best ones in the Mailbag and try to get to the rest in the responses.