It's the start of another week: morning conditioning and training tonight, with some work in between...
I noticed how "tigerstyle" in the forums post about how lots of people will be sporting MMA clothes and will start to get involved in MMA because of movies such as, Never Back Down and Redbelt (both to be released soon). I think he's right. One good thing about this is that the sport will gain more recognition and popularity. However, with increased growth comes more problems. A negative result could be that MMA becomes as commercialized as common TKD or Karate schools. That would be very sad. Another negative might be the plethora of wannabe fighters walking around "tough" everywhere they go. It happens a lot, in all sports. All of a sudden, everyone becomes an expert - even with little or no training time.
A few weeks ago, I went to a neighborhood MMA store to buy a pair of shin pads. Being in the sport for a long time, I knew exactly what I wanted, and knew the differences among the different kinds of shin pads in the store. To make a long story short, the store's sales person was bigger than big, and not in a good way. He had to be 250-280lbs and was as round as a ball. The salesman kept telling me this and that about the shin guards, and how I have to train, etc. He was basically making me feel like a lowly beginner compared to him. Not once did he bother to ask if I trained, where I trained, and/or how long I trained. He treated me like he was the world's best pound for pound fighter. So, I just let everything go and didn't say a word. In my mind, this guy was just another one of the new "experts," licensed by watching the UFC. It's not a big deal, but it can get annoying. (If I ran the store, as part of good customer service and PR, I would make a point for all sales people to quickly recognize or find out if the customer trained, how long they trained, and maybe even where. That's providing personal customer service.)
Redbelt appears to be a better movie based on its trailer (http://www.apple.com/trailers/sony/redbelt/trailer/). You've got a better cast and professional fighters starring in the movie. Never Back Down (http://www.apple.com/trailers/independent/neverbackdown/trailer/) reminds me of old martial arts movies like No Retreat, No Surrender and Best of the Best. The movie might be entertaining, but it looks like a corny teen flick. I haven't watched the movie yet, so I'll have to wait and see.
Ok, time to run...
Monday, March 10, 2008
The Beginning of MMA Movies?
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2 comments:
i agree with that. the more commercially known a sport is, the more there will be "eperts" on mma. The "experts" that know-it-all, because they've seen great fights in their Tv's or DVD, even in the net. But the real fighters are humble through the time and pain we spent at practice.
That's true. Most of the top athletes are the humblest you'll meet. I'm curious to see what will happen in the coming years.
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