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By: Jason Bent, MMATorch Columnist Was Roy Nelson auditioning to be a dancer?
Seriously, after I heard the news that the UFC had decided not to pick up the former IFL Heavyweight Champion due to his looks, I was puzzled. I imagined Dana White presiding over Chippendale auditions on a Saturday Night Live sketch with Roy Nelson stepping in for Chris Farley.
Apparently Joe Silva had told Nelson to "lose some weight and gain some muscle" and that Nelson needed the “UFC look". What is the UFC look? Since when is fighting for the UFC the MMA equivalent of being a waitress at a Hooters? I know Dana White announced that UFC was going to be taking over JC Penney and offering up lighters for sale at convenience stores but when did they announce a beefcake calendar was in the works? Was this announced after the action figures and maybe I just wasn't paying attention?
Look, I will grant you that on appearance alone Roy Nelson looks like he is a practitioner of General Tso's style of martial arts and that you might imagine his gym also has a liquor license, but the guy can flat out fight. Nelson doesn't have to look like a fighter; he merely has to fight like one.
I know that Dana White wants to never again feature a guy who looks like Tank Abbott because he wants to dispel the notions that these guys are untrained barroom brawlers and the sport is unrefined but he has to realize that a guy who looks like Nelson has to actually be able to fight in order to hang with the new model MMA fighter. Roy Nelson can stand in there with the best heavyweight fighters and I have reason to believe that he could be successful when facing most of them. Nelson may look like he came from the bar but he fights like he belongs in a cage; and just watching the guy in action will tell you that he is not your out of shape local loudmouth who thinks he can kick some ass after dollar shooter night at the strip club.
Since when should how a fighter looks determine whether or not he can have the chance to prove himself in the UFC octagon? Dana White is doing nothing to dispel some of the rumblings that he is trying to be the Vince McMahon of MMA. A lot of people took offense to Brock Lesnar strolling in and receiving top billing and most grumbled that the UFC is not the WWE and should not even entertain such notions. Obviously Brock proved he could fight, but the general consensus was still that Dana wanted the larger than life personalities that permeate the pro wrestling ranks and now this body standard is going to do nothing to silence the critics. Because once you give a chance to a guy because he happens to look like you think the public wants a fighter to look, you are essentially doing the same damn thing that Vince McMahon has done, which has cultivated a culture of death in the pro wrestling world.
Pro wrestlers use and abuse anabolic steroids in order to be looked upon more favorably by the promoter and in order to have the look that so many imagine a pro wrestler should have. Obviously they are not taking steroids in order to have a competitive advantage in the ring but you can bet that they are trying to gain an advantage that will get them into the ring in front of the large crowds. I think it is great that the UFC has incorporated such production values, and I do enjoy the larger than life personalities who fight under the UFC banner, but at the end of the day it is all about who is the best fighter and has nothing to do with looks.
We do not want to see anabolic steroids become more of a problem than they already are; and it would be a shame if a fighter would use them not to accentuate his ability, but rather to become more marketable in Zuffa's eyes. If I recall correctly it was Tim Sylvia who got pinched for using steroids and he gave the excuse that he was trying to achieve a "six pack abs" look and get some more definition. If Tim Sylvia did have six pack abs I still wouldn't want to watch him fight and I definitely am not in the minority on that one. Speaking of Sylvia, how about we mention Fedor Emelianenko and how despite not having the perfect body he could possibly be the most perfect fighter in the game today.
If Fedor would eat a few more Blimpie subs he would go from the Michael Chiklis who starred on 'The Shield' to the Michael Chiklis who starred on 'The Commish,' but it probably wouldn't make much of a difference inside the ring. As long as he makes weight and is in decent cardiovascular shape then he belongs in the ring. Of course it wouldn’t have mattered if Fedor incorporated smoking a carton of Kools into his training regimen as he finished Sylvia off in such short fashion that his conditioning did not even matter. All that mattered is if he could fight and he more than proved that to any of the few doubters that remained. I don't recall any of us discussing how Fedor's body looked, and he could have looked like the Banjo Boy from 'Deliverance' and it would not have mattered. Who cares if a fighter has a certain look?
Would Matt Lindland be a guy you would want to look at? He looks like he should be driving a white van around the schools. Phil Baroni pointed out that Lindland looked like "Woogie" from the Farrelly Brothers film 'There’s Something About Mary’. However Matt’s looks don’t matter to the fight fans as Lindland has shown that he can fight. I don’t think any of us are sitting around and debating who the cutest fighter is as if we are 14 year old girls squealing and riding the arm of a couch to thoughts about one of the Jonas Brothers.
If you want to see two buff guys wrestle around, I imagine you would be best served to peruse one of the back aisles at your local adult bookstore for a video to rent and not necessarily be ordering up a UFC PPV. Now if you want to see two guys go at it in a way other than the aforementioned adult video genre, why would you care what they look like? Woogie, I mean Lindland sure looked good in victory at least.
I don't think any of us should be concerned with Roy Nelson's bulge and personally I don't worry about any fighter's bulge at all. I mean unless Ron Jeremy shows up and uses his third leg like Royce Gracie did a gi in the early days of the UFC then we should not concern ourselves with a fighter's body at all. Of course if you tuned in for the UFC and saw Ron Jeremy choking someone this is a good sign that you probably ordered up the wrong PPV, and I think you should contact your provider immediately. Of course I have nothing against Ron Jeremy; in all honesty I'd rather watch a Ron Jeremy film than one featuring Shia LeBeouf even though you could argue that both have some wooden acting skills. The only skills we need to worry about are fighting skills, and it isn't about looks or height or ripped abs but rather if they can kick ass or not.
I know that Dana White enjoys asking fighters the question, "Do you want to be a f***ing fighter?," but maybe he also asks this while they are nude in his office and standing on a scale while Joe Silva uses calipers to measure their body fat. By these standards John Basedow should be penciled in to fight Georges St. Pierre and not B.J. Penn. I mean Basedow can give you abs in eight minutes so why not give him five minutes to disembowel someone in the Octagon? From "Fitness Made Simple" to fighting made simple? Who knows but he certainly does have the "look".
Would you rather the fighters be able to fight or do you just want to go and snag a few guys off of Venice Beach because they look like they are tough. It is just a shame if the UFC changes any of their criteria to include what a guy does or does not look like. It doesn't matter if they want to be a f***ing fighter or not but rather if they are a f***ing fighter that matters in my book.
Roy Nelson should be able to rub his belly all he wants if his hand is raised in victory and he should have the chance to rub the heavyweight championship belt as well. Of course they may have to add an extension to the belt in order to fit him or perhaps have Rochester Big & Tall work on something, but Roy Nelson is a talented fighter who should have had the chance to compete in the UFC Octagon. Because they do still compete in an Octagon and not on stage after being rubbed down with oil, right? At any rate the UFC's loss is Affliction's gain as they were more than willing to take on a fighter who has as much considerable talent as he has heft.
Roy Nelson's "affliction" may be his waistline but I think the UFC made a huge mistake and possibly gave us a look inside their operations at something that will only give their detractors even more fuel for their fire. When you select an athlete based on looks it is almost a guarantee that this will not pan out for you in the future. Ask the San Diego Chargers if they thought Ryan Leaf looked like he could be a good NFL quarterback and then ask them how that worked out for them.
How a fighter looks determines nothing, but how a fighter fights certainly is the deciding factor as far as whether or not we want to look at him. Roy Nelson can fight but because of how he looks he will be fighting for Affliction rather than the UFC. The UFC comes out of this looking worse than Roy Nelson ever could.
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