OC Times Editorial: The State of MMA, where upset is king.

This commentary contains UFC 70 spoilers if you've not seen it consider yourself warned.



Pride 33: Sokoudjou Def. Antonio Rogerio Nogueira
UFC 68: Randy Couture Def. Tim Sylvia
UFC 69: Matt Serra Def. Georges St. Pierre
Pride 34: Sokoudjou Def. Ricardo Arona
UFC 70: Gabriel Gonzaga Def. Mirko Cro Cop

All of these fight results are considered to be upsets. Yet, are they really? I've been thinking about this since I saw the result of tonight's Cro Cop fight, yeah, I read the spoilers.

The thing is, that when enough of these kinds of things happen, it is the indication of a trend more than a series of fluke occurrances. However, I want to do something before I examine the trend.


I'm going to rank these from least shocking to most shocking.

1. Randy Couture Defeats Tim Sylvia - UFC 68

The least shocking of all the resent upsets to me. The fact is that Couture was a former champion in 2 different weight classes and even though he is 43 years old, he was more of a known comodity than any of the other men who have pulled off recent upsets.
It was a good story, but this was not a fight where I said to myself: "I never saw this one coming".

2. Sokoudjou Def. Ricardo Arona - Pride 34

This is the second least surprising just from the standpoint that this was his second upset in a 2 month period and not nearly as shocking as the first. However, it is still pretty big considering he'd had all of 5 fights prior to this.

3. Matt Serra Def. Georges St. Pierre - UFC 69

No, I never saw this coming and this would've been the biggest upset to me if the next to events had not taken place. Fact is though that Serra had a gameplan and he executed it and he won that fight. He was not given a chance by myself or very many others for that matter and this was one I didn't see coming. However, I think had you asked me which was more likely a Serra victory over GSP or a Gonzaga victory over Cro Cop I would've said Serra.

4. Gabriel Gonzaga Def. Mirko Cro Cop - UFC 70

Nobody gave this man a chance in hell of winning this fight, and this just proves that everyone is stupid if they think they've got this sport figured out. I'm going to examine the how and why further down, but the fact is Gonzaga's opponents weren't exactly the who's who of MMA.

5. Sokoudjou Def. Antonio Rogerio Nogueira - Pride 33

This man was entering in to his 4th fight against one of the Nogueira brothers who between them had never been knocked out. He not only won the fight but did so by knockout in a mere 23 seconds. I can't even imagine what Vegas Odds would've been for this fight.

One thing that all 5 of these fights had in common is that none of them were flukes. None of these men were being dominated before they pulled out an out of nowhere win. They were all in control. Sure, the Sokoudjou upset of Nogueira was considered a fluke just because it didn't last very long, but that was erased once he fought Arona with a similar outcome. So these weren't the freak of nature type things like in days gone by or in other prior upset bouts.

However, I think that these upsets can be explained. As the sport of MMA has become more popular it has become more prosperous and thus more people can make a living fighting full time. In the days gone by many of these fighters would've had to hold down other jobs while training to fight, with only the very top men able to work full time.
Now though, more and more fighters are able to spend more time training in different disciplines. This leads to more well-rounded competitors with more complete games. The result of this is that the gap between the top guys and the next level or so down is shrinking rapidly.


What you are seeing is the beginning stages of parity. If you are a fan of the National Football League you know what I'm talking about.

You are approaching a day where anyone can beat anyone else because the field of play is even. In the NFL you used to have a large group of haves, and another large group of have nots and nothing in the middle. Now you have a league where aside from the very best team and the very worst team, the teams are even to the point that any one of them is capable of winning any week regardless of conditions. Even for the bottom and top teams though it doesn't take a lot to change around fortunes. A team can go from worst to the playoffs in a year, and from Super Bowl champs to barely a playoff team or even out of the playoffs the next.

I think this is what you're beginning to see in MMA. The more diverse your skill set the wider range of fighters you are able to match up well with and thus the greater the chance to develop an effective game plan.

The loss of 1-dimentional fighters in favor of more well-rounded ones means the loss of 1-dimentional game plans.

A fighter that is a dominant striker fighting against one who works well on the ground and in the clinch as well as striking is at a disadvantage by not being as well versed in those other areas.

So the better prepared you are the better chance you have and the more time you have to prepare the better trained you will be. We still see these defeats as upsets because they buck established trends. This is why we are merely approaching parity and not set right in the middle of it. The more that you continue to see so called upsets the less you will consider them to be upsets.

This is my working theory anyway, and until a better one comes along I think I'll stick with it. Your thoughts?