Strikeforce and CBS should thank Kevin Garnett
by Zak Woods on Apr 18, 2010 9:48 AM EDT
Email
PrintIt is still early on Sunday but it appears that Strikeforce: Nashville may sneak under the mainstream radar. It is a busy time for sports with the NBA and NHL playoffs, Ben Roethlisberger being a Roethlisberger and the NFL draft right around the corner but it certainly helped that Kevin Garnett caused a ruckus of his own on the hardwood.
Got to love that "playoff intensity".
That doesn't mean that CBS officials were thrilled with what happened. The suits definitely chose their words carefully saying there was "no place for it" in reference to melee and that they were "not happy" but then again it doesn't take a "Mentalist" to read what they were feeling; that's The Mentalist airing on Thursday's at 10pm ET.
Of course this lack of play is a double edge sword. It may mean that CBS won't pull the plug immediately (let's wait and see the ratings) as the event might not swirl into a firestorm of faux outrage. On the other hand, if a brawl inside the ring can't generate an iota of media coverage then Strikeforce and MMA has a long way to go (no shit).
2 comments
|
0 recs |
Do you like this story?
Comments
Got to love that “playoff intensity”.
Therein lies the double standard.
No one was worried about the future of hockey after Bertuzzi broke Todd Moore’s neck, no one worried about college football being pulled from major networks after the Miami vs FIU brawl, and no one cried about how basketball was being set back decades because of the Ron Artest fuelled brawl that included fans.
While I do think MMA fans are being alarmist reactionaries (not unlike Fox News), if major media outlets and prominent ESPN pundits decide to classify MMA as a sport because of this brawl while refusing to do the same with those other mainstream sports is appalling and would be one of the largest double standards in sports (besides the Roethlisberger rape cases) in the last decade.
"It’s going to be like sex with a grizzly bear, you know, a lot of scratching and growling on both sides." - Don Frye
Well said!
This is exactly what I’ve been saying, and perhaps it’s fortuitous that a brawl broke out on the same night in one of the “big 4” team sports.
It just goes to show how reactionary the MMA fanbase is, and what kills me the most is how they’re patting Dana White on the back but if they watch any season of The Ultimate Fighter tv show, it caters to this type of behavior on purpose by sticking fighters in a house with nothing but alcohol an rage and the fans eat that shit up.
Certain photos copyright © 2012 by Associated Press or Getty Images. Any commercial use or distribution without the express written consent of Associated Press and Getty Images is strictly prohibited.
