An Inside MMA segment that ticked me off; Fight to win or Fight to entertain?

"I fight to win for me. FOR ME"

--Ivan Drago, Rocky 4

Recently, I watched last week's edition of Inside MMA on HDNet and there was a segment on there that angered me as a fan of MMA. First let me give some you a quick background on this story. Antonio McKee is the MFC Lightweight Champion and has not lost since dropping a decision to Karo Parisyan back in February 2003. McKee has currently been under fire for "not finishing fights" specifically from Inside MMA host Bas Rutten and HDNet Fights President Guy Mezger. Both men have said that his style is boring due to lack of finishes and his controlling wrestling style.

The segment included McKee, Rutten, co-host Kenny Rice, former UFC champion Forrest Griffin and the MFC promoter Mark Pavelich (who just looks like a typical "MMA Promoter"). The gist of the segment is this, McKee doesn't finish people and he is boring.  Therefore, McKee has stated that if he goes to a boring decision, he will retire because the fans must not understand the sport if they can't appreciate what he does. He states that he will change up his normal gameplan and fight "toe to toe" like everyone seemingly wants him to do. Needless to say, this segment pissed me off.

Now, this claim that McKee is boring is dubious at best. I've seen a couple of his fights and I would not describe them as "boring". Yes, he doesn't finish his opponents but the lack of a finish doesn't mean the fight was "boring". McKee is a wrestler who chooses to focus on that aspect, taking his opponents down and using control and ground and pound to win the fights. Is it not the job of a fighter to win? Especially a champion? I could understand if you're a "Chris Lytle-level" fighter who has come to grips with the idea that you'll never be a champion and therefore should make secret deals with opponents to keep it standing and go out and put on wars. Or even if you're a young fighter trying to get noticed by the larger organizations. I don't agree with it, but I understand the mentality. But Antonio McKee is 40 years old and is already the champion of his organization. Unfortunately, at his age, he's probably not going to see time in the UFC and is focused on winning and putting food on his table.

The notion that he should change up his style to please the fans and the promoter is bluntly idiotic. Like Forrest said "You don't change up what works". The man hasn't lost in seven years. That's like telling Michael Jordan to dunk the ball on every attempt because dunks are exciting and that's what the fans want to see. This is supposed to be a sport, not pro wrestling, not the X-Games, not ballet. This is a fight and you do whatever it takes within the rules of the sport to win. Don't put yourself in danger unless you have to. There's no difference in what McKee does and what the UFC Welterweight Champion GSP does or the man about to get a 2^nd try at the Middleweight title Chael Sonnen does.  I honestly hope that this is all him blowing smoke and he comes out and does his regular gameplan and gets the win.

Shame on Bas and Guy. As former fighters, they should know better than to critique a winning formula. Then again, they aren't speaking from the view of fighters, they are speaking as businessmen. For Mezger, the more "exciting" the fights, the more people watch and thus, more money for the company. This isn't the year 2000 and this isn't Japan where wins and losses didn't matter and it's all about HOW you fight. There's real money to be made in this. Wins and losses count just as much in this sport as in any other.

The same can be said about MFC promoter Mark Pavelich. We all understand you don't really care who wins and who loses; you only care about the bottom line. How much money can be made? That is the reason behind your interest in "exciting" fights. You go so far as to say that fans want the standup finish and want to see guys get knocked out. Then why don't you promote kickboxing? Why don't you go the Elite XC route and pay fighters to stand up? I mean that's what fans want, right? As much flack as Dana White gets, you'd be hard-pressed to find him saying some idiocy like that. He might call a fight where there's no action boring (Starnes/Quarry, the last 2 rounds of Silva/Maia), but I've never seen him criticize a fighter's winning gameplan.

The fans are not blameless in this issue either. The constant whining of "lay and pray" and calling a fighter a "blanket" leads to promoters thinking in this archaic way. Yes, fans like exciting fights. I love exciting fights. However, a fighter should not sacrifice his wins and losses to be "exciting". Many fans call GSP boring because he doesn't stand up and bang and take people down and works from there. That statement is silly. For the fans that cry for legitimacy in the mainstream, you can't in that same breath cry for knockouts and big finishes. That's like expecting every NFL game to end in a Hail Mary pass. I would say that the percentage of NFL games that are more than 2 scores apart (meaning can't be won in one play) is much higher than the number of non-finishes in MMA. Yet no one will call those games boring. Fans need to appreciate the SPORT of a good wrestler or the SPORT of a BJJ player before others not as familiar will accept MMA as legit.

It's funny to me that the only active fighter (besides Mr. McKee) is the one saying "this is stupid".  Forrest Is right, this is dumb. You fight to win.