ROUND 2! about MMA!

ROUND 1 


about MMA & UFC!




WHAT is the ENTITY THAT OWNS THE UFC® [ULTIMATE FIGHTING CHAMPIONSHIP®] BRAND OF MIXED MARTIAL ARTS (MMA)? 

The entity that owns the UFC® [Ultimate Fighting Championship®] brand is the world's leading mixed martial arts sports association, formed in January, 2001 by Zuffa, LLC. The UFC® event productions feature a strong ownership and a depth of management experience across a spectrum of live event sports, television production and ancillary business development. The New UFC Brand is positioned well for the future as the standard bearer for the evolving and exciting sport of mixed martial arts.

WHAT is MIXED MARTIAL ARTS? 

Mixed martial arts (MMA) is an intense and evolving combat sport in which competitors use interdisciplinary forms of fighting that include jiu-jitsu, judo, karate, boxing, kickboxing, wrestling and others to their strategic and tactical advantage in a supervised match. Scoring for mixed martial arts events in Nevada, New Jersey, Massachusetts, and Florida is based on athletic-commission approved definitions and rules for striking (blows with the hands, feet, knees or elbows) and grappling (submission, choke holds, throws or takedowns). No single discipline reigns.

WHAT CHARACTERIZES ULTIMATE FIGHTING® MMA EVENTS? 
Ultimate Fighting® is a proprietary term and registered trademark and service mark of Zuffa, LLC, associated exclusively with the UFC® brand of MMA events. Ultimate Fighting® events feature the highest caliber mixed martial arts competition in the world between high level professional fighters who utilize the disciplines of jiu-jitsu, karate, boxing, kickboxing, wrestling, and other forms in UFC® live events. UFC® competitors, many of whom earned their way into the UFC events by being participants in "The Ultimate Fighter®" reality-based television series are among the best-trained and conditioned athletes in the world. While this is a highly intense sport, fighter safety is of paramount concern to UFC ownership and management: it is noteworthy that no competitor has ever been seriously injured in a UFC event.

WHAT is the ULTIMATE FIGHTING CHAMPIONSHIP® PRODUCTION? 

The new Ultimate Fighting Championship® production is a series of international competitive mixed martial arts events televised throughout each year and available live or tape-delayed on pay-per-view and other formats, seen domestically and internationally. The New Ultimate Fighting Championship® producers are committed to providing the highest quality live event and television production available to entertain and engage viewers in a fascinating sport. The New Ultimate Fighting Championship® brand of MMA event distinguishes itself from the controversial spectacle of the last decade: The first event produced under new ownership and management was February 23, 2001.

The Ultimate Fighting Championship® events are produced exclusively in cooperation with and under the exclusively ownership of Zuffa, LLC.

WHAT DISTINGUISHES UFC® EVENTS FROM THOSE OF ITS COMPETITORS?

The elite level of the competitor also known as "The Ultimate Fighter® athletes."

The UFC® events bring together the most talented martial arts experts in the world. UFC® fighters come from the US, Canada, Brazil, Japan, Russia, Holland, England, etc. All UFC® fighters have previous combat sports experience and many are world or Olympic champions. UFC® athletes train up to six hours a day or more in preparation for an event. Almost all have studied martial arts as a lifelong vocation and many are college educated. In addition to their UFC careers, many of these men are business owners. They are also students, professionals or managers working for diverse types of companies. But it is the success, discipline and focus of The Ultimate Fighter® stars that makes each of them different from just about any other competitor in or out of mixed martial arts.

Absolute consistency of rules: presence of officials, judges, weight divisions, rounds, time limits.
Leadership in obtaining commission approval for a new sport.

Mandatory Equipment: 

• Competitors may only use Zuffa and commission approved 4-6 oz gloves, designed to protect the hand but not large enough to improve the striking surface or weight of the punch.
• Commission approved MMA shorts and kickboxing trunks are the only uniforms allowed. Shirts, gis and shoes, and the problems they present for grabbing are not allowed.

The Octagon™ Competition Enclosure

The octagonal competition mat and cage design are registered trademarks and/or trade dress of Zuffa, LLC and are symbolic of the highest quality mixed martial arts events brought to you under the Ultimate Fighting Championship® brand name. In 1993, UFC events were the first to feature an eight-sided competition configuration which has become known worldwide as the UFC Octagon™

Absolute adherence to commission mandated rules for MMA:

• Commission approved gloves
• Weight classes
• Time limits and rounds
• Mandatory drug testing
• No head butting or kicking to the downed opponent
• No knees to the head of a downed opponent
• No downward point of the elbow strikes
• No strikes to the spine or the back of the head
• No groin or throat strikes
• State Athletic Commission approval in such major states as New Jersey, Nevada, Florida, and Louisiana

GET YOUR DUKES UP

These 5 UFC fighters have all given their blood, sweat and tears for the organization, and they will all hold a special place in the history of the sport. Their competitive drive, their strength to succeed and their love and passion for the sport are what brought them to greatness. And it is those qualities that will forever keep them great and true pioneers of the UFC. However, with the passing of time there will always be a fighter who will challenge himself to rise to the occasion and to one day surpass any one of these individuals to take the title of the Ultimate Fighting Champion.

TOP 5 UFC FIGHTER

Randy Coture

NUMBER 1

Randy “The Natural” Couture has speed, strength, stamina, endurance, and a

 slew of fighting skills. Couture was the first ever UFC fighter to win a championship in two different weight classes, starting his career in the Heavyweight division and becoming the UFC Heavyweight Champion in December 1997. Couture would lose, win and lose the Heavyweight title before switching to the Light Heavyweight class, in which he defeated Chuck Liddell for the title, which was the fight that gave him two title wins in two different weight classes.

On February 4, 2006, Couture retired immediately following a loss to Liddell, and on January 11, 2007, Couture announced that he was coming out of retirement to join the Heavyweight class. Couture proceeded to stun the UFC world by taking down champion Tim Sylvia and becoming a five-time UFC champ. Couture is one of only four UFC fighters to be inducted into the UFC Hall of Fame

Royce Gracie

NUMBER 2

Royce (pronounced "Hoyce") Gracie is the one person that makes the UFC automatically pop into your head at the mere mention of his name. Gracie is arguably the man that put the UFC on the map; he’s a UFC Hall of Famer and the first ever winner of the UFC open class tournament in UFC 1. A master at Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu (a submission specialist), Gracie proved to the world with his memorable wins that size and strength does not mean victory. Gracie’s wins over his bigger opponents is what gave birth to fighter’s practicing more than one fighting style to achieve success. Gracie was one of the first UFC fighters to be inducted into the UFC Hall of Fame

NUMBER 3

Ken Shamrock

Ken Shamrock was also one of the original fighters in the early years of the UFC, and winning the UFC Superfight title (an open weight class tournament) may have been the highlight of Shamrock’s career. Afterweight classes were established in the UFC, Shamrock joined the Light Heavyweight ranks, in which Shamrock had some ups and downs. The biggest moment of Shamrock’s Light Heavyweight career was his title fight against the very cocky Tito Ortiz, in which Ken lost. On November 21, 2003, the UFC’s 10th anniversary, Ken Shamrock was inducted into the UFC Hall of Fame alongside Royce Gracie

NUMBER 4

Matt Hughes

Matt Hughes is a UFC fighter who can very well do it all; he’s a submission specialist, a powerful striker and a fighter that uses his brain just as much as his brawn. After winning the Welterweight Championship in November 2001, Hughes successfully defended his title a whopping five times before losing it to B.J. Penn in January of 2004. However, Hughes regained the title in October 2004, when he defeated St-Pierre. Hughes’ reign came to an end in a rematch with St-Pierre, in which St-Pierre completely dominated the entire match. Hughes will go down as one of the best fighters to ever grace the UFC octagon, and is a shoe-in for the UFC Hall of Fame.

NUMBER 5

B.J. Penn

B.J. “The Prodigy” Penn is one of only two men in UFC history to win a title in two different weight classes. B.J. Penn is a UFC fighter with tons of skill and heart, something that can make a winner out of any fighter. Penn won his first title in the Welterweight class against champion Matt Hughes. Later on in his career Penn went down to the Lightweight class and won two straight fights to obtain the Lightweight Championship, giving Penn a place in UFC history

MMA vs BOXING

ABOUT BOXING

Boxing is a combat sport and martial art in which two people fight using their fists. Boxing is typically supervised by a referee engaged in during a series of one- to three-minute intervals called rounds, and boxers generally of similar weight. There are three ways to win; if the opponent is knocked out and unable to get up before the referee counts to ten seconds (a Knockout, or KO) or if the opponent is deemed tooinjured to continue (a Technical Knockout, or TKO). If there is no stoppage of the fight before an agreed number of rounds, a winner is determined either by the referee's decision or by judges' scorecards.

Tim Starks started a boxing blog called Seven Punch Combo in 2007 before joining MVN that same year. He joined Bloguin in 2009. He also has contributed toRing magazine, The Sweet Science, East Side Boxing and Bad Left Hook. His boxing writing has been cited by The Wall Street Journal, The Village Voice, Deadspin and other publications. When not writing about boxing, Tim reports on intelligence agencies for Congressional Quarterly. Tim has been called a "crack head" on national television for no apparent reason and a "baby killer" by commenters on this very blog who disagreed with an April, 2008 decision to bump Manny Pacquiao down from #2 to #3 on his list of today's best fighters. His 10 favorite boxers include, in no particular order, the Marquez brothers, Miguel Cotto, Israel Vazquez, Nonito Donaire, Chad Dawson, Yuriorkis Gamboa, Paul Williams, Juan Manuel Lopez, Tomasz Adamek and... Manny Pacquiao. (Yes, that's technically 11, but he's counting the Marquez brothers as one.) Pound-For-Pound Top 20 Boxers Update, 5/10

Sunday, 02 May 2010 08:01

It was an exceptionally busy two months for some of the pound-for-pound best boxers in the world. Eight of the people on this list were in action since the last update, and four people who used to be on it aren't anymore. I've issued a rare course correction from the last update, convinced by some of you that maybe I'd over-promoted someone last time around. No matter how consistent I try to be with this subjective dark art, it reaches its dark art tentacles into my guts and perverts me, corrupts me. Anyway, the ultimate standard remains how a boxer has fared against quality competition (especially of recent vintage), with activity level and rough estimates of talent figuring into the mix too. But you're probably wondering: Was there a change at the top after the big Floyd Mayweather-Shane Mosley fight? Wonder no longer. 1. Manny Pacquiao (welterweight) Mayweather’s win over Mosley gives him the best win of his career, and arguably a better win than any of Pacquiao’s, but it doesn’t fully eclipse anything Pacquiao has done for the totality of his career or even over the last couple years. Don’t forget that since around this time in 2009, Pacquiao has beaten two boxers widely ranked in the top 10 pound-for-pound (Miguel Cotto and Ricky Hatton) and a third ranked in some people’s top 20 (Joshua Clottey in March), plus he claimed record fourth lineal championship at junior welterweight and conquered two big welterweights. And none of that takes into consideration that he beat three boxers earlier in his career that arguably rank among the 50 greatest ever (Marco Antonio Barrera, Erik Morales, Juan Manuel Marquez) and more besides. What Mayweather has done in the last year (and his career) is extremely good too – but for now, it narrows the gap between #1 and #2 rather than closes it. I used to think there wasn’t a debate about whether Pacquiao was the pound-for-pound king. Now there is.  Hopefully, everyone involved takes it personally and decides to settle it in the ring. It’s THE fight in boxing. 2. Floyd Mayweather (welterweight) Except that 2nd round pounding he took, Mayweather turned in perhaps his best performance in a fight against his best opponent. What more could you want? We had a feeling Mayweather's talent would rise to the occasion when presented with an opponent who was this good, and it did. If he did it more often, he'd be my pound-for-pound king. That I think Mayweather would likely beat Pacquiao is secondary -- the best fighters have to prove it. Pacquiao's proven it over and over again against the utmost competition. Mayweather, finally, is getting there. And he needs to get into the ring with Pacquiao to decide it once and for all -- blood tests and purse splits be damned. Find a way to get into the ring with the best opposition, Floyd. For the first time in eight years, you did Saturday. You can do it again. 3. Paul Williams (junior middleweight) If “The Punisher” seems too high to you, I offer you two counterarguments: 1. He was #4 on my list and a few other sensible ones, and he benefits from Mosley’s drop; and 2. On short notice last year, he beat the man who two weekends ago claimed the middleweight championship and debuts in the top 10 of my list, Sergio Martinez. A rematch becomes perhaps the second-most desirable fight in all of boxing, but if Pacquiao and X can’t come to an agreement on a fight, Williams deserves to figure into the mix. I know, I know, nobody believes he can get to 147 at his height. But what do you want to bet he weighs less than 154 this week at the weigh-in for next weekend’s bout against Kermit Cintron? Anyway, I think he’s stuck at #3 until #1 and #2 square off, or he gets a shot at one of those men himself. (P.S., most of the above is clearly contingent on Williams beating Cintron.) 4. Chad Dawson (light heavyweight) Except Bernard Hopkins, who has no interest in battling him, Dawson has cleared out the old guard at light heavyweight. That leaves the young guard, and he’s stepped up to the plate – he’s booked for an August fight against Jean Pascal that will determine the lineal, Ring magazine light heavyweight championship of the world. That might or might not be enough to move him into my #3 spot – but if he wins it, it sure won’t hurt. I’m pretty sure I’ve mentioned lately that the win over Tomasz Adamek keeps looking better all the time, but it warrants mention again after Adamek got another nice notch on his belt in April. 5. Shane Mosley (welterweight) How much to drop Mosley is a difficult question. I didn't drop Juan Manuel Marquez very much for losing to Mayweather, and Mosley fared better against Mayweather than Mosley did. It's tough to say why Mosley disappeared after that amazing 2nd round, but at least a big part of it was Mayweather, who really turned it up a notch in the 3rd and never let Mosley get back into things. It's at least possible Mosley aged overnight, but it's also possible -- and he said so himself -- that being out of the ring since January of 2009 affected his performance. His stamina wasn't where it usually is. So I'm going to give him the benefit of the doubt. In part because it's hard to imagine considering putting him beneath the next guy.

MUSIC to the SOCIETY

Music is found in every known culture, past and present, varying wildly between times and places.  Since all people of the world, including the most isolated tribal groups, have a form of music, scientists conclude that music is likely to have been present in the ancestral population prior to the dispersal of humans around the world.

Music is influenced by all other aspects of that culture, including social and economic organization and experience, climate, and access to technology.

Today, more people listen to music than ever before. Live performances have also increased in number and size. Certain kinds of music have leaped over the oceans to entertain multitudes in ways never anticipated a few decades ago. Music has become a presence and power with awesome effects. Popular music has become a global language that leaves a personal and permanent impression. From early times, music was heard in the presence of the performer at festive occasions, at times of praise in worship, and at times of war in preparation for battle. Each culture, thus, made music fit its own particular taste from simple drum-like instruments to the precision and demands of instruments like those in the keyboard, string, woodwind, brass and percussion families.

Music has a significant affect on its listeners. it is used to inform the masses. music can influence the way we dance, dress, talk and it also sets the tone for cultures.  

I think that music of a particular time seems to relfect the opposite of what's going on in society. For example, think of Mozart's music, it's some of the most beautiful music ever written, same with Beethoven. Now both of these composers lives weren't exactly easy. They suffered, lost their families and were constantly struggling, with either money or social acceptance. Now we have bands like Black Sabbath, and Cradle of Filth.....just look at these names. And the music seems to be written always about really bad violent things, sometimes sad...etc etc. Music is a form of art. How will it affect society? Well, music is one of those things that is uncapable of sustaining life, but things like music, art, poetry....these are the types of things that we stay alive for. I'm not sure on how it would effect society, but I know that in some cases, depending on the type of music it would be good, and on some others, it would be bad. The more aggressive the music, probably the more grumpy the people who listen to it if you know what I mean.

Music has long been an expression of people from different cultures around the world. The oldest artefacts that show people playing musical instruments are found in Asia and are around four thousand years old. Other archaeological findings suggest that different cultures around the world have always focused on their own special instruments and unique methods of playing them. However, no matter how much music may have differed in different parts of the world, it seems that music served a general common purpose: to bring people together.

On Animals and Plants, Too!

Tests on the effects of music on living organisms besides humans have shown that special pieces of music (including The Blue Danube) aid hens in laying more eggs. Music can also help cows to yield more milk. Researchers from Canada and the former Soviet Union found that wheat will grow faster when exposed to special ultrasonic and musical sounds. Rats were tested by psychologists to see how they would react to Bach's music and rock music. The rats were placed into two different boxes. Rock music was played in one of the boxes while Bach's music was played in the other box. The rats could choose to switch boxes through a tunnel that connected both boxes. Almost all of the rats chose to go into the box with the Bach music even after the type of music was switched from one box to the other.