Sunday, March 9, 2014

Sunday Link Dump - 3.9.14

NEW YORK


I've been working on a longform piece for Fightland that involves digging up some links about New York MMA and the whole Culinary Union mess, so today's link dump pertains to stuff about that. Read them and weep. Literally.

  • Since the Culinary Union has been so vocal about how they feel the UFC is evil, Zuffa struck back with this nice little webpage.
  • There isn't much by way of direct evidence or smoking gun that ties the anti-MMA effort to the Culinary Union, and according to Pete Lampasona, the whole union angle is a red herring. However, I can say that I've spoken to a few high-ranking insiders off the record, and to them the union influence is real.
  • In case you wanted to know how the ban came about, you should read this.

Observations From My Couch: UFC Fight Night "Gustafsson vs. Manuwa"

UFC



  • Solid win by Louis Gaudinot, but did Phil Harris not know he was capable of that guillotine? The dude had won with that move twice before, and had threatened opponents with it many times. Come on, Phil, watch some tape.
  • Igor Araujo, Danny Mitchell, Claudio Silva and Brad Scott only got to fight in the UFC because Bellator hasn't come to the UK yet and therefore doesn't need local scrubs for prelim bouts.
  • Keep feeding Luke Barnatt nobodies and he'll keep looking good.
  • Ilir Latifi versus Pat Cummins - make it so!
  • Gunnar Nelson looked fantastic on the ground. On the feet, he looked the very opposite of fantastic.
  • How old is Brad Pickett? The dude looks to be about 60. Is that a result of the hard Pikey life?
  • I love a good fighter rebirth, and therefore enjoy seeing Michael Johnson's slow climb out of the depths of ignominy and into the world of ass-kickery.
  • Remind me again why Alexander Gustafsson didn't get an immediate rematch with Jon Jones?

Flashback: Elite Cage Challenge - 3.17.13

NEW YORK


Promoting ain't easy, which is the lesson learned from Elite Cage Challenge's March 17, 2013 show - a show that had serious trouble finding a venue when their first choice gave them the boot after realizing that there would be some fights in a cage (duh!). But this ECC event still managed to come to fruition, and the action was solid.