Why do the fighters pretend to dislike each other like WWE? Why the corny Jones/Ngannou face-off?

[Viper2]

Why can't the sport just be professional and mature without the obviously fake and silly rivalries conjured out of thin air?

Fedor never did that nonsense and people respect him for it and he's the GOAT.

Is it that fans of MMA find real-life boring, so they have to see fake cartoonish hatred before a fight?

What has happened to MMA?

 

[Melas Chasma]

Because it creates interest, you have more stupid questions?

 

[Boomb]

Because people are retarded and they get more interested if there's some sort of a fake beef...

 

[LindyBrah]

It’s an individual sport. You need narratives otherwise it turns into the prelims. You’ll have replaceable fighter A against replaceable fighter B.

 

[Van Daz]

Why can't the sport just be professional and mature without the obviously fake and silly rivalries conjured out of thin air?

Fedor never did that nonsense and people respect him for it and he's the GOAT.

Is it that fans of MMA find real-life boring, so they have to see fake cartoonish hatred before a fight?

What has happened to MMA?

Watch the early ufcs. They were respectful for the most part & spoke of their styles. Then watch Chael & Conor with their shit talk. Hypes up people to watch, ufc get more views & they may make a lot more money as fighters. Simple mma math, Timmy.

 

[loisestrad]

Let's be honest, Fedor would have been a bigger star if he had talked some trash. He was popular despite his respectfulnes, not because of it.

 

[TGArthur]

Because as much as much as you don't like it, there is a business aspect to the fight game, and bad blood (even if it's clout trash talking) has always in the history of combat sports been a very marketable tool. How many times have you heard "These guys truly don't like each other" just to see them at the end of the fight hugging each other stating there is no animosity.

 

[cmw43]

Why can't the sport just be professional and mature without the obviously fake and silly rivalries conjured out of thin air?

Fedor never did that nonsense and people respect him for it and he's the GOAT.

Is it that fans of MMA find real-life boring, so they have to see fake cartoonish hatred before a fight?

What has happened to MMA?

All the biggest Boxing and UFC PPVs were based on personal rivalries.

It's prize fighting, the more eyes you get on the fight the bigger the prize.

 

[Luthien]

 

[Dandy Chiggins]

You should learn about supply and demand. It's been in existance before we even evolved.

 

[Filter909]

Were they supposed to hug and dance like on Barney?

This is potentially fighting to the death if the ref doesn't step in. And image is half the battle. Hell, an image company owns the UFC.

 

[Reptile_Bong_Hit]

At this point, the theatre is so baked into the cake that it's difficult to distinguish from normality.

I don't doubt for a second that this is a promotional piece, but don't underestimate the egos of both of these fighters! That's a lot of testosterone, brother!

I actually got a little psyched (despite it being a tease), but perhaps I'm getting old!

 

[AmericanMMA]

Wolf tickets

 

[NicholasJBasile]

I'm thinking marketability and interest for most, but I get the idea for some folks that they do it because they feel they have to in order to perform better (ie Diaz bros). I'm not a fan of it in either case.

 

[BigOlJeet]

Because it creates interest, you have more stupid questions?

Go back to WWE dumb wannabe MMA fan.

if you need WWE level storylines to create interest in a fight, MMA isn’t for you.

 

[Mind Mine]

Not to insult your intelligence but currently there are about 3 threads discussing their faceoff and not a single thread about how good and professional a fighter acted. You sound naive to the fact this is entertainment so it causes you to ask things like this

 

[jooohnmatrix]

Why can't the sport just be professional and mature without the obviously fake and silly rivalries conjured out of thin air?

Fedor never did that nonsense and people respect him for it and he's the GOAT.

Is it that fans of MMA find real-life boring, so they have to see fake cartoonish hatred before a fight?

What has happened to MMA?

Mostly retarded so called fans buy into the hype and drama and it sells tickets. Mma fans don’t need the crap though.

 

[Qays Stetkevich]

Why does the average-or-below-IQ Joe (UFC's preferred target demographic) prefer fake tele-drama? Why do they tune-in for cheesy face-offs and celebrate trash-talking?

"Is it that fans of MMA find real-life boring, so they have to see fake cartoonish hatred before a fight?"

-Kind of. Rather, the average fan's attention span and tolerance to sensationalism is so high (just think what a decade(s) of doom-scrolling, cellphone addiction, reality TV, and getting your news from FB feeds and main stream media would do to your attention span/sensationalism tolerance).

In short, that stuff makes money because people are stupid, lame, and/or boring.

 

[Clark Rogers]

Not to insult your intelligence but currently there are about 3 threads discussing their faceoff and not a single thread about how good and professional a fighter acted. You sound naive to the fact this is entertainment so it causes you to ask things like this

Yeah but are there enough dots over naive there?

 

[BSquared]

Why can't the sport just be professional and mature without the obviously fake and silly rivalries conjured out of thin air?

Fedor never did that nonsense and people respect him for it and he's the GOAT.

Is it that fans of MMA find real-life boring, so they have to see fake cartoonish hatred before a fight?

What has happened to MMA?

These “fans” don’t actually enjoy watching two skilled individuals compete to see who is better. For them, there has to be “stakes,” whether emotional, personal beef, etc. And they are so jaded, that they don’t care that it’s fake.

They’re really pro wrestling fans but Kayfabe is dead, so there’s no more question of validity. It’s known to be pre-determined. So they switched to MMA where the beefs are fake just like pro wrestling but the fight is at least real. So to these people it’s like wrestling back when kayfabe was still alive.

And the non pro wrestling converts are probably mostly young people who just want as much drama as possible. I dunno, but it’s making the sport lame and it draws in all the low hanging fruit.