Champions need to defend their belt

[markg171]

Cry me a river.

Do I get to see champions defend their belt more of I do? Cause last year this is how many title fights there were per division:

FLW: 1
BW: 1
FW: 1
LW: 3
WW: 2
MW: 1
LHW: 2
HW: 2

 

[markg171]

Well that's a much different point that what you originally posted. I don't really disagree; they're employees of the UFC, so if the brass suggests a fight, they should take it, barring injuries. However, a ranking system is really the best way to go about it, because it gives the lower-ranked guys a well-defined plan for getting to the top, as opposed to some sort of patronage system where whoever the flavor of the week is gets a shot because he's marketable or what have you.* Just randomly picking people seems arbitrary and would probably discourage a lot of less charismatic yet talented fighters from even trying.

* not aimed towards any fighters in particular :icon_chee

Ya it's what I was trying to get across, went back and made it clearer I hope. I think the UFC needs to release it's own rankings and the fights are determined by that if they really want things to be legitimate. I mean I'm not complaining that they put on fights the fans want to see, but it does kind of screw over some guys. Then again, I don't consider the UFC to be a sport so I don't really care who fights who as long as it's interesting.

BTW if anyone is going to get butthurt by me saying the UFC is entertainment and not sport and that that's why it's okay to have the champ fight interesting fights that fans want to see and not necessarily fights that should be made ranking wise, in every "sport" the top ranked teams play the bottom ranked teams just as often as they play the other top teams. Just cause you're Superbowl champions doesn't mean you're not playing the last place team at some point during the season, so if you think the UFC is a sport why are you against the champ fighting people other than the #1 contender?

 

[Cotillion]

I'm not saying they fight everybody in the UFC but if the UFC comes to them and says "we want you to fight this guy" they shouldn't be allowed to say no

When did this last happen?

 

[Ray Lewis]

Cry me a river.

 

[BROWNPRIDE]

then maybe you need to call dana white

 

[wellsdj1]

Do I get to see champions defend their belt more of I do? Cause last year this is how many title fights there were per division:

FLW: 1
BW: 1
FW: 1
LW: 3
WW: 2
MW: 1
LHW: 2
HW: 2

Don't look for 2013 to be much better!

WW - George won't fight more than twice.
MW- who knows what Silva is doing
LHW - jones might get 3 fights but it will be close. April, August ? And maybe December ?
HW - Cain probably memorial day weekend and December?

I think LW and lower champions might all get 3 title defenses.

Don't worry though Ronda will get 3 title defenses this year.

 

[J180]

Clearly not enough.

 

[markg171]

When did this last happen?

Silva turned down Sonnen multiple times and has said no to fighting Weidman, Condit and Barao (initially) said they weren't going to defend their interim belts when the whole point of the interim belt is to keep the division moving, Jones turned down Sonnen, pretty sure Cruz didn't want to fight Faber. It happens every now and then

 

[wellsdj1]

Silva turned down Sonnen multiple times and has said no to fighting Weidman, Condit and Barao (initially) said they weren't going to defend their interim belts when the whole point of the interim belt is to keep the division moving, Jones turned down Sonnen, pretty sure Cruz didn't want to fight Faber. It happens every now and then

When you are champion you should have no say who you defend your title against. Baring injuries champions should fight every 4 months 3 times a year. They are millionaires they should treat their job as a full time job not taking 6+ months off between fights.

 

[markg171]

Don't look for 2013 to be much better!

WW - George won't fight more than twice.
MW- who knows what Silva is doing
LHW - jones might get 3 fights but it will be close. April, August ? And maybe December ?
HW - Cain probably memorial day weekend and December?

I think LW and lower champions might all get 3 title defenses.

Don't worry though Ronda will get 3 title defenses this year.

I think you're wrong about GSP. He targeted a quick turnaround after 154 so I could see him trying to fight 3 times this year, but definitely wouldn't be surprised at 2 as that's what he normally does. Also, no idea what Ronda's going to do as we don't even know if the "division" (AKA Ronda + Liz) is going to be around after 157 as Dana has said it's not a permanent division and that he has no idea how long it's going to be around. She fought twice in 2012 so I'd say she does 2 fights this year. I think best case scenario for title fights in 2013 is something like this:

FLW: 3
BW: 3
WBW: 2
LW: 3
WW: 2-3
MW: 0-2
LHW: 3
HW: 1-2

I wouldn't mind seeing UFC 158 become a precedent event where you have multiple contenders from the same weight class fight on the same card that the champ of their weight class is fighting on. That way if a challenger gets injured you have someone ready to step up and it can help give us more title fights a year

 

[TheComebackKid]

Champs need to defend their belt against anybody willing to fight them that the UFC offers

No, no they do not

 

[Smeaglebutcrack**]

Champions should face all comers, Pride style,

If this was Pride Anderson would have faced Shane Carwin ages ago and Mark Hunt would have pulverised Jones's legs before atomic butt dropping him into wrecked confidence alley.

 

[markg171]

No, no they do not

They work for the UFC. If the UFC says they want them to fight somebody, why would they get to deny people a shot at their belt when most of them took questionable opportunities to get the belt themselves?

 

[Reaper Down]

Champions should face all comers, Pride style,

If this was Pride Anderson would have faced Shane Carwin ages ago and Mark Hunt would have pulverised Jones's legs before atomic butt dropping him into wrecked confidence alley.

Ahhh...the good old days. Wouldn't be the same nowadays though.

 

[TheComebackKid]

They work for the UFC. If the UFC says they want them to fight somebody, why would they get to deny people a shot at their belt

Because sometimes Dana White comes up with some retarded ideas. For the most part I like to see fighters take on all comers but at a certain point I think some fighters get to earn the right to pick their opponents here and there.

For example, GSP earned the right to push for the Diaz fight and Silva earned the right to laugh his ass off at the idea of defending his belt against Chris '9 fight' Weidman.

when most of them took questionable opportunities to get the belt themselves?

I would disagree with this. I don't think most champions took questionable opportunities to get the belt.

 

[wellsdj1]

Because sometimes Dana White comes up with some retarded ideas. For the most part I like to see fighters take on all comers but at a certain point I think some fighters get to earn the right to pick their opponents here and there.

For example, GSP earned the right to push for the Diaz fight and Silva earned the right to laugh his ass off at the idea of defending his belt against Chris '9 fight' Weidman.



I would disagree with this. I don't think most champions took questionable opportunities to get the belt.

I'm just curious who Silva thinks is worth defending his belt against if not Weidman? Bisping, Lombard, rematch with Belfort?

 

[Unbreakabull]

They work for the UFC. If the UFC says they want them to fight somebody, why would they get to deny people a shot at their belt when most of them took questionable opportunities to get the belt themselves?

How do you know that it doesn't already work that way? Does GSP really want to fight the guy who lost to the last guy he beat up? Come on...

 

[Unbreakabull]

I would disagree with this. I don't think most champions took questionable opportunities to get the belt.

Well actually its about all of them, though we wanted to see them get there in every case, there is some shadiness to go around here.

The Weidman nine fight thing, yea, I almost used the same analogy when talking to the same brick wall

 

[markg171]

Because sometimes Dana White comes up with some retarded ideas. For the most part I like to see fighters take on all comers but at a certain point I think some fighters get to earn the right to pick their opponents here and there.

For example, GSP earned the right to push for the Diaz fight and Silva earned the right to laugh his ass off at the idea of defending his belt against Chris '9 fight' Weidman.



I would disagree with this. I don't think most champions took questionable opportunities to get the belt.

I meant more just the current batch of champions had some "interesting" opportunities when they fought for the belt, as I outlined in the OP. Far and away the vast majority of champions tend to have earned their way to the belt though

Also, while I'm fine with GSP turning down Hendricks for Diaz, I'm not fine with Silva turning down Weidman. The reason is because while both champs turned down a fight, GSP turned down Hendricks to fight someone else and is still defending his belt, while Silva turned down Weidman to take the year off and no one knows when he's next defending his belt. You should only be able to turn away a challenger if you're willing to fight someone else instead

 

[markg171]

How do you know that it doesn't already work that way? Does GSP really want to fight the guy who lost to the last guy he beat up? Come on...

Oh no, I have no doubt that the UFC and Dana prefer GSP/Diaz over GSP/Hendricks and definitely pushed him to "ask" for it