by David P. Greisman
There are those among you who, for whatever silly reasons, foam at the mouth about whether boxing is better than mixed martial arts or if MMA is better than boxing.
For those among you who foam at the mouth over such things, understand this: James Toney’s and Ricardo Mayorga’s temporary departures from the ring and forays in the cage will say nothing about the supposed hierarchy of these two combat sports.
What James Toney does against an as yet unnamed opponent in the UFC Octagon – and how Mayorga fares against MMA veteran and former UFC fighter Din Thomas in a May bout promoted by something called Shine Fights – will be irrelevant when it comes to that tired debate. The results will only be relevant when it comes to discussions of Toney, Mayorga and their respective opponents.
Even then, those conclusions could be inconclusive, depending on how and why they win or lose.
Yes, it is hard to resist imagining and debating the outcome of battles waged between boxers and mixed martial artists. After all, the pairing of different fighting styles is how the UFC got started.
Those earliest tournaments were designed to prove the superiority of Gracie Jiu-Jitsu over various other forms of fighting and martial arts. Now mixed martial artists are well-rounded fighters, combining a number of skills including wrestling, kickboxing, Muay Thai, Jiu-Jitsu, and even judo and Karate.
The first UFC saw boxer Art Jimmerson tap out to Royce Gracie after two minutes and 18 seconds. And just as Gracie couldn’t compete in today’s UFC with jiu-jitsu alone, a boxer would need more than skills honed under the Queensberry Rules to win against a smart, skilled mixed martial artist.
Nearly all of the pro boxers who have attempted MMA haven’t gone up against the upper tier of opponents, or even the contenders and measuring stick opponents. The biggest win a boxer had against a mixed martial artist was last year, when a 48-year-old Ray Mercer needed just nine seconds to knock out former UFC heavyweight champion Tim Sylvia with a single shot.
Of course, Sylvia was grossly overweight and stood like a 6-foot-8 punching bag within range of Mercer. Other respectable mixed martial artists know that’s just like asking to be knocked out.
One of the best examples of a pro boxer dedicating himself to making the transition to MMA is Marcus Davis, who was 17-1-2 in the Sweet Science and is 16-6 in MMA, including 8-3 in the UFC.
Davis spoke to this scribe last year about his transition from one sport to the other.
“There’s probably a lot of boxers that watch it and just think they can get into MMA and box and get away with it, that their hands would be so fast that they’d be able to hit guys when they’re trying to take them down,” Davis said.
“You watch it from the outside. You’re like, ‘If a guy shot in on me I’d throw an uppercut and just catch him and it’d be over.’ It doesn’t work that way. They think it does, but it doesn’t. The first time you go in there, you try to hit something, they shoot and take you down. If you don’t know anything about the ground, you won’t get back up. They’ll keep you there and finish the fight there.”
Davis had to get rid of habits that were good for boxing but bad for MMA.
“One is the way you stand,” Davis said. “The way everyone stands so upright and staggered. You need to square your hips to defend a takedown. Also, to check a kick, you can’t do that from a staggered stance. You have to center up a little bit, hips pointed forward, in order to check a kick correctly.
“That right there takes away a lot of your boxing stuff,” he said. “And then the way you throw punches, the way you move your head. The defense is different. In boxing you lean back and do, like, the fading out of a punch. You can’t do that in MMA. If you lean back, you leave your legs forward. That leg will either be kicked or it leaves the leg open for a takedown.”
Bobbing and weaving leaves a fighter open to being kneed or to getting caught in a Muay Thai clinch that leaves him vulnerable to knees and elbows.
A boxer would be foolish to think he could get by in MMA with just boxing. And a mixed martial artist would be foolish to let a boxer try to get by in MMA with just boxing. Any wise fighter will take advantage of his opponent’s weaknesses while avoiding his strengths.
Toney, who signed with the UFC last week, doesn’t have a date set yet for his first bout in the Octagon. But no matter when it is, it won’t be long enough for him to pick up the necessary skills. At 41, he will have difficulty adjusting and incorporating techniques such as sprawling, checking kicks or even getting an opponent off of him.
He will more closely resemble Kimbo Slice than he will Brock Lesnar.
Kimbo Slice, for all of his desire to succeed, was a striker first and has been slow to learn the various other facets of this new fight game. His only win in the UFC came against Houston Alexander, another fighter whose goal is to keep a fight standing up.
Lesnar had a stellar wrestling background and a track record of being a prodigy. That he is both so fast and so big is why he was able to become the UFC heavyweight champion so quickly.
Unless Toney somehow makes the type of transition that Marcus Davis did, this is how his stint in the UFC should be judged:
If he wins, consider who his opponents were, how they fought and what Toney did. If he loses, do the same thing: consider who his opponents were, how they fought and what Toney did.
Toney, a future lock for the boxing Hall of Fame, is easily the most notable boxer to sign with an MMA promotion, and the most notable MMA promotion, at that. As significant as his signing seems, a boxer of his pedigree entering MMA (but remaining a boxer in a world of mixed martial artists) will only confirm what we’ve long already known – boxing and mixed martial arts are two different sports.
The 10 Count – Pugs in Cuffs Edition
1. Boxers Behaving Badly, part one: Former heavyweight titlist Tommy Morrison was arrested last week outside of a Kansas gym on suspicion of marijuana possession, according to The Wichita Eagle.
Police, checking out a report of a suspicious person, saw Morrison sitting in his car. They searched through stuff Morrison says was in his car due to a recent move and found a pipe in a box with boxing equipment.
“They found an old pipe that had some residue on it or something,” Morrison was quoted as saying to the newspaper. “Someone in my position, I guess, has to be more careful. I wasn’t aware of what I had in that box. I wasn’t aware of anything illegal.”
Morrison, 41, held a heavyweight title for less than five months in 1993. He left the sport in 1996 after being diagnosed with HIV, returning 10 years later. He fought once in 2007 and once in 2008, winning each and bringing his record to 48-3-1 (42 knockouts).
He is out on $4,000 bail.
2. Boxers Behaving Badly, part two: Undefeated prospect Jack Arnfield was arrested late last month, one of three men accused of dealing drugs, according to British newspaper The Garstang Courier.
Arnfield, 20, has been charged with “conspiracy to supply Class A and Class B drugs, four counts of supplying cocaine, four counts of supplying a controlled drug Class B and three counts of offering to supply a controlled drug Class B,” according to the newspaper.
He is out on bail, due back in court June 10.
Arnfield has won all 12 of his fights, three by knockout, with his last appearance being a four-round points win back in October. He has fought in the 154- and 160-pound divisions.
3. Boxers Behaving Badly, part three: An Australian Olympian and pro prospect named Adam Forsyth has been arrested for his alleged role in a February bar brawl in which two men were assaulted, according to Perth newspaper The Sunday Times.
Forsyth, 28, is a manager at the bar. He and another manager have been charged with assault occasioning bodily harm. Forsyth has also been charged with deprivation for liberty for allegedly dragging one of the men, a bar patron, into an office and locking the door.
Forsyth competed as a heavyweight (200-pound weight limit) in the 2004 Olympics, losing in the quarterfinals. He turned pro in 2008, going between cruiserweight and heavyweight, and has won his first six fights, five by knockout. His last appearance was in November, an eight-round decision win over Anthony McCracken.
Forsyth is out on bail, due back in court May 28.
4. Boxers Behaving Badly update, part one: Retired welterweight Eamonn Magee has won an appeal overturning the guilty verdict he received last month on a charge of assaulting a man in a social club in Northern Ireland, according to BBC News.
The man had asked Magee, 38, to leave the club this past August. Magee responded by head butting the man, busting the man’s nose. Magee claimed the man was drunk and had shoved him three times. He also claimed he was attacked by as many as 15 people after the confrontation.
But the man withdrew his complaint against Magee “and wanted no further action taken against him,” according to the report.
Magee had been sentenced to three months for the assault and another three months that came from a suspended sentence for driving offenses. There was no indication in the article as to what will happen to the latter sentence.
Magee fought in the 140- and 147-pound divisions, holding national pro titles and being the first person to knock Ricky Hatton down. Magee lost to Hatton and five other fighters. After a May 2007 loss to Kevin Anderson, Magee left the sport with a record of 27-6 (18 knockouts).
5. Boxers Behaving Badly update, part two: Undefeated British fighter Jamie Cox was found guilty last week of punching a man outside of a bar in December 2008, according to the Swindon Advertiser. The man suffered “facial injuries,” whatever that means.
Cox, 23, is 14-0 with eight knockouts. His last sanctioned fight was in February, an eight-round decision win.
Cox’s sentencing hearing is scheduled for March 25. A quick search of my archives shows that Cox was also in court two years ago for June 2007 incident in which he allegedly floored a man in a nightclub with a single punch after spitting at the man’s girlfriend. I’m not sure what the outcome of that case was.
6. The real highlight of the Swindon Advertiser article was this sentence: “The Swindon southpaw had drunk between four and six lagers and a shot in less than an hour at The Spot on the night in question.”
Who says there’s only one Ricky Hatton?
7. Boxers Behaving Badly update, part three: A long-troubled member of Canada’s 1996 Olympic boxing team who was already awaiting sentencing on one charge is in trouble yet again, according to Ontario newspaper The Sudbury Star.
Phil Boudreault, 35, had pleaded guilty earlier this year to “violating the conditions of a long-term offender supervision order” after testing positive in 2009 for cocaine and marijuana component THC. That sentencing is scheduled for April 2007.
Last week, Boudreault was pulled over allegedly driving twice the speed limit, going 80 km/h (about 50 mph) in a 40 km/h zone (about 25 mph). He is under the supervision order because he was convicted of assaulting a man and the man’s son nearly six years ago in a pizza bar.
Violating the supervision order can bring a sentence of up to 10 years in prison. There are no minimum sentencing guidelines.
Boudreault competed as a junior welterweight in the 1996 Olympics, finishing in fourth place, but he ran afoul of the law afterward. He finally turned pro as a junior middleweight in 2008, winning five and losing his last appearance, a fifth-round stoppage loss in March 2009 to Justin Fountain.
8. Boxers Behaving Badly update, part four: Charges have been dropped against a Canadian fighter who had been accused of exposing himself in front of children in September, according to Nova Scotia newspaper The Chronicle Herald.
Darrell Flint, 48, had pleaded not guilty. Prosecutors said they had a lack of evidence.
Flint turned pro in 1986, at one point holding the Canadian middleweight title and challenging for the national 168- and 175-pound belts. He retired in 1999 before returning seven years later as a heavyweight. His last bout was in April 2009, a first-round knockout loss to a 1-0 fighter named Rob Nichols, bringing his record to 12-17-2 (10 knockouts)
9. Three thoughts:
Why is a guy in his late forties with a losing record still getting licensed for fights?
How can a guy now fighting as a heavyweight get away with having the nickname “Pee Wee”?
And how unsurprising is it that a guy with the nickname Pee Wee is getting accused of exposing himself?
10. Five years of Fighting Words as of today. That’s 268 columns. And 347 entries and updates involving boxers, boxers’ livestock (yes, boxers’ livestock), boxing journalists, broadcasters, commissioners, judges, managers, promoters, referees and trainers behaving badly.
I don’t know which of those I’m more proud of.
David P. Greisman is a member of the Boxing Writers Association of America. His weekly column, “Fighting Words,” appears every Monday on BoxingScene.com. He may be reached for questions and comments at fightingwords1@gmail.com
