Words With A MAD Coach

Josh Hokitt and Sean Strickland news.  My Coach called in and reminded me that I'm not too old to learn new things.

I could say don't get stabbed, don't get shot at, don't get into car accidents, and so on.  I could focus on things out of my control. However, I'd rather focus on what I can control.  Try a smile and a reason to laugh.  There's power in it!

It’s Wednesday—Comic Book Day—and that got me thinking about something fighters often overlook: people need a reason to care about you beyond what happens in the cage.
Your interests, hobbies, work, family, creativity, and experiences aren’t distractions from your martial arts journey. They’re part of what makes you interesting—and many of the skills developed outside the gym can strengthen what you do inside it.

Taking a look at the Tapology  Rankings for the P4P list
 
Using Tapology’s North Carolina regional P4P rankings as the starting point, I work my way through the list—not necessarily to tear it apart or rebuild it, but to ask whether the rankings make sense right now.
For me, pound-for-pound shouldn't simply be a collection of good fighters with strong records. Activity matters. Recent performance matters. Level of competition matters. Momentum matters. And when you mix amateurs, developing professionals, veterans, undefeated prospects, and fighters who haven't competed recently into one regional list, the criteria become even more important.
 
The biggest question isn't whether Tapology got every position right.

Recap of my sports weekend viewing pleasure

What impact are you making?  What is Your Legacy?

 
A young fighter asked me, “Coach, can I train multiple times a day? Can I do three-a-days?”
My answer is yes—but I don't want to just throw him into three hard workouts and see whether he survives. I want to teach him how to train three times in a day.
And that got me thinking: maybe every developing fighter should experience this periodically. Not three-a-days every week. Maybe once every three or four months, take one day and experience what it feels like to organize your entire day around being an athlete.
 
 

Catching Up with the local MMA Scene

 
 
With UFC 332 headed to Salt Lake City and Natalia Silva taking on Chung Wong, I started asking a simple question: Why Salt Lake City?
This will be the UFC's fifth trip to the city, dating all the way back to Yair Rodriguez vs. Alex Caceres in 2016. After a six-year absence, the UFC returned in 2022 with Usman vs. Edwards 2—and since then, Salt Lake City has become home to numbered UFC events featuring fights like Poirier vs. Gaethje 2 and Pereira vs. Rountree.
That tells me something.
The UFC doesn't just look for new markets. It returns to markets that work. This is a business, and when a city demonstrates that it will show up, buy tickets and support major events, there's a reason to keep going back.
But UFC 332 has me interested for another reason: disruption.
This card may not jump off the page with championship contenders from top to bottom, but sometimes that's exactly where the fun begins. Give me the prospect nobody expects to lose. Give me the newcomer nobody knows. Give me the veteran everybody has counted out. Give me the fight where 98% of the audience thinks they already know what's going to happen—and then completely disrupt the story.
Because uncertainty creates intrigue.
Gable Steveson getting knocked out doesn't necessarily hurt the next show—it can make you wonder what could happen next. A short-notice fighter suddenly exploding onto the scene creates somebody new to watch. An unknown fighter upsetting the prospect everybody expected to win gives us another story.
I don't want guarantees. I want disruption.

Getting back to the fundamental good aspects of the combat sports industry