The Best Aspect of MMA

The movie The Hurt Locker is one of the greatest war movies of all time. It stars Jeremy Renner as SSgt. JT Sanborn who is a demolitions expert in Iraq. The movie shows his daily life while in Iraq going out on missions to defuse bombs. The whole thing is brilliantly directed and has amazing acting but the reason the movie is so great is because of one thing, anticipation.

The whole movie you are sitting on the edge of your seat waiting for something to go wrong. When Renners' character goes to defuse a bomb you can't help but think it is either going to explode in his face or something else is going to happen unexpectedly. This is partially due to the audience understanding that things in Iraq are hectic and unpredictable but mostly it is because of the nature of the task at hand.

Either way the greatest quality this movie has is the anticipation factor.

The same is true of MMA.

The other night I was watching the Fedor Emelianenko fight as he was facing off against Brett Rogers. The whole time I was just sitting there waiting for Fedor to end the fight with one amazing punch and that is exactly what happened.

At 1:48 of the 2nd round Fedor hit Rogers with a devastating right hook that ended the fight and allowed Fedor to continue his reign as the best pound for pound fighter in the world.

While the knockout was amazing it wasn't the best part of the fight. The best part was the lead up to the knockout. All of the dancing and exchanges only help build that level of anticipation much like in The Hurt Locker. The whole time you are just waiting for something amazing to happen at any moment and it captures you and doesn't allow you to look away.

The idea that anticipation is what makes MMA so good can really be crossed over to any sport. Say for instance you love baseball. In the playoffs every pitch seems like it could end the game and it is the lead up to the ball being thrown that makes the outcome that much sweeter. Instead of weeks of hype like in MMA it is only the few moments between pitches where you get to build that anticipation.

It is the same in football, basketball, soccer and hockey. The whole build up to the eventual outcome makes the outcome that much better.

Still I think MMA does it the best. A fight can ended in literally 1 second. One punch or kick thrown and it could all be over. One leg positioned a certain way and a triangle choked is locked in and it ends. No other sport can really offer the kind of split second drama MMA can and that is why people love MMA.

Anything can happen on any night and anyway can win in the blink of an eye. When people watch baseball and someone like Pedro Feliz is up against Mariano Rivera in the World Series the commentators will say Feliz has "a punchers chance." This of course is just a metaphor.

But in UFC everyone really does have a punchers chance. Look at Matt Serra and Georges St. Pierre. No one gave Serra a chance and yet in one split second he threw a punch that won him the fight. It may not have been an instant knockout but from the moment that one punch hit the fight was over.

Obviously people love the knockouts, submissions, violence, slams, throws, trash talking and combat that MMA provides but I feel like these are all byproducts of anticipation. Everything in a fight leads up to one moment and that is why we watch. We watch MMA so when that one moment happens it will all be worth it. The anticipation breeds excitement and when fist hits face it is pure joy.

You might think this theory is stupid or completely wrong but next time you are watching a great MMA fight between two great fighters think about it. Both guys have the skill to end the fight at any moment and the idea it could all end in a heartbeat is the best part. The lead up to the end. With each exchange you get closer and closer to the edge of your seat and you get more and more invested in what happens. This isn't because of violence or respect for what fighters do. It is because of those moments of anticipation.

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