The Best and Worst of MMA in 2009

The obvious thing to do as we draw each year to a close is to reflect on the year that we’ve had, whether it’s in personal terms or in terms of something like mixed martial arts. It may be a bit arbitrary, but it’s also fun, so we’re going to go ahead and outline some of the best and worst happenings in the sport of MMA in 2009.

The Best

UFC Champions Holding On to Their Belts

I’ve always thought that one of the most overlooked, yet important, features of a successful combat sport has to do with having strong champions. While a title changing hands is by no means a bad thing, having titles pass around with each event gives the impression that anyone can be champ, which devalues the titles and makes title fights ultimately void of the appeal and prestige that they need to have.

So, it’s good to know that four of the five UFC champions at the end of 2009 were also champions at the end of 2008 (I’m counting Brock Lesnar because he was the official champion and Frank Mir was only holding the interim title before their matchup at UFC 100). Sure, there were hiccups along the way, like injuries to every title holder at some point in the year, but at the end of the day, the UFC’s current crop of champs is the best group that they have ever had. Unless you’re a huge fan of one of the unlucky contenders in the five weight classes, that’s a good thing.

New Talent Emerging Everywhere

With years like 2009, where injuries and even movie shooting schedules interfere with appearances by top talent, it is important to have new fighters burst on the scene and capture the imaginations of MMA fans. In 2009, we had just that, as fighters like the UFC’s Jon Jones, Strikeforce’s “King Mo” Lawal and Dream’s Marius Zaromskis really stepped out and showed what they could do in 2009. Moreover, fighters who were already on the map, such as Anthony Johnson, Gegard Mousasi and Dan Hardy continued to move forward with their sights set on even greater heights.

Big Things in the Heavyweight Division

No matter what your view is on the Strikeforce signing of Fedor Emelianenko, it can definitely be said that the heavyweight division, always the most shallow group in the sport has gotten considerably deeper this year. Promising contenders such as Brett Rogers, Cain Velasquez, Shane Carwin and Junior dos Santos were excellent in 2009, while Frank Mir and a few others finally started showing signs of reaching the potential that they had always had.

Even with the UFC’s champion, Brock Lesnar on the shelf, a surprisingly long line of viable contenders is forming to challenge him once he is healthy again. Meanwhile, in Strikeforce, the world’s number one heavyweight faces the likes of Fabricio Werdum, Alistair Overeem, and even a rematch against Brett Rogers, all of which could happen in 2010.

A Viable #2 Promotion in Strikeforce

Speaking of Strikeforce, the folding of Affliction in 2009 left a gap in the MMA landscape that the company was all too happy to fill. While Strikeforce was content to sit by for years and build its promotion slowly, the signing of stars like Fedor Emelianenko and Dan Henderson, along with a talent exchange agreement with Dream, have allowed the organization to step up and be a major player in MMA, if not a threat to the UFC in any real way.

Let’s be honest, though: there will not be an organization anytime soon that will challenge the UFC directly. Still, it is good to have some depth for fan who can’t get enough MMA and fighter who have either gotten on Dana White’s bad side or need an alternative to fighting in the octagon. Strikeforce’s relationship with Dream also makes it possible to see matchups that we would otherwise never see, which is a plus. Strikeforce is also a major part of the upcoming EA Sports MMA video game, which will be great exposure for the sport and Strikeforce.

The Women Take Center Stage

Kudos also goes to Strikeforce for joining many Japanese organizations and lower-level promotions the world over in letting the women get their chance to shine. Female fighters can be just as exciting to watch as the men, and work just as hard, so it was great to see a truly historic moment as Gina Carano and Cristiane “Cyborg” Santos headlined a Strikeforce event with their title bout. This was the first major event in MMA headlined by female fighters, and a huge step for the sport. Considering there isn’t even a major women’s professional baseball league, the fact that women headlined a card featuring male fighters in a sport as young as MMA is definitely no small achievement.

The Worst

Dubious Decisions

It’s always unfortunate when a fight goes to the judges for a decision, but it is a fact of life, barring 90-minute contests like Royce Gracie and Kazushi Sakuraba once had. The days of such fights (as well as four-hour bareknuckle boxing bouts) are long gone, though, a victim of waning attention spans and constrictive television time slots, which makes judges a necessary evil in the sport.

It’s hard to think of a year that presented more controversial, as well as simply debatable decisions than 2009. Fights like “Shogun” Rua vs. Lyoto Machida, Randy Couture vs. Brandon Vera, Donald Cerrone vs. Ben Henderson, and the absolutely ridiculous Chase Beebe vs. Mike Easton decision raised eyebrows all over the world. The problem is, as MMA fighters get better, it is harder for them to even use their strengths to produce a decisive victory, which means we have more close fights to be decided by the judges in our future. For instance, look at Couture-Vera, where neither the veteran grappler or the dynamic striker could use their skill advantages to gain a decisive advantage. More rounds and better usage of 10-10 scores could help, as would an overhaul of the judging system. However, the UFC isn’t planning on using five-round fights for non-title matches (despite the athletic commission okaying it), we still aren’t seeing many 10-10 rounds, and though Dana White and others continue pointing out the flaws in the 10 point MUST system, we aren’t any closer to changing it.

Injuries, Injuries, Injuries

While the year started out well enough, it wasn’t long before the injuries started taking more headlines in MMA than the fights themselves. Nearly every UFC champion was injured at one point or another (including everyone but BJ Penn near the end of the year), and some fighters, like Brock Lesnar and more recently, Steve Cantwell, reportedly have their careers hanging in the balance of their health-related setbacks. Look no further than the now-unrecognizable final card for UFC 108 for evidence of how bad the injuries got in the sport this year.

Sportsmanship Optional?

It may be appropriate that Shinya Aoki gave the middle finger to his opponent (Mizuto Hirota) after breaking his arm at the annual Dynamite!! show on New Year’s Eve in Japan. After all, this has not exactly been a banner year for sportsmanship in MMA. Whether it was Aoki flipping the bird, Brock Lesnar getting in the face of Frank Mir, or Thiago Silva pantomiming shooting an unconscious Keith Jardine while standing over him, it seems that just winning wasn’t enough to settle the score for many victorious fighters. Then we had “King Mo” Lawal’s energy drink bath over himself, the mat (with a few fights left to go in the night) and his fallen opponent, as well as Forrest Griffin’s bizarre sprint backstage after losing to Anderson Silva. At least Griffin was acting under the circumstances of having been knocked around and befuddled by one of the world’s best fighters, which makes his reaction hard to truly get upset about. What can you say for all the victorious fighters who didn’t think that defeating another man in front of the whole world was enough?

Closing Time

While the redistribution of much of the talent and the lesson that was once again learned (you can’t just write huge checks and expect to compete with the UFC) were positive, the fall of Affliction was not really a positive development. Many fighters who were supposed to fight on Affliction’s doomed “Trilogy” card lost out on a much-needed payday, and not all of Affliction’s fighters have been able to find suitable employment elsewhere. Certainly none of them have been able to find someone as willing to shell out ridiculous amounts of money as Affliction did. Still, at least other promotions, like Strikeforce, Dream and Sengoku, have given avid MMA fans their fix when the UFC’s offerings aren’t enough.

The Worst of the Rest

I can’t close out this year without mentioning such low-lights as Jose Canseco’s failed attempt to compete in MMA, Kyle Maynard being allowed to compete in an MMA event (I applaud his courage, but this is why athletic commissions are needed- to save athletes from themselves), and Josh Barnett’s major screw-up that deprived fans of a great fight and ultimately was the death blow to an entire promotion…though admittedly, they were headed that way, anyway.

Here’s to a great 2010, though. Hopefully next year, the “Best” category will far outnumber the “Worst”…though, as long as a few of the bad things are at least entertaining, who’s complaining?

E-Mail Jon Hartley

Tags: Anderson Silva, BJ Penn, Brock Lesnar, Cyborg Santos, Dan Henderson, DREAM, Fedor Emelianenko, Georges St. Pierre, Gina Carano, Jose Canseco, Josh Barnett, Lyoto Machida, Sengoku, Shogun Rua, Strikeforce, UFC