What Writers Can Learn From MMA Fighters

Since the “in your face” burst of Ultimate Fighting Championship following the first season of the Ultimate Fighter launched the organization into mainstream status, the UFC has traditionally allocated certain weekends for major fight cards each year.

You can almost always count on the fact that Super Bowl, New Years, and Memorial Day weekends will play host to a major fight card. Obviously some cards have been better than others but for the most part each card has lived up to the hype that it was given.

This weekend in an all heavyweight main card as UFC heavyweight champion Junior dos Santos will defend for the first time since winning the belt from Cain Velasquez in November of last year. Former champion Frank Mir will look to obtain the gold that once sat around his waist.

But is that star-studded heavyweight lineup the best the UFC has presented their fans with over the years? You be the judge.

Last year, Quinton “Rampage” Jackson and Matt “the Hammer” Hamill headlined the holiday weekends. It was not the most entertaining fight to date but nonetheless the UFC scheduled the fight for one of their biggest weekends believing that Rampage would be a big draw.

Rampage fought two other times at the unofficial start of summer, once defeating UFC Hall of Famer Chuck Liddell to be crowned the UFC’s light heavyweight champion in 2007, and then in 2010 he dropped a unanimous decision loss to Rashad Evans.

Both were big money makers for the UFC so it only made sense to send Jackson up for a third headlining event against Hamill. Evans lost his light heavyweight title to Lyoto Machida on May 23, 2009, never having the chance to successfully defend his title after winning it from Forrest Griffin the year before. At UFC 84 “Ill Will” future hall of famer the B.J. Penn defeated Sean Sherk, retaining his lightweight strap. For more info about the bout check out US Combat Sport’s glove review. 

Could any fight have been bigger than to pair the two legends against one another, when the first UFC champion in history came out of retirement to take on arguably the best welterweight champion of all time in Matt Hughes? Royce Gracie was responsible for putting the UFC and Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu on the map in the United States and he put it all on the line but Hughes made short work of Gracie ending the fight in the first round.

So, which was the biggest or best fight card to date? Will tomorrow night’s UFC 146 take the cake or was there another one that stood out in your mind?

Presidents

Presidents: Every Question Answered

Carter Smith

Presidents Every Question AnsweredISBN: 1-59258-066-1
$29.95 US
Hardcover
7 1/2″ x 9 3/4″, 400 pp
600 images, 4-color

A one-of-a-kind sourcebook of information on the Presidents and Presidency.

The 2004 presidential election was an event of great interest, as you may have noticed. More and more, people all over the planet are paying attention to the office of “the most powerful man in the free world.” So we’ve made a book that will be the ultimate source book for answers to just about any question that you could ask about any president, past or present (to which you could reasonably expect an answer). We came up with a design that allows you find the information you need quickly and easily, and is also pleasing to the eye-no mean feat. We have a book that will tell you each president’s date of birth and death, place of education, religion, party, term in office, vice-president, cabinet, first lady, career-before and after office-and much more. There is a timeline of the presidency and of world events. There is an electoral map for each campaign, plus a list of opponents. There are quotes by the president, and about the president, both then and now; there are lists of bills passed; there are the successes, failures and indiscretions. There are rankings; there’s information on supporters and on enemies; quotes from famous or infamous speeches-really, anything you can think of. And if that isn’t enough we’ve included the complete text of every inaugural address. This book will become an invaluable resource for historians, students, history buffs, journalists, and as a family reference. With an introduction by Allen Weinstein, founder of the Center for Democracy, it carries the Smithsonian’s seal of approval.

About the Authors

Carter Smith has written and edited numerous works on American and World history, including The African-American Experience On File (Facts On File), the five-volume Daily Life in 20th Century America (Greenwood) and Mapping Epidemics: A Historical Atlas of Disease (Scholastic). He is currently working on an atlas of U.S. History.

Allen Weinstein is the founder of the Center for Democracy. His international awards include the United Nations Peace Medal (1986) for “efforts to promote peace, dialogue and free elections in several critical parts of the world”; The Council of Europe’s Silver Medal (twice, in 1990 and 1996), presented by its Parliamentary Assembly, for “outstanding assistance and guidance over many years”. Professor Weinstein’s books include The Haunted Wood: Soviet Espionage in America-The Stalin Era (Random House, 1999); Perjury: The Hiss-Chambers Case (Knopf, 1997), which received several citations including an American Book Award nomination; and The Story of America (DK, 2002).