# The Iron Ring



## Unseen (Dec 25, 2006)

By Layandpray.com

People who think that the UFC has already answered the question of which fighting style is best are wrong, according to one of the event’s original creators.

“Don’t think that all the questions raised by MMA have already been answered,” says Campbell McLaren, who co-produced the early Ultimate Fighting Championships and is currently working on a new reality fighting show for Black Entertainment Television.

“Seriously, where do boxers fit into this? It’s not that they can’t learn ground techniques; it’s that they don’t want to risk injury and take away from a potentially lucrative career as a boxer. I say that until you bring boxing into the mix, MMA hasn’t seen the best.”

While scouting talent for the upcoming “The Iron Ring” program McLaren has seen fighters representing a variety of fight backgrounds, from the MMA-sport style to pure street fighters to what could be called urbanized versions of traditional martial arts.

The early results may surprise some viewers, McLaren says.

“We have one fight where you will see what happens when a real trained boxer goes up against a ground fighter who tries to stand up. Remember Rock ‘Em Sock ‘Em Robots? That’s what happens. Because when a boxer punches you, you are punched.”

It’s worth noting that McLaren is a master at generating publicity for fight shows. It was he and UFC co-producer David Isaacs who helped create the “two men enter, one man leaves” image that firmly planted the event in the public consciousness back in 1993.

“For better or worse, we’re the masterminds behind the ‘renegade’ UFC,” McLaren says.

“The Iron Ring” takes a different tack. Scheduled to air this summer, it will feature four celebrities managing teams of hand-picked fighters who will then battle it out for cash prizes. Comedian Eddie Griffin has signed on, along with rappers Ludacris, Snoop Dogg, and Juelz Santana and Jim Jones of the Dipset Crew.

The show’s first fighter tryout, held in New Jersey earlier this month, was met with criticism by some in the MMA community for creating bad mismatches. One fighter left with a broken jaw. McLaren says that it could have been better organized, but turned out well considering that 70 fighters showed up. Unlike New Jersey, future tryouts, including those scheduled for Atlanta and Los Angeles, will not be open to all comers.

The concept for the show was born in the aftermath of a proposed pay-per-view fight between comedian/UFC announcer Joe Rogan and action star Wesley Snipes. If the fight took place, BET planned to promote it with a television series following Snipes’ training (Spike TV may have done the same with Rogan).

When that match fell through, McLaren, Isaacs, and film producer Warrington Hudlin (House Party, Boomerang) met with Hudlin’s brother Reginald, the president of BET.

What would an urban version of Ultimate Fighting look like, the network honcho asked.

The three producers had an answer:

Public interest in fights is often as dependent on the clash of personalities as the actual skill of the fighters. Take Kimbo Slice, who has made himself a pseudo-celebrity by fighting overmatched guys named “Afro-Puff,” “Big Mac,” and “Dreads” in backyard brawls. It’s ridiculous, but it’s fun to watch because, well, you have a guy named Afro-Puff fighting a big bald dude named Kimbo who talks threateningly about “getting his bread.” It’s like a video game come to life.

Real professional fighters aren’t always blessed with great personas, though, so why not find somebody who can do the talking for them? Given BET’s audience, young black entertainers were the obvious choice.

The program will air this summer in six one-hour installments. The first four episodes will highlight each celebrity’s selection and managing process. The final two will feature matchups between the camps of fighters. The producers know they can’t compete for the kinds of fighters who are appearing in Pride of UFC. Instead they’re searching for a combination of overlooked talent who haven’t been noticed by the top promotions, and fighters with backgrounds beyond the jiu-jitsu/wrestling/kickboxing mix that’s so common today.

"We want to have really great matchups, classic matchups that represent different camps. Maybe street guys versus the thoroughly trained, for example.”

Getting the celebrities involved was easy, McLaren says. In fact they couldn’t wait to get started: “Juelz Santana [of the Dipset Crew] went nuts. I thought he was gonna get in the ring himself at the tryouts. He’s never trained, but he’s been a big fan of MMA, and he was running around with these guys like a kid at Christmas-time. He was the most animated celebrity I’ve ever seen around something like this.”

Ludacris, on the other hand, working with Atlanta-based BJJ blackbelt Abdul Mutakabbir, took a more reserved approach. At one point, he gave a speech to a large group of fighters in which he credited them for having heart, but said only one was good enough for his team.

Eddie Griffin said he didn’t need to attend a tryout -- he already has a team. Apparently, the Undercover Brother is no joke when it comes to martial arts.

“I called Eddie and said, ‘We can help you build a team,’” McLaren says. “He told me ‘What?! I’ve got my team. My guys are ready now! Just tell me the weight classes and I’ve got multiple guys!’ I was laughing on the phone as he was screaming at me, but he was serious. They were already making space on the trophy shelf. He was fired up.”

Juelz Santana and Jim Jones also have at least one fighter pre-picked: Their bodyguard.

“Dipset is telling me they have a bodyguard who can kick everybody’s ass,” McLaren says. “I said okay. We’re not going to put an amateur against a guy who might fight in Pride or UFC, but if they have a great bodyguard, and, say, Luda’s bodyguard is a pretty tough guy, there might be a bodyguard fight.”

McLaren admits the show will be entertainment-as-spectacle, but says that isn’t necessarily a bad thing.

“Spectacle and serious fight show are not mutually exclusive,” he says. “One of the best UFCs of all time was ‘David vs. Goliath,’ with 200 pound guys against 300 pound guys. And when Marco Ruas fought Paul Varelans [at UFC 7], that was spectacle. Paul was a big strong kid and Marco chopped him to pieces. That shows that toughness is nothing without skill.”

If public interest in MMA eventually wanes, it will happen because of an overload of highly technical fights, McLaren believes. While some hardcore fans may appreciate a sport BJJ-style match in the Octagon, that’s not going to appeal to a larger audience. Fan boredom may not be an issue, however, if McLaren is correct about the eventual rise of boxers in MMA.

“I still don’t think the question has been answered in terms of one fighting style, is there really a best one?” he says. “I look back and remember how wrong I was when I thought Art Jimmerson [the one-gloved boxer from the first UFC] was going to knock Royce’s head off, but on the other hand, how come Tito [Ortiz] won’t fight Dana [White]? It’s because Dana used to be a boxer.

“There’s another evolution to be had here and that will occur when the punching arts are more integrated into the sport. MMA has come this far because the grapplers have found out how to neutralize boxers. What happens when boxers find out how to neutralize the neutralization? Then it becomes a very different sport.”

It’s an interesting point considering that stand-up sprawlers like Chuck Liddell and Mirko “Cro-Cop” Filipovic are already causing nightmares for ground specialists. How would a top-flight boxer with a great takedown defense fare?

“The Iron Ring” is open to all brands of martial artists, McLaren notes, though you won’t see many of the McDojo types who would have been wiped all over the mat in the early UFCs.

“We have been approached by a lot of traditional martial artists, but they’re African American martial artists who have actually been in real fights, and whose neighborhoods don’t have white suburban kids coming in paying $275 a month to study tae kwon do. With the African-American martial arts, it’s a much more practical system, less nonsense. It’s things like how to punch when you’re inside, much like JKD. Dipset’s trainer, Novell, is a proponent of that style.

“They’ll **** you up.”

For tryout information, visit: 

http://www.zilo.com/the-iron-ring/



This is very interesting, but I still take TUFs over these chumps any day


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## Unseen (Dec 25, 2006)

Even though its no UFC, Im still gonna be watching this


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