Books and Cage Fights

In all the time I’ve maintained this blog, it seems as though I’ve spoken more about mixed-martial arts than actual books. Hell, I even have an old post on here where I stand up for Fallon Fox after all the verbal abuse she’s taken. On DeviantART, I have a journal entry where I question the hatred toward the UFC for attempting to bail out Jeremy Stephens after his assault charge so that he can fight on the card. My MMA references on both sites may appear accidental, but they’re by design, for a different reason from the fact that I’m a fan. The way I see it (and as many of you guessed from the first post I made back in 2012), a good book should be like a bonus-worthy cage fight. For those of you who aren’t UFC savvy, I’ll explain the whole bonus jargon to you. Every UFC event has a series of fights and afterwards UFC President Dana White will give out bonus checks to the fighters for Knockout of the Night, Submission of the Night, and Fight of the Night. What do post-fight bonuses have to do with a good book? Usually, the post-fight bonuses will go to fighters who made their fight a fast-paced battle with lots of action and very few breaks. Do you see the operative words there? Face-paced and lots of action. The books don’t necessarily have to be thrillers or mysteries in order to meet this criteria. They just have to be fun to read, in the same way that a bonus-worthy fight is fun to watch. For example, if you pick up any novel by Carl Hiaasen, it’ll be just as exciting to read as Dennis Bermudez vs. Matt Grice was fun to watch. Carl Hiaasen knows when to strike and does so in large volumes, much like the eventual winner of the fight Dennis Bermudez, who won by split decision. On the positive-negative spectrum, the MMA example works the other way as well. If you pick up a copy of Beowulf in its original format (fruity language and all), reading this slow-paced nightmare will be a lot like watching Frank Mir vs. Mirko Cro Cop. If you can’t decipher the poetic language of Beowulf as accurately as the A+ students in my Pre-16^th Century Lit class did, you’ll have no idea what the hell is going on and you’ll probably think there’s not much activity. The Frank Mir vs. Mirko Cro Cop fight back at UFC 119 could be described as the worst performance in both fighters’ careers due to the inactivity. It was so lackluster that even though Frank Mir was the only fighter on the UFC 119 card who recorded a knockout victory (knee), Dana White refused to give him the Knockout of the Night award. So with all of these MMA references floating around, you’re probably wondering why I’m not converting this blog from Garrison’s Library to Garrison’s Octagon. It’s because I’m a bookworm and writer first and a cage fighting aficionado second. I’ll gladly put pen to paper, but I’ll never get in an MMA cage for as long as I live. I’m too out of shape for athletic competition and really, the only way I could win a fight with these monsters is by kicking them in the nuts, gouging them in the eyes, or smashing their clavicles. I hope this blog entry answered those lingering MMA questions.

　

***MIXED-MARTIAL ARTS QUOTE OF THE DAY***

“For those of you who were booing the flyweight fight tonight, do me a favor. Please don’t ever buy another UFC pay-per-view again. I don’t want your money.”

-Dana White-