No Helmet, No Pads, No Escape

The sport of mixed martial arts is definitely going mainstream. The New York Times has a recent article, No Helmet, No Pads, No Escape, about former NFL receiver Johnnie Morton entering the sport, and both ESPN and NBC Sports now have web pages devoted to the sport.

Articles on the sport have changed dramatically in tone over the years, from tales of "human cockfighting" to This guy scares you?:

"Chuck looks like an ax murderer," says UFC president Dana White. "But he's the nicest guy in the world."

Even so, being an ultimate fighter has very little to do with being nice. It's about being an incomparable athlete. You must excel at boxing, martial arts and wrestling. You must possess depths of fortitude and a willingness to stand alone. And you must be accountable for yourself in a way that few sports require. Liddell knows this, having played virtually every other sport with the exception of tennis.

The article even has a few comic bits:

A short list of largely unknown facts about Chuck Liddell:

He was in the chess club.
He has never broken his nose.
He was an A student in high school.
He has a degree in accounting.
He has a Chihuahua named Bean.
He has seen "Fight Club."
It was "fine."
He has also seen "The Sound of Music."
He loved it. So much so that he went to see the musical -- a couple of times.

Frankly, I'm shocked that I can read a good pre-event rundown of all the match-ups on the UFC 71 card on ESPN's site — and then I realize that I can watch a pre-fight video at NBC Sports' site, along with a new UFC Tapout news show.

Things have changed.

Addendum: Here are a few more links:

http://www.nbcsports.com/index.html
http://espn.go.com/
http://msn.foxsports.com/
http://cbs.sportsline.com/
http://sports.yahoo.com/
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/
http://www.nytimes.com/pages/sports/index.html
http://www.usatoday.com/sports/default.htm
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3032113/
http://sports.aol.com/