Opinion: The Nature of the Beast

Editor’s note: The views and opinions expressed below are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Sherdog.com, its affiliates and sponsors or its parent company, Evolve Media.* * * I know what you’re thinking, and the answer is yes: UFC Fight Night “Lineker vs. Dodson” also reminded me of the fable of The Scorpion and The Frog. In case you’re not familiar with the fable, a scorpion asks a frog to carry it across a river. The frog is worried that it might get stung, but the scorpion assures it that nothing of the sort will occur. After all, if the frog goes down, the scorpion would drown, too. Of course, when the frog decides to give it a ride, it gets stung and they both descend into their watery fate. Before they die, the frog asks the scorpion why it stung him, to which the scorpion replied, “It’s my nature.”  Humor me for a minute. UFC Fight Night 96 was a solid billing as far as these sorts of events go. It had a few fights with varying degrees of divisional relevance and a few fights for quasi-name value action; and some fights were just there. Whatever the card lacked in substance, however, it apparently made up for in outrage-inducing circumstances.John Lineker and Alex Oliveira, half of the headlining and co-headlining bouts, missed weight and won. On top of that, Oliveira was blatantly disrespectful after winning. Then there was the close decision at the end between Lineker and John Dodson. All of these elicited a fair amount of foot stomping and fist shaking from fans and media, but such things are the nature of the sport. First things first: I’m 100 percent in favor of calling out and making fun of fighters who miss weight. It’s a fighter’s job to make weight, and there is enough knowhow out there that it shouldn’t be an issue, let alone a consistent one. I’m looking at you, Lineker. However, mockery and legitimate anger are very different. If a coworker of yours shows up to work hungover, by all means make fun of him or her, but there’s no need to be a schoolmarm about it if he or she still gets his or her work done. More often than not, fighters who don’t come in on weight lose their fights. It’s rare that overweight fighters win, let alone twice on the same card. In Lineker’s case, it’s frustrating because this is becoming a habit of his and one that is preventing him from contending for the title. Even so, that half a pound of added weight didn’t beat Dodson. Lineker’s weight problems are not preventing him from fighting and they aren’t hurting his actual performances, so there’s no need to get upset. He’s ultimately only hurting himself and his ambitions, while we still get to enjoy his Octagon presence. Perhaps it’s simply his nature to be awful at …

continue reading in source www.sherdog.com