Swick in for Kos: AKA fighters continue to play dangerous game

[Clark Kent]

12-29-2009 09:15 AM:

There are good buddies and gym mates all over mixed martial arts. UFC 109, veteran Randy Couture finds himself fighting Mark Coleman, a guy he's allowed to train at his Las Vegas gym. Couture has stated on many occasions fighting comes ahead of friendship. If it comes down to it, he'd recommend that Tyson Griffin and Gray Maynard square off if it meant a shot at B.J. Penn. That's not the case with most fighters who train under the same roof. By all accounts, Josh Koscheck, Mike Swick and Jon Fitch are a lot tighter than Couture and Coleman. They've often stated they will not fight one another unless it's for a title shot. Where does that leave them? Recently, it's meant all three American Kickboxing Academy fighters have had to take matches against fighters outside of the top seven in the UFC's 170-division. MMAWeekly confirmed that Swick is going to take a big chance again by stepping in for Koscheck at UFC 109 against Paulo Thiago. What happens if he losses? In the middle of 2009 Swick was on the edge of main event status. By the middle of February 2010, he'll be on the edge of not fighting on pay-per-view.

Swick's title chances are on life support while Fitch's standing has actually dropped even with two wins because they came against relative unknowns in Thiago and Mike Pierce. Former UFC fighter Jason MacDonald doesn't get the apprehension over fighting a teammate:

"My belief is you're doing your friend an injustice by not fighting each other," told Neil Davidson from the Canadian Press. "You're taking money away from yourself, you're taking money away from your friends and you're losing an opportunity to fight."

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Couture, Coleman and MacDonald are pretty isolated cases according to Davidson's informal polling:

"It is not a good business decision, you build something up in any business with a core group of people," said Fitch. "Why would you risk everything you have built for one fight?"

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Is it better to take the risk and fight the Thiagos and Pierces of the world, guys who are often in their first or second fight?

UFC president Dana White says it's outrageous:

"Listen, it's the dumbest thing I've ever heard in the world. It's like Shaq [O'Neal] not wanting to play against one of his friends. It's a sport and you're out there to compete with each to see who the best is, not you're my friend and I don't like you if we fight. You're competing to see who's better. Imagine if certain baseball teams didn't want to play other baseball teams because they're friends. 'He's my friend, I don't want to see him lose.' Give me a break. It's ridiculous. And if you and a guy that you're friends with are two of the best in the world and you're in the same weight division, you're going to have to fight."

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His welterweight champ Georges St. Pierre suggests that White doesn't understand the difference between fighting and sports like the NBA, NFL and NHL:

"You can say 'Oh I'm going to play football, I'm going to play hockey, I'm going to play baseball.' But you can't say I'm going to play fighting. It's not a game. It's a sport, yes, but it's a full-contact sport. And the way I fight, my so-called friend, if I fight him, it can affect his well-being. So let's say I'm mounted, on top of my friend, and it's time to land this last big elbow that will probably make a scar in the middle of his forehead and knock him out cold and cause him brain damage."

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Thiago's the lucky guy. An MMA nobody this time a year ago, he'll have fought all three AKA welterweights by the middle February. A win over Swick and maybe he'll by one step closer to GSP. For the other three, they risk any chance at the title by consistently taking on lesser foes.



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Cagewriter is an MMA blog edited by Steve Cofield.

 

[sgtmac_46]

If you don't want to fight friends, that's fine.......but the consequences can be pretty high.

Personally, I think if your friend is a fighter, he knows it's not personal. Pound the hell out of each other, and drink a beer later. Business is business.

Now, it's different if you're a guy like Pat Miletich, who has to keep a stable together.......then the rule against fighting teammates makes sense, since the stable is more important than individual fights.

But not taking a fight because a guy is a buddy is a whole different story. That's what being a professional is all about.