Except he wasn’t, and the farce played a large role in boxing’s decline.
Saturday night on CBS, mixed martial arts will unveil a cartoonish giant named Kimbo Slice (actual name Kevin Ferguson, which we’ll probably never hear again). Like Butterbean, he is a big galoot with no formal training; his fame derives from street brawls that captured a cult following on YouTube. He is The Next Big Thing.
Instead of being a sign of the downfall, though, Kimbo Slice is the headliner of MMA’s long-awaited, much-debated entry into mainstream America.
Times, and sports, have changed.
“This is the opportunity for people to understand that mixed martial arts is really a sport,” said Gary Shaw, the promoter for Saturday’s EliteXC fight card.
But that isn’t a question anymore, not after MMA’s years making millions of dollars on pay-per-view shows. Mixed martial arts is a sport, and it’s too big to ignore.
The significance of Saturday is the prime-time network debut, where the 12-fight card – including a women’s match – might accidentally sully unsuspecting sensitive eyeballs between 9 and 11 p.m. (Live from Newark, N.J., it will be tape-delayed for the West Coast.)
Will the accidental viewer be
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