"They have no authority over anyone" Is that what he really said, I mean I know he's one of the best trainers but I already think he's illogical!

Since when should one person have authority over another. He is clearly biased in my opinion.

His point about when you go to a gym and you get taught knowledge and then you can go to another gym and represent them. He's making it out to be something special, did you not just pay a monthly fee for that knowledge? Or was he suddenly training me for free all this time?

Or that coaches don't value themselves because they have a hands off approach when it comes to their students choice to stay or go to another gym? Is this guy high? It's called being more evolved than you, but he does not get it, I think!

I'm not sure I follow you there (perhaps link to which segment you are referring to). He's advocating going to different gyms to attain elite knowledge in certain areas, which is often not offered at one location.

Well of course, a gym is still a business. Beside, the nature of the sport, being individual and pitting fighters against one another, requires isolation from other parties during practise in order to increase chance of success.

love most of the videos Firas puts out. he has so much in depth knowledge about mma/bjj/training its easy to see why he's one of the best trainers out there

Just saw a episode of real sports talking about how mma fighters are far more likely to beat women. So my question is does mma breed women beaters or are women beaters drawn to mma?

I think the latter, sad thing is they get 'good' at it training MMA :P

Police officers are prone to being wife beaters too (I can't remember where but the rate was way higher than in the general population), probably due to high stress long hours job + being used to using force to solve problems + authority type position being attractive towards people who like to use force to control others which would be a trait shared by wife beaters.

In the case of MMA fighters I would assume competing in MMA (as opposed to watching/training etc) is likely more attractive to people who enjoy hurting other people and competing in MMA allows them to do that without going to jail and people who enjoy violence are more likely than average to be wife beaters.

I'd also guess that a lot of MMA fighters come from a lower socio-economic background as it's a low paying job unless you reach the elite level and there would be some sort of a link there as well, people raised in poverty are less likely to have had positive role models in their life, I mean look at the way Cody Garbrandt acts as an example of that (not saying he's a wife beater, just that he's clearly aggressive/snaps and gets violent over any minor perceived slight etc)

Cody definitely comes across as a psycho on TUF so far and seems to like drama more than most teenage girls. Getting that mad about a guy moving gyms and trying to provide a better life for his family just makes him seem like an idiot.

And I would agree that violent people are drawn to MMA and being LEOs or any kind of position of authority. They also usually have higher suicide rates as well, whether that's pre-existing or a result of having their head smashed in on a regular basis is up for debate.

Yeah Cody should calm down, but I totally understands Uriah Faber's point.
Loyalty and friendship means something, especially in MMA and at that level.

He took TJ in, they become good friend over the years, TJ even stayed at his place when he had little money, I think Faber is a big reason TJ got on the TUF show, he also mentioned him in the octagon campaigning for his titleshot. So I get that TJ leaving him and then training with a guy Uriah has problems with rubs him the wrong way, or at least warrants him to give TJ an ultimatum to choose between the two camps.

But on the other side I understand TJ aswell for doing what he thinks is best for his career. It's just a situation where it's hard to split on good terms, ego's are hurt and it's almost impossible to avoid some drama.

Faber is acting like a someone left the gang. Huge lol at siding with that kind of behavior.

I vaguely remember war machine but apparently he was in jail for assault when he was signed.

I think a lot of wife beaters are guys with low self esteem that are weak and with a lot of bottled up aggression that they are too pussy to release on other men when confronted so they let it out on their female partner. So I don`t think that`s the case. The MMA fighters that do beat women are the kind of men that would have done it anyways i would imagine. The only time MMA makes someone a women beater is those who have suffered brain trauma cause of fighting. Just my two cents.


I wonder if you guys can recommend a european betting site that offers a lot of fights for various organizations and not just ufc and bellator. All i find is ufc and bellator + maybe one or two more. There are so many organizations and fights every week and at least one event every day.

Faber would have more of a point if he hadn't driven Duane Ludwig out of the gym when Ludwig was responsible for TJ improving to the point he became an elite fighter/champ. Sure, he has every fight to get rid of a coach he doesn't like but he has to deal with fighters who like that coach going with the coach if he does. Giving TJ an ultimatum saying he can't split time between Ludwig and TAM is immature and absurd and obviously terrible for TJ's career given Ludwig was the coach who got him to championship level, I mean look at TAM's results before, during and after the periods where Ludwig was coaching at TAM, the during period was when their fighters improved drastically (most noticeably TJ and Mendes) and their winrate was far better when Ludwig was coaching than it has been since Faber basically drove him out of the gym.

At the end of the day Faber and Bang had a falling out over money with both sides blaming the other, TJ tried to split his time between both of them and Faber gave him an ultimatum to basically stop training with Bang or leave TAM, I mean what did he expect for TJ to leave the coach who took him from being a wrestler to a well rounded fighter with championship level striking who he's also friends with just because he's friends with Faber too and has known Faber longer? TJ offered to split time between the camps, Faber rejected that. Faber's entirely in the wrong and based on his body language I think he's very likely to be lying about how things went down with both Bang and TJ and even if he's not TJ had to do what's right for his career. Faber acts like TJ is his personal property for life just because he's the one that discovered him early in his career.

I'm actually pretty disappointed we didn't get to see TJ humiliate Faber in the octagon and beat him into retirement, the UFC really dropped the ball not making that fight as one of Faber's last few fights, I mean Jimmie Rivera? Brad Pickett? Surely they could have found time to make that fight. I guess it's a proxy battle now as he takes on Faber's new protege instead.

It would be cool if the UFC did a gym vs gym type rivalry card with a prize for the gym whose fighters won more fights (ATT vs Blackzilians TUF style), the promos/buildup could be amazing. Elevation vs TAM wouldn't work as Elevation don't have enough sub 155 guys and TAm don't have enough 170+ guys, but there are plenty of gyms out there with enough elite guys to fill a main card against another gym, obviously this wouldn't be an all the time thing but it could make a fun special event occasionally.

Yeah agree, TJ did what he had to do and made the right move IMO.

I did not side with Faber as the other dude posted. I only said I can relate with Fabers feelings. It's his gym and sure TJ is not his property but it was his fighter, representing his team/gym.

In the end if you got a gym with fighters and you have a fighter who wants to train with another coach who you dislike, not trust, maybe even hate, It's completely normal that you not want your fighter to train with that other coach. There is a reason why Bang was fired/left in the first place. Both coaches/teams need to be able to communicate and maybe even corner TJ in his fights, so obviously they need to be on good or at least speaking terms.

TJ should obviously do what he thinks is best. But you can't force or expect Faber to just be cool with it either. TJ wanted it both ways wich I understand, but unfortunately for him that was just not an option.

Swoop:

You and I seem to have opposite emotional attachments most of the time--both for fighters we like and dislike. It is interesting because it helps me examine my confirmation bias to see the other side articulated.

I see faber as more credible in those ridic arguments with tj over the "ultimatum", tho the truth is likely a stupid semantic point neither will back down from. Likely faber told him if he split his training he was not really a true TAM member, and tj used that to say he got kicked off the team since he really wanted to leave anyway. Regardless, I find tj unlikable and faber seems more genuine to me.

The other points you made about Ludwig and how much influence he had on the success at tam are interesting too, because another narrative is available. When tj left to train for the Cruz fight with Ludwig exclusively he promptly lost the belt (though it was razor close) and after Ludwig left Cody beat Cruz decisively.

Also did not want to see tj vs faber at all. Personally, I would have been rooting for the underdog retiring vet who opened the door for smaller fighters over his younger prodigy, but I assume tj would have demolished him. Not a lot of questions to answer there.

Anyway, cheers for the thoughts you share here. I enjoy reading them and often learn something new.

Likewise, I enjoy reading opinions from people who like different fighters both as a fan and handicapping wise

Cody beating Cruz post-Ludwig is the best point, I do think as a whole TAM was a far more successful gym with Ludwig than without though as all of their fighters seemed to be improving at that time. I just have a 'read' I guess that Faber's the one lying when he says he never gave TJ an ultimatum which doesn't really mean anything, there's a chance that it was some ambiguous conversation/message or whatever and both parties think they're right though and regardless of what happened Faber is the one acting like a tool.

TJ has grown on me a lot over the last couple of TUF episodes, I never really liked or disliked him prior to recently but he seems to really care about his fighters and the fact he's in a rivalry with Faber and Cody, both of whom I dislike makes me like him more by default I guess

It's interesting how in MMA there are no universally loved or hated fighters and the fanbase splits seemingly at random on any given fight, there doesn't seem to be any firm correlation in fight style or personality between the fighters I like and dislike.

This is not a very logical way to look at things. Business is business at the end of the day. If you can get better training somewhere else then that's what you should do.

Faber is acting like a little girl, somebody left the cheer leading squad so lets all be mean to her!

I mean friendships are going to form if you train together etc, but what kind of friend behaves this way afterwards? I mean is Faber really his friend if he behaves like this afterwards? Wouldn't a real friend be on your side regardless?

Well if mma is anything like other sports only the players /fighters are expected to be loyal

Dominic shares the same view as myself, interview with Ariel : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5_ZgMdqf0V8

Time stamp 11:30 if you only want to hear about TUF, Cody and Faber.

JDS, alvarez, and cejudo are all juicy lines right now

So women's 125 is coming to the UFC: how long until we have Joanna Two-Division Champion? :P

http://www.bloodyelbow.com/2017/5/3/...mpion-mma-news

I'm liking Alvarez a lot, I think JDS and Cejudo opened juicy but are dried up now, looking to bet Miocic at best price, even money would be really great IMO.

I lean the same way on all three. Kinda regret not getting some Cejudo -285 or whatever it was when the line opened, at this point I think i'll wait for the Cejudo -3.5 pts or UD line though

That weird one day swing on JDS and Masvidal was interesting, someone built a huge position on both and it swung the lines everywhere, it'll be interesting to see which way the late steam goes on both fights. Then again it's steamed against Maia in a lot of his wins so i'm not too concerned, just annoyed I didn't get the current price

Yeah I think Cejudo wins too, but I don't see much value at -370 to -400 that's on offer now...

Going to wait for a few more lines to open before firing but don't mind the look of Branch as a small dog to Jotko, although Jotko's on a nice run too.

Aguilar seems tempting on paper too in a pickem although I haven't seen enough of her fights

Skelly is very dynamic too, if his draw no bet line is a pickem or close to it like the moneyline that might be tempting as he should finish more often than Knight and when he loses it should be by decision a lot

Yair Rodriguez has steamed in but he's still as high as +130.

I like Frankie Edgar as much as anyone, but surely that's giving Edgar credit for the fighter he used to be, not the fighter he is now? He's nowhere near as fast or explosive as he used to be. He could out-savvy Rodriguez but he could very easily get caught and slept or just out-worked IMO. Feels to me like Rodriguez should be the slight favourite but name recognition has the odds the other way around.