It was telling how a weekend that was prefaced by a bottle-throwing melee between Nate Diaz’s entourage and Conor McGregor– coined along the lines of a pro-wrestling angle – was closed out by a SummerSlam event that saw Brock Lesnar open up Randy Orton’s skull in a manner eerily resembling an MMA shoot.
And understandably, both incidents were met with outcry from the purists that identify with the respective industries.
Pro-wrestling and MMA, however, aren’t as contrasting as chalk and cheese as they would have you believe. Even before Brock Lesnar blurred the boundaries between the two domains in a big way, there has always been an overlapping audience demographic between the two.
Yes, there has been a good deal of finger pointing from one corner towards the other; while MMA fans condescend that pro-wrestling is ‘fake’, pro-wrestling marks turn their heads in disgust at a ‘bloodsport’ that has, at best, been at the fringes of mainstream entertainment since its advent.
MMA is characterized by two fighters looking to expose each others’ weaknesses and capitalizing on them, while pro-wrestling involves effectively plastering over the chinks in your opponent’s armour, and making sure they aren’t exposed.
One involves exploiting your opponent, while the other involves complementing him. One is broadly grouped under the umbrella of sport, while the other has segued itself into the niche of sports-entertainment.
But what neither party would care to admit is that, in essence, both are cut from the same cloth. Now before you object vehemently, pause for a second to spare a thought.
As different as they may be on the surface, at the heart of both domains is the story-telling aspect that makes the audience want to tune in each week. Drama is humanity’s greatest aphrodisiac, and both pro-wrestling and MMA revolve around relaying a compelling narrative.
And that was exactly what the second fight put on by Nate Diaz and Conor McGregor at UFC 202 encapsulated.
Conor McGregor had to win this fight in order to continue being the larger-than- life personality that had served the sport so astutely in the past year or two. He was treading a fine line, while full well aware that another loss to Diaz could have seen him irrevocably cut down to size.
Nate Diaz, in turn, who was fuelled by the chip on his shoulder, was finally getting his due in being recognized as the superstar he had always claimed he possessed the gumption to be.
On one hand, you had the cult hero; ignored conveniently by the powers that be and scantly regarded as a ‘needle mover’, until he upped and choked the life out of that notion with his ‘upset’ victory over Conor McGregor at UFC 196.
On the other, the golden boy of the sport, who in many ways, has come to represent the very epitome of how MMA is perceived by the mainstream public today; brash yet undeniably dramatic, tasteless yet irrefutably dynamic.
The tantalizing prospect of a redemption story – attached with strings bearing heavy implications on the landscape of the UFC – tied it all together. All in all, it was must-watch television. In a nutshell, Vince McMahon would have been proud of this one.
And it wasn’t as though the WWE supremo was otherwise left out of the loop at UFC 202 either; in all the pre-fight trash-talk that Conor McGregor hurled at the WWE, it was telling how he refused to disrespect Vince McMahon, The Rock or Ric Flair. It was classic heelery, putting himself over while putting others down, and yet not straying too far from the vein of reality while doing so.
Those who ‘deserved’ respect were attested their dues, while all else fell by the wayside to McGregor’s sharp tongue. It was a promo that would have parallelled a 'pipebomb', had it only been cut within the confines of the squared circle rather than from inside the Octagon.
Almost on cue, a barrage of WWE Superstars responded in kind to his caustic comments. It would seem that the perennial heel had touched a nerve after all; only, he wasn't even a pro-wrestler to begin with.
By now you would have caught on to what I'm trying to imply here. Had you not, then surely Brock Lesnar's unforgiving elbows to the dome of Orton 's head would have rammed in the point indelibly. In a world where MMA and pro-wrestling proudly preach their differences, all it took was one weekend of coinciding interests to awaken us to the stark similarities between the two industries.
If Conor McGregor and Nate Diaz displayed how potent aspects of pro-wrestling can manifest themselves in MMA, Brock Lesnar returned the favour with his graphic obliteration of Randy Orton at WWE SummerSlam.
Even as he was teeing off with elbows on a grounded and helpless Orton, I was nether-consciously urging MMA referee John McCarthy to step in and stop the fight.
Oops. It took me a moment to realise there.
Much like how Conor McGregor and Nate Diaz were ridiculed for their ‘pro-wrestling’ antics leading up to their second fight, Brock Lesnar has been the recipient of torrents of vitriol for his ‘couldn’t care less’ attitude towards pro-wrestling and how unsafe he was presumed to be while handling Randy Orton.
The only difference in this situation, thus far at least, is that McGregor and Diaz silenced their critics by putting on a performance that defied the ages; a fight that has had fans – hardcore and casual alike – waxing lyrical, while eliciting soaring comparisons with the Ali-Frazier rivalry of lore.
Brock Lesnar, however, still awaits the pay-off for his actions at WWE SummerSlam. But isn’t it incredibly telling that the pro-wrestling fans aren’t asking for Lesnar to be taken to ‘Viperville’ in retaliation, but instead searching desperately for a legitimate fighter that can pay him back, truly in kind.
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