Scott Ferrall's atrocious announcing, props to CagePotato.com for the video.

The event has ended, thankfully, and hopefully it will never return. I’m talking about YAMMA, the new MMA company run by former UFC owner Bob Meyrowitz. For those who were unable to see the event, you didn’t miss anything. YAMMA was filled with inactivity, fighters who looked like shells of their former selves, terrible commentary, and a general “cheap” feeling to the production. But that isn’t all, Meyrowitz was interviewed by Sherdog’s Greg Savage after the event and had some pretty unrealistic things to say. 

“Well, I’m thrilled. I mean it was so exciting.”

Savage asked Meyrowitz for his initial feelings on the debut show, to which Meyrowitz responded, “Well, I’m thrilled. I mean, it was so exciting.” Are you kidding me? Thrilled? Exciting? He might as well have told the truth; the event was a disaster. What is there to be thrilled about, the fact that no one showed up to the weigh-ins when they were expecting 1,000 people? The fact that the new surface would eliminate lay-n-pray, but it did the exact opposite? Or was it the fact that the fights were painstakingly boring? Meyrowitz is clearly delusional. There is no way that he could be thrilled about this event; it was a disaster from start to finish. 

“This was a great night of fights.”

Umm…excuse me? There wasn’t one fight in that whole bunch that I would classify as “great,” much less the group of fights that took place. The fights were boring, and the surface of YAMMA was built to eliminate the lay-n-pray tactics of wrestlers. That clearly didn’t work as 6 of the 8 fights went to a decision. 

“We’re going to do another one in June.”

Please……God…..no.

“Oleg Taktarov told me before the show, it’s going to take 5 shows to see how this really works.”

Ok, Taktarov is clearly as delusional as Meyrowitz. I don’t know about the rest of the fight fans out there that watched it, but I was able to tell after this event that the YAMMA surface is a terrible idea. I really hope that Taktarov said that because he needs 5 more paydays, if not he’s just as dumb as Meyrowitz. Let’s not forget that there is no way YAMMA turned a profit on this event. I don’t know how many investors are going to stick around losing this much money.

“It was thrilling that it worked.”

This comment was made about YAMMA’s fighting surface. How can Meyrowitz think this worked? It did the exact opposite of what it was planned to do. The YAMMA surface was introduced to keep the fights standing and to eliminate the typical lay-n-pray and stalemates that takes place along the cage of “normal” surfaces. All the surface did was trip the fighters up while they were standing, and it helped the wrestlers who could push the fighters up the ramp and take them down. The surface clearly did not do what it was designed to do.

“We saw two stars created tonight.”

Uh….what? Travis Wiuff is not a star, and this event isn’t going to make him a star. Meyrowitz thinks that he’s creating stars with the YAMMA. All he’s doing is losing credibility with every statement he makes about this event. Wiuff is a decent fighter, but he doesn’t have the exciting style that makes MMA stars. He definitely didn’t do anything to up his value after this tournament.

“Since then [selling the UFC] there have been almost no stars created.”

Okay, this comment really is just ridiculous. Meyrowitz can say that he had the stars under contract when he owned the UFC, but he didn’t build them up. Outside of Tito Ortiz, Ken Shamrock, and Royce Gracie, no one knew who these fighters were. Sure they had Liddell, Couture, Barnett, BJ Penn, etc., but they didn’t build these fighters up. The Zuffa owned UFC has put the money into marketing their stars and advertising for them. Meyrowitz can try to stake claim that he had these stars, but he didn’t develop them or create them. Zuffa created these stars and made them household names. 

I seriously had to stop quoting Meyrowitz, because the crap he was spewing was simply ridiculous. They aren’t looking to get on national TV; they are working to create stars and fights that people want to see. Did anyone want to see Butterbean fight Pat Smith? How about Oleg Taktarov against Mark Kerr? No way. I honestly didn’t even know that Pat Smith was still competing. Kerr hasn’t been the same since his battles with drug addiction. Taktarov wasn’t that great of a fighter in the sports infancy. 

The fact of the matter is, YAMMA will fail, and it will cost some people a lot of money. The fact that they are trying to make all of their revenue on pay-per-view, and not worried about getting their fighters into the mainstream is a recipe for failure. Doesn’t this sound like the reason the Meyrowitz owned UFC was sold? YAMMA was a disaster, and I would seriously be surprised if they hold an event in June. I’m definitely interested in seeing the pay-per-view numbers and the fighter’s salaries. 

I hope that YAMMA slowly fades into the dark and it becomes a distant memory of how MMA has evolved over the years. There is no room in this sport for one night tournaments. The freak show matches were boring and simply disturbing. Watching Butterbean try to get back to his feet after he was tripped by Smith reminded me of Keith Hackney and Emmanuel Yarborough, and that’s not a good thing. And please, don’t get me started on the commentating. John Peretti was absolutely awful and sounded bitter and angry most of the night.

Meyrowitz simply doesn’t understand the sport of MMA and he clearly doesn’t understand the business of it. Bringing in recognizable older stars are good, if you’re trying to build young talent, like Rich Franklin fighting Ken Shamrock. But Meyrowitz is hoping that the one-night tournaments will build stars. The problem is, it’s hard to build stars when no one is watching your show. Here’s to you Mr. Meyrowitz, you showed us all how NOT to host an MMA event.

This is exactly why one round is a terrible way to have a tournament format

Pat Smith's "most technical fight" ever according to Blatnick

Oleg Taktarov gets a gift from Mark Kerr... Kerr falls into a kneebar

With seconds left in the final fight of the evening, fans watching at home and those sitting in the seats at the Taj Mahal let out a sigh of relief. The event had finally ended, and it was arguably one of the worst mixed martial arts events in recent memory for many fans. YAMMA's new concept was an utter and total failure, its fighters found a way to win fights in the most boring fashion possible, the superfights were atrocious, and the entire production of YAMMA will live in infamy as one of the sport's worst. But hey, at least Scott Ferrall was the ring announcer.. sigh.

YAMMA's debut event from the Taj Mahal was abysmal. The World Combat League-style ramps that were installed on the cage were deceiving to most of the fanbase when they were first announced. Many people believed they would definitely keep action from hitting the mat while others felt they could be advantageous in pulling off huge suplexes and other crazy moves that normally couldn't be done on a flat fighting surface. Unfortunately, those people couldn't be farther from the truth.

The ramps were absolutely crushing to anyone on their back. Instead of using the cage as a tool to help a fighter maintain top control, fighters were able to easily use the ramp as a tool for the same exact reason. It also seemed relatively easier to do so due to their opponents sliding down on the ramp during escape attempts. Fighters backing into the ramp during the standup game would trip up their footing and hit the mat as well, and in some instances, fighters hit the floor even quicker than during a regular flat surfaced matchup. Instead of creating more action, YAMMA managed to mistakingly increase the ability for wrestlers to control their opponents.

Secondly, who came up with the genius plan to hold one round tournament fights? According to the opening round of hype talk from the commentating team of Jeff Blatnick, John Peretti, and Bruce Beck, the purpose was to push the fighters to make drastic moves to win the fights since their time was limited. Of course, any knowledgeable MMA fan knows that if the time is limited to one round, a true lay and pray technique will likely become the center of attention, and that's exactly what happened.

Unsurprisingly, Ricco Rodriguez lost in the heavyweight tournament to Chris Tuscherer due to this exact technique while Travis Wiuff used the similar technique and mixing in ground and pound to plow through the field and win the heavyweight tournament belt. It was far from impressive, and is probably better described as exactly the opposite of that.

In other action, Oleg Taktarov was given a kneebar win by Mark Kerr when Kerr managed to fall directly into the hold midway through the first round. Patrick Smith easily pounded out Eric “Butterbean” Esch by using his reach to flatten Esch from a distance and then put him to the floor for a beating. Both fights were lopsided and sloppy, but I doubt anyone really expected much out of these two battles.

Overall Event Quality: F – The ramp killed it for me after the first fight, and it became unbelievably obvious that fighter mentality always outranks what you can do to the cage to stop fighters from working specific gameplans. The competition on this card wasn't great either. A bunch of overweight heavyweights who can hardly strike won't draw in the masses.

Production

Again, horrible. Scott Ferrall was not only the worse announcer I've ever heard, his voice was god awful and promoted everyone who smokes cigarettes regularly to quit. His little additions to each fighter's introduction only induced laughter rather than setting a mood. Chris Tuscherer was “going to the ELECTRIC CHAIR” and he numerously told the crowd to “GET SOME!” after introducing a number of fighters. Quite frankly, it was pitiful and just made the event sound even more like a shanty about to crumble.

John Peretti probably saw the trainwreck in front of him and decided to be a complete asshole for the rest of the night in his commentating duties. He referred to Sherman Pendergarst as being built like a sprinter, yet Pendergarst fought like he didn't want to be there. Peretti also talked about how he didn't “like the flying stuff” after witnessing a superman punch. No wonder all of these guys were fired when Zuffa came in.

Blatnick was at least upbeat in some of the action, but even he was having problems during the broadcast and post-fight interviews. The whole event reminded me of an old school UFC production team with the exact problems that occurred back in those days.

Overall Grade: Just get rid of them

Final thoughts

I will be very surprised if YAMMA's second event ever sees the light of day. They blew so much money on this event, and it was one of the most memorable events I've witnessed as being absolutely terrible. Heavyweights in a pit that helps wrestlers is the worst idea imaginable, and I'm not sure how anyone really thought that it would promote action. Nearly every single tournament matchups ended via decision against the ramp, and if it didn't, they spent most of the fight in that position.

K-1 will be such a refreshing relief after YAMMA's terrible presence in the MMA market.

For some reason, people in general like to watch a trainwreck happen live as it happens. In MMA, it's no different for many people, and YAMMA could very well prove to be a trainwreck of action. YAMMA's weigh-in took place on Thursday with all fighters making the weight. Not surprisingly, Ricco Rodriguez came in overweight, but cut down to 264.6 pounds to make the 8-man heavyweight tournament complete. Eric “Butterbean” Esch weighed in at a whopping 416.2 pounds, but I doubt his weight will be a huge advantage considering he'll be trying to box with Patrick Smith.

With all of the fighters making weight, Mark Kerr being miraculously cleared to fight, and “Butterbean” being featured in the main event alongside an 8-man heavyweight tournament, this could either be an epic event of pure awesomeness... or a complete wreck of mass proportions. Of course, like all MMA events, it could also be a mediocre event that drags on for hours.

Will you be watching YAMMA? Are you actually excited for this event? To be perfectly honest, I'm definitely interested in seeing the 8-man heavyweight tournament. While Ricco is the clear favorite, three fights in one night for the two finalists will definitely create a survivability factor. Ricco didn't look horrible against a gimped Antonio Silva, and maybe he is actually improving toward something more, but it's obvious that barely making weight can't help matters.

There are some quality fighters in the tournament that could present problems. Travis “Diesel” Wiuff at 49-11 overall is a good test for anyone in the tournament. He has an excellent wrestling background, and should be able to get some quick wins against greener opponents. Undefeated George Bush and Chris Tuchscherer, former Bodog fighter Alexey Oleynik, Tony Sylvester, and Sherman Pendergarst will also compete in the event with Ron Waterman serving as an alternate. The sleeper pick could possibly be Marcelo “Pato” Pereira who runs a Gracie Barra academy in the San Diego area. A black belt in jiu-jitsu, he's won the Pan-American championships four times.

I think Waterman is an interesting alternate. If someone goes down during these fights, Waterman could make an appearance having one less fight than the rest of the field. Also, Waterman's size is definitely an issue for many fighters. There also happens to be a small storyline in that Waterman has an ongoing history with Ricco Rodriguez, defeating him in WEC 16, but losing in his next fight against Ricco via TKO at the end of round 1 at WFA: King of the Streets in late 2006.

Weigh in in our comments section. I'm curious to hear what people really think of the event and if you'll be watching.

YAMMA Pit Fighting, the newest MMA promotion that has been founded by original UFC founder Bob Meyrowitz, will take place on Friday night and will feature Eric “Butterbean” Esch vs. Patrick Smith, and Oleg Taktarov will battle it out with “The Smashing Machine” Mark Kerr. The event will also feature an 8-man heavyweight tournament with Ricco Rodriguez and Travis Wiuff involved. It could actually turn out to be an interesting night of fights, but YAMMA isn't banking on the fighters helping the cause. They've implemented an interesting idea for the cage.

YAMMA's pit features ramps around the edges of the cage that cause the fighters to maintain the fight in the actual area away from the cage. According to the small video on the YAMMA site, this will stop fighters from using the clinch and working their skills by utilizing the fence. Unfortunately for YAMMA, they are missing the bigger picture here that a cage with ramps can't solve... fighter mentality.

Neutralizing the clinch and the use of the cage for benefits in the ground game are small ways to keep the fighting in the center of the cage and promote some striking, but it doesn't create explosive battles that YAMMA is claiming it will. Instead, fighter mentality is the biggest problem when it comes to boring fights. Some fighters simply want to guarantee that paycheck at the end of the fight, and other fighters don't have the power or skill to finish their opponents, but have able enough defense to stop their opponent from turning their lights out. Either way, both outcomes aren't affected by a cage's characteristics.

Taking risks for big reward produces exciting fights. Clay Guida's use of the fence didn't make the fanbase buzz the next day after his battle with Roger Huerta. No, it was the unbelievable pace, cardio, and strength that both fighters exhibited that made for one of the best matchups of 2007.

YAMMA's Pit doesn't guarantee an end to the non-exciting fight. Matchups make fights, and I'm positive we will see some brawls in the pit. Unfortunately, fighters can still use wrestling, ground and pound, and top control in the Pit, and YAMMA's attempt to stop those types of techniques aren't addressed with their new way of fighting. I don't think I want to see an end to that way of fighting either, but it's obvious they are trying to appeal to the mainstream casual fanbase.

Unfortunately for YAMMA, I don't see this working out quite the way they had planned. With Butterbean, Taktarov, Smith, and Kerr headlining the first event, it's obvious that quality matchups aren't on the horizon, and quality fights are what make great mixed martial arts. Maybe this odd shaped cage will surprise us with some unbalanced opponents being suplexed to the floor with ease, but I won't hold my breath.

The new MMA promotion that has been created by UFC founder Bob Meyrowitz has announced its inaugural fight card that will take place on April 11th at the Trump Taj Mahal in Atlantic City, New Jersey. The card will feature 2 Main Event bouts and an eight-man Heavyweight tournament. Don Frye will take on Oleg Taktarov, and Gary Goodridge will fight the massive “Butterbean”. Well… it could be at least entertaining.

To be honest, what did anyone expect? New promotions seem to be coming to life every day, and the biggest problem is that the talent that can draw a crowd has already found a home. The old names like Frye, Taktarov, or Goodridge are definitely not huge draws, and having a tournament that really has only one logical choice in winning the entire thing is absurd.

Looking over the card, it really is tough not to laugh. Don Frye was knocked out by Leland Chapman’s bodyguard in a lobby following the cancellation of the Brawl For It All event back in October. Taktarov hasn’t fought in ages, and has just recently made a return to MMA after having big success in the movie industry. I’d still give it to Taktarov. Goodridge still has some big power, and “Butterbean” has short little arms and zero ground game. It should be a quick one.

Travis Wiuff is the only real veteran in the 8-man tournament. His 49 wins are bigger than all of the other competitors wins combined. Rex Richards, Marcelo Pereira, Alexey Oleynik, Chris Tuscherer, Tony Sylveter, Sherman Pendergarst, and George Bush are all expected to be battling in this tournament as well. Of course, there are some prospects that will be looking to prove themselves to onlookers, but can anyone give Wiuff a run for his money? He’d have to get run over by a truck.

Overall, the card is so damn predictable. It’d be strange if Taktarov or Goodridge loss, but does anyone care? The 8-man tournament really only has one big name unless you think Pendergarst should be mentioned. Wiuff should win it quite easily. A predictable card full of bad matchups just won’t cut it these days. This promotion shouldn’t be around long with this kind of quality. Maybe they expect George Bush to be the anchor for its popularity... bad move.