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.