A Look at Mixed Martial arts and its recent rise in popularity

The sport of mixed martial arts, commonly known as MMA has become very popular in a relatively short space of time. It can now be seen on TV in every home in America, not to mention a lot of other countries as well. Having gone from a spectacle to a recognized and respected sport so quickly is certainly no mean feat, although here have been several driving forces behind its sudden increase in popularity.

The fact that the sport is moving more and more into the mainstream has come largely as a result of the adaptations that it has gone through in recent years. These have been things such as adopting unified rule systems, requiring combatants to use gloves and also banning things such as kicks to downed opponents. This has lead many people who before might have branded MMA as barbaric to become fans.

The fact that boxing and wrestling have both continued to decline in recent years is also another reason for the success of MMA. This has been largely due to the fact that boxing is so fractured and corrupt, and that the largest wrestling company now controls basically the entire industry. Lack of any real competition within wrestling has tended to make the WWE a lot weaker than it once was, and many people think that it has lost its edge. Similarly boxing's lack of big stars, particularly at heavyweight in recent years has meant that MMA as been able to absorb a lot of disillusioned fans of both sports.

The UFC alone is responsible for a lot of the popularity of MMA in the United States, being the largest and most influential promotion around at the moment. They were instrumental in making a lot of the changes that stopped MMA being purely something designed to shock audiences and instead made it into a real sport.because of their popularity and practices, a lot of the smaller companies have tended to follow in their wake, and the overall scene is a lot different because of this.

The UFC was the first mixed martial arts company in recent years to secure a TV deal, which means that certain shows and events are broadcast on the spike TV channel. This channel, aimed at the 18-30s age bracket has been instrumental in hyping and advertising the UFC and its product for several years. The end result of which is that the sport as a whole has become more and more popular, before this there was very little mixed martial arts exposure on TV, meaning that attracting new fans was difficult.

After the initial successes of the UFC, helped along by its reality show the ultimate fighter, more and more companies were finding their way onto TV. Although not all of them could negotiate a prime time channel spot, and a lot of them folded soon afterwards. However today there are several companies such as the WEC, which airs all its shows live and free. There are also other promotions which are available on pay per view, which along with the increased awareness that the sport now has, can achieve considerable buys.

Some of the recent success of the UFC is also down to the fact that it has become a global brand, having put on shows in the United Kingdom, Canada, Germany, Brazil and Japan. They also apparently have designs on putting on shows in a variety of different countries in the coming years, and are also in the process of developing TV deals abroad as well.

In some ways, the MMA explosion has only really happened in the United states, as countries like Japan and South Korea already had MMA scenes of their own. In actual fact until its eventual implosion due to mismanagement and yakuza connections, the Japanese promotion PRIDE FC was thought by many to be superior to the UFC by most people. Events in Japan can regularly see attendances upwards of 50,000, which dwarfs the largest American attendances, which are even now only around 20,000.

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