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Originally Posted by rivethead  I'd say it was foolish, and selfish, but I've never been inclined to give rampage the benefit of the doubt.
I don't think he didn't disappoint fans. I think it would be a tremendous disappointment, regardless of whether you got to see him live.
I'm a big Pogues fan. I've seen them close to 30 times. Against my better judgement, I took my wife a few years back to see them in NYC on St. Patricks' Day. Shane was horrible. He showed up late, he was unintelligible, and he wandered off stage several times and had to be brought back by minders. They played for 40 minutes, he sang maybe 6 songs. It was an enormous disappointment. Sure, my wife had never seen them [or Shane] and now she can say she did, but it wasn't in any way satisfying or as absolutely thrilling as it had been back in the day. It would have been better to have seen him stumble through an airport or something, where there wouldn't be the inherent expectations of a performance.
rampage had inherent expectations of a performance. He utterly failed to live up to them.
I think he wanted to get paid. I think he knows he'll never get within sniffing distance of the belt again, that he'd lose to Jones 10 out of 10 times, and so what's left? He wants to get paid, he wants choice spots on key UFC cards, because he's earned them. But he's never been a guy to kill himself in the gym getting ready for a bout, and now there's even less reason to do it, particularly because he's getting paid no matter what.
He allegedly injured his knee three weeks ago. He could have lost 6 pounds in that time without working out at all, just by changing his diet. If he needed to cut more, he could have found low-impact ways to lose the weight along with dieting.
Or he could have pulled out. He could have made an appearance as a guest color commentator, he could have been in the crowd as a VIP and signed autographs later. It wouldn't have been as great for fans as it would have been to see him fight like he used to fight, but that was never an option on the table.
But he made the choices, he's going to live with them.
I'd also bet that the UFC is back in Japan within two years. And I bet he'll try to glom on that card as well. And it wouldn't surprise me if he loses again, unless he's fighting a C level fighter, or he changes his camp and revitalizes his career--which would surprise me.
rh |
i don't know how you drew that comparison, but it works perfectly. at least rampage didn't repeatedly vomit into the first three rows during 'pair of brown eyes.'
the look on rampage's face when he gets taken down is the most telling bit about where his career is going. completely disinterested, and scared in a really annoyed kind of way. he'll still act like he's too good to fight guys like hamill, but will never get past the shoguns and jones' of the division. at this point, he's half a click above gatekeeper, and i don't know if a guy of his pride will be able to deal with that.