If you are a football fan and/or a Mixed Martial Arts fan you’d have to be living underneath a rock not too know who Herschel Walker is. Herschel Walker needs no introduction, but I’ll give him one. He is probably one of the best college football players to ever grace the gridiron. He toted the pigskin like nobody’s business for the University of Georgia and earned the Heisman Trophy in 1982. He has played in the National Football League and went to the Olympics in 1992 for the sport of bobsledding. He is absolutely amazing.
In the recent past Herschel has decided to dabble in the sport of Mixed Martial Arts. He has been training and has taken the sport seriously and was signed by the organization Strikeforce.

Now here’s where the waters get cognitively muddied.

Some people on public forums and in the social media have chosen to say a couple of things.

The first thing that they have chosen to do is to compare Strikeforce with UFC. Well, it is an apple and oranges comparison. Strikeforce is NOT the UFC and the UFC is NOT Strikeforce. They are both in the Mixed Martial Arts and Sports Entertainment business and they have similar products but not the same products.
Comparing one set of fighters to another set of fighters makes no sense. It’s like comparing the fighters from PRIDE to those from the UFC. The rules are different, the landscape is different and the fighters are different. It is just a nonsensical argument. It’s like saying Chocolate is better than Vanilla. Well that all depends on if you like Chocolate or Vanilla (especially with the new addition of the Heavyweight division in Strikeforce).

Then I hear people say that Herschel Walker has taken a television slot for a more well-deserving Mixed Martial Arts fighter. I won’t get into that argument, but will say this – NOBODY IS GUARANTEED ANY SPOT. The one that Herschel Walker has is HIS spot.

Now Let’s Get To The Meat-n-Potatoes Of This Discussion

Is Herschel Walker Good For MMA?

Yes!

Believe it or not, as someone who is close to the age of 50 years old, Herschel Walker is in some phenomenal shape. He is not in MMA to be the next Light Heavyweight Champion. He is there to grow the sport and show people that the sport of Mixed Martial Arts is for everyone and can be done at any age. You don’t have to do it at the intensity that Herschel is doing it but you can do it. If you love the sport of Mixed Martial Arts, stop saying things like, “They need to throw Herschel Walker to the wolves.” Herschel Walker is an ambassador for the sport and quite frankly Strikeforce is doing a wonderful job at catering to the over 40 MMA demographic who actually have money to spend and remember Herschel playing football and quite honestly, who are probably overweight and out of shape.

In my opinion Strikeforce and Herschel should design a MMA Fitness DVD or Workout for the Over 40 Crowd. It would sell like hotcakes and could be cross promoted during his fights. A win-win for everybody.

Herschel Walker is an MMA “feel-good” story. It is not a stunt or an act. He’s training seriously. It is a possibility for you to see a fighter develop right in front of your face. Is he the best? NO! But we don’t watch the sport to see the best. If that was the case, we’d only watch championship fights. We watch fights for two reasons: 1) we want to see a good fight and/or 2) we want to watch who is fighting.

Period.

And when it comes to Herschel Walker.

The world wants to see him in the cage. I know I do.

This entry was posted on Friday, January 28th, 2011 at 10:03 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.