LONGEVITY IN COMBAT SPORTS: MMA VERSUS BOXING

Since the UFC pushes Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) to the mainstream, an age old question remains: Is MMA safer then boxing? The main premise behind the debate has always been that unlike boxing, in MMA, there are more avenues to success compared to hitting your opponent. Highlighting the apparent, there are less debilitating routes to success, thus creating some losses in MMA less damaging on a fighter’s body and brain. The Unified Rules of MMA make it feasible for a MMA fighter to win a bout by judges’ decision or by possibly submitting their opponent. The resulting idea is that MMA athletes suffer fewer traumatic injuries and the chances are lessened they might become jaded drunk. But, proponents of boxing are always quick to point out the bigger gloves implemented in MMA and the fact that the rules allowing for leg strikes and elbows. Therefore”it’s time” to have a comprehensive appearance to either side of this debate. Prior to getting into the thick of this argument, I want to highlight one of the key reasons I chose to write this article. Shawn O’Sullivan, a retired fighter that I have met many times, lives in my hometown. On paper, his life looks like a success story. However the actual truth is his boxing career killed his odds of having a successful life after his career was finished. A brief documentary about his story are available below.Many would believe O’Sullivan’s career somewhat illustrious as he had been the 1981 World Amateur Champion, 1981 Canadian Athlete of the Year and 1984 Olympic Silver medalist at light middleweight. Also many consider his gold medal bout against Frank Tate very controversial as it appeared like the fix was in. Despite scoring two standing 8 counts in round two the judges awarded that round to Tate. Upon going expert, he found himself quickly retired in 1988 with failed comebacks in both 1991 and 1997. Shawn’s overall record of 23-5-0, together with 16 knockouts passed him by without accomplishing his dreams of competing in a world title bout. After four more fights in 1997, a neurologist refused to renew the license he needed to continue boxing due to brain injury that he saw during a CAT scan. Now, O’Sullivan is living with the issues of brain damage, however, he doesn’t repent his career in boxing. Throughout my many discussions with O’Sullivan, he almost always slurred his speech and had problems recalling parts of his life. Sadly, his ability to talk about his story is all he has to show for his famous career. However, that’s hindered because of the culmination of blows to the head he suffered during his boxing career. O’Sullivan suffers from boxer’s dementia, commonly known as being”punch drunk” caused partially as a consequence of the fighting style and gruelling sparring sessions at the gym. If you want to see exactly what I mean, take a few minutes and see his bout against Armando Martinez. What remains untold to most, and something which highlights the relevance of this article is that O’Sullivan was pushed into boxing by his first coach: his dad. Rumors are his father was letting his son spar against heavyweights and even larger guys as part of the daily reality check for O’Sullivan. As parents, an individual may feel uncomfortable advocating that your child partake in any battle sport from this fear of the long term consequences. So signing up your child to either boxing or MMA training can become a question of which can be safer? Is there a possibility you could help select the lesser of two so-called evils. Until recently the entire debate behind MMA is safer then Boxing was entirely theoretical. There remains to be little scientific facts and findings to support the claim. The University of Alberta’s Dr. Shelby Karpman led a review of more than a decade’s worth of health care exams from roughly 1,700 fighters in Edmonton, Canada. According to the study, Fifty-nine per cent of MMA athletes sustained some kind of harm, compared to 50 percent of fighters. However, fighters were likely to lose consciousness during a bout: seven per cent versus four percent for MMA fighters. Irrespective of the facts to as which sport is safer, The Canadian Medical Association has called for a ban on both MMA and boxing. By highlighting a 2014 University of Toronto study showed an MMA fighter suffered a traumatic brain injury in almost a third of specialist spells. It’s not my intention to cast doubt onto the protection of a game, nevertheless both boxing and MMA have had cases of fatalities that are well documented. Recently a MMA fighter died due to complications cutting weight. John McCain, who once labeled the game of MMA”human cockfighting,” sat ringside at the 1995 boxing death of Jimmy Garcia. However, very few severe life threatening injuries in MMA come into mind as none have occurred on its main stage. A fighter’s death inside the Octagon has never happened and it never will. But it’s something which has to be in the back of everybody’s mind when we see fighters getting knocked out lifelessly. Rendering a competition not only defenceless but unconscious remains to be the name of the struggle game if it be MMA or Boxing. That is where a fighter’s fanfare, bonus money and continuous hype derives. UFC President Dana White announced MMA that the”safest sport in the world, fact.” The idea that MMA is the most popular sport in the world is mad. Tennis, golf, track and field, swimming… are”safer” sports in that they lack head injury all together and present little risk of passing. Touting up security should come with a responsibility to fully study the ramifications of your game. The construction on what’s going to be called the UFC Athlete Health and Performance Center starts this shortly and will take 15 weeks to finish. Alongside health insurance for training injuries, this is MMA’s next most important step towards taking on more of a top role in sport safety. With that said, Dana’s end game is that Scientific research will finally brand MMA as a”safer” choice for battle sport athletes compared to boxing. But, it might just further the game’s inverse relationship. Since MMA increases in popularity, boxing’s visibility in the national consciousness continues to fall and it is simple to finger stage. It also can not be stressed enough that the first generation of fighters are just getting out of the game within the last couple of years. Science has an incredibly small sample dimension to check at with respect to aging MMA fighters right now, though UFC originals such as Gary Goodridge are already feeling the consequences. We probably still require a couple more”generations” of fighters to retire and grow old to have an actual sense of the effects of the sport on them since they age. And by that I mean fighters who have had to compete with other high level athletes, not fighters that were the very best of a game that was very much in the developmental stages. Fighters like George St Pierre, Demetrious Johnson and Ronda Rousey are unlikely to deal with any longstanding consequences of brain trauma primarily due to their runs of desire as well as their capacity to prevent significant harm. Johnson recently said on the Joe Rogan Experience that”There’s not enough money in the world for me to risk brain damage.” Johnson, like many other fighters that are educated, understands that carrying too much harm in his career will hurt his longevity both indoors and outside the sport, and that’s why he’s so conscious of his security in the Octagon. Maybe that is the main reason why he’s never lost consciousness from the Octagon. In any scenario, it is tough to use findings of the past to find out the safety of the game today. So much constantly changes within the sport of MMA that trying to compare between eras is essentially the exact same in attempting to compare completely different sports. Maybe then a better approach isn’t to examine the game’s past, and rather on its present as time goes on. The debate about which sport is safer due to the glove size is moot. The amount of punishment a fighter takes over their career is individualistic and highly dependent on a fighter’s style. The most important selling point as to why MMA is more powerful than boxing is truly the glove dimensions. The boxing glove was made to protect the hands, not the individual being punched. However MMA practitioners argue that they utilize the bare minimum in hand defense. Any argument surrounding how a hand will crack before the head isn’t exactly the most appealing approach to advocate for a safer sport. The same goes for the standing eight count. Arguing that permitting a concussed fighter to keep at a struggle after being knocked down just furthers brain trauma. In MMA we witness that a lot follow up punches after a fighter is left unconscious — possibly equally damaging to allowing a boxer to continue after receiving devastating blows. There are so many variables in determining the devastation of a landed punch–out of technique to timing, to whether or not the receiver saw the punch coming–that it would be virtually impossible to determine at a live match which glove size could have caused the maximum damage. What’s more, there are a number of different elements and rules that determining which game is safer. The normal duration of a Boxing match is generally longer then that of an MMA fight. There are many variables that are individualistic to the fighter. I’d like to declare each game equally as harmful, but until further research is completed, one can’t make this kind of statement with much confidence. The inherent risks in both sports are intrinsically connected. The capability of a fighter to achieve longevity in the game is more dependant on the skills of this fighter themselves then their various sports parameters independently. Generalizing which is safer without the scientific evidence to support such a claim remains to be a matter of opinion.
Disclaimer: This page contains affiliate links and MMA Odds Breaker will be paid if you make a purchase after clicking on the hyperlinks.

Read more: sportsweed.net