Bisping defends MMA on BBC interview !!

Bisping was on BBC 2 today for a quick bit of promo for his fight in Australia in February and the presenter was so clueless as to what MMA involves he asked do they allow weapons - yes, WEAPONS - in the Octagon.

Needless to say, The Count set him straight and gave a really good account of himself and MMA:

Interviewer: "What is Ultimate Fighting?"

Bisping: "... It's similar to boxing, but we're trying to take our opponent out by either knockout, submission or judges decision... In a nutshell, it's a combination of boxing, kickboxing, judo and wrestling, which are four Olympic sports. The difference is, we have to do them all at the same time."

Interviewer: "Is there anything you can't do?"

Bisping: "Absolutely. It's a common misperception that this is no holds barred, two men enter, one man leaves. Couldn't be further from the truth. This is a highly regulated, highly disciplined sport. There's a long list of dos and don'ts..."

Interviewer: "Such as?"

Bisping: "You can't kick a downed opponenet, you can't knee a downed opponent, you can't eye gouge, you can't strike to the groin, you can't strike to the back of the head..."

Interviewer: "No weapons?"

Bisping: "... no abusive language is even in there. No spitting. It's all very civilised stuff. Seriously. The common misperception is that we're "cage fighters". I am not a cage fighter. I hate the term or the expression "cage fighter". I'm a mixed martial artist. I do a mixture of martial arts."

Interviewer: "So you look down on "the cage"?

Bisping: Yeah. We like to call it an Octagon, which is an 8-sided fighting arena with fenced walls. The reason we have fenced walls is because we use wrestling as one of our tools, one of our weapons, so to speak, and if we were in a ring, we'd go right through the ropes and fall over. So it's for a fighter's protection, but at the same time, the spectator can also see. Therefore, henceforth, you get the name "cage fighting", but it's really not the case."

Interviewer: "Just to finish, it's not a mainstream sport yet is it?"

Bisping: "Well, it's not. It's been around a while. Initially it had to deal with the gutter press. I.e. "cage fighting", "barbaric", all that type of thing. But now we're getting past that. People are starting to see the sport for what it is, the skill and the technical aspect involved and that we are true athletes. We're getting there slowly but surely. We're making ground..."

Anyone wants to listen, Bisping comes in at 1:45:40.

www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00xhfm3/Simon_Mayo_Drivetime_27_01_2011/




You did us proud Mike!!

To be fair to interviewer I'd reckon that a lot of people listening to Radio 2 at that time would have been as clueless about the sport of MMA. Bisping does come across well though and gives a decent quick explanation of what MMA is about.

nice one Mike!!!

...but i cant stand listening to him so ill take you guys word for it

Yeah good on him but like a lot of people here I can't stand him so can't go past the errors he made.

Didn't know kickboxing was an Olympic sport?

Plus all the bollocks about the Octagon - when I first started watching MMA I preferred the cage, but having watched a lot more of the sport, the ring does have certain advantages. The big one I noticed recently while watching the Best of Pride on ESPN is that the camera work is a whole lot cleaner and you get some wicked angles, especially at mat level.

WOAH!!! best of pride on ESPN When? and Whens it on next?

It's not broadcast in the UK.

shit.

I know, you'd have thought ESPN Classic would gave found a home for it in place of it's constant TUF repeats.

if i were bisping when the interviewer said "no weapons" id of said yeah sure between round members of the crowd shoot ring girls first to five wins an iphone.

What a guy!