GSP will likely be the man that will front a UFC card in Toronto that should attract over 60,000 fans to the Rogers Centre.

I find it ironic that the weekend news of the Ontario government’s decision to sanction MMA fighting in the province comes in the same week that the BC Medical Association is pushing the Canadian Medical Association to advocate for a national ban on the sport.

And so while Vancouver was first to lift the ban and hold a UFC Pay Per View, it looks as though Toronto and Ontario are poised to overtake our position within the country for a sport that clearly has huge economic impacts attached to it.

The BCMA resolution is likely to have a ripple effect that needs to be addressed early rather than permeating the consciousness of the decision-making powers at both the provincial and municipal levels.

First, the BCMA is completely off base with its statements.

Take this for example:

“We’re concerned that this is a sport that’s different from many others, in that the goal is to disable the opponent,” association President Dr. Ian Gillespie told CTV News.

“We know that there is an increased risk of concussion in this type of sport with the nature of the blows.”

Let’s break this down.  First, how is it different from Boxing, where the goal is also to “disable the opponent”?  Second, how can there possibly be more of a concussion risk than in boxing, where 75%  of the blows are to the head (Muhammad Ali is in the state he is in today for that very reason).

Furthermore, with concussions overtaking hockey and football, I guarantee you that the statistics will show that there are far more in those sports than in MMA.

There are is also research that completely disputes what the BCMA is claiming.

A report from the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine Department of Emergency Medicine entitled “Injury Trends in Sanctioned Mixed Martial Arts Competition: A Five-Year Review, 2002-2007,” details that:

“During the 635 professional MMA matches, 300 of the 1,270 athletes sustained documented injuries with an injury rate of 23.6 per 100 fight participations. Most common reported injuries were lacerations and upper extremity injuries. Severe concussion rate was 15.4 per 1,000 athlete exposures, or 3% of all matches. No deaths or critical sports-related injuries resulted from any of the regulated matches during the study period. Age, weight, and fight experience did not statistically increase the likelihood of injuries after controlling for other covariates.”

The report concluded that injury rates in regulated professional MMA competition are similar to other combat sports; the overall risk of critical sports-related injury seems to be low.

Or how about this:

In the United States, there were 22,900 cheerleading-related injuries treated in emergency rooms in 2002, up from 10,900 in 1990, according to the Columbus study. The Consumer Product Safety Commission, meanwhile, reported there were nearly six times as many emergency room visits for cheerleaders in 2004 than in 1980.

Of 104 catastrophic injuries sustained by female high school and college athletes from 1982 to 2005 — head and spinal trauma that occasionally led to death — more than half resulted from cheerleading, according to the National Center for Catastrophic Sports Injury Research. All sports combined did not surpass cheerleading.

In 2005, the National Collegiate Athletic Association’s Catastrophic Injury Insurance Program found that 25 percent of the money spent on claims for student-athletes since 1998 resulted from cheerleading. That made it second only to football.

So the BCMA has no idea what it is talking about.

Furthermore, the resolution was crafted without a lot of inquiry into it:

“Citing concern for participant safety, BCMA president-elect Dr. Ian Gillespie stated that the decision to ask for a ban on the sport was “not something that had been a long-standing focus for the BCMA in any way,” adding that “it’s not something that has gone through a full policy review.“

“People are going to do these things anyway, and so by driving it underground, we’re not doing a service to the athletes and that’s where somebody is going to get hurt,” he said.

Instead of a ban, Gutman believes that regulation is the answer for protecting fighters’ health — MMA is not currently regulated on an amateur level.”

Involvement, rather than attaching stigma to the fastest growing sport in the world right now, is how things become safer and better.  Turning a blind eye to a phenomenon that is unstoppable is just stupid.

The amount of money that a Rogers Centre event in Toronto with Georges St. Pierre headlining next year could reach $30-50 million in economic spinoff for the city.

BC if now in third place of the three provinces where UFC is heading, largely because of a provincial government that is not willing to create a provincial sanctioning body (a cop-out approach) and a City that is looking to cripple the sport by unreasonable demands on insurance and indemnification clauses – far more than any other jurisdiction.

It’s time to get to work, people.  MMA is not going away.  The economic impact of an event is absolutely huge:

The Ultimate Fighting Championship’s sophomore event in Montreal set a new North American MMA attendance record with 21,451 attendees, who combined for a staggering $4.9 million gate.  The combined economic spinoffs from the two UFC events held in Montreal is estimated to be over $50 million.

A recent study done in New York state found that a UFC event in New York City would generate $11.5 million in ‘net new’ economic activity: $5.3 million in direct event spending, $1.4 million in non-lodging visitor spending, and $4.9 million in indirect/induced benefits.  This would in turn provide and $400,000 in tax revenue for New York City and $550,000 in tax revenue for the state.

Another study in Massachusetts determined that a UFC event in Boston would produce economic output of $12.3 million. provide $775,000 in tax revenues to the state and employ 600 workers.

In Las Vegas, the UFC generated $86.2 million in nongaming revenue for six events between February 2, 2008 and January 31, 2009.

If we don’t get our shit together here in BC, it might be a very long time before UFC returns to this city.

And that would be bad for everyone, regardless of whether you are a fan of the sport or not.

The numbers do not lie.

CTV Sportsnet's "Showdown" Joe Ferraro might have stepped into an empty octagon before, but that certainly didn't help his credibility last week after falsely reporting that the UFC Vancouver pay-per-view had been cancelled.

He calls himself “Showdown Joe” and ironically, the name of the show he hosts on CTV Sportsnet is entitled “MMA Connected.”  Yet, you would never have known that Joe Ferraro has any knowledge or connection to the sport with the way he inserted himself into the UFC-Vancouver courtship last week, which revolved  around his shoddy reporting that put the now-secured deal in serious jeopardy.

Before I get into the story of how everything went down last week, here are a couple of excerpts from a from an interview Joe did where he described how he broke into MMA broadcasting:

“From there, we started sponsoring fighters at various events and then I met up with some promoters. They fell in love with the knowledge that I had and how I could break down fights into what this guy needs to do to win and what that guy needs to do to win, and then during the fight I would explain what guys needed to do to get out of a position and they said, “Did you ever think about doing commentary?”

“About three or four month in, the guys from Sportsnet started getting into MMA, they started covering the UFC and they decided, “We need an analyst; someone who is involved in the sport and can pick up the phone and call Chuck Liddell or Randy Couture.” So they started looking around and realized that The Fan 590 is owned by the same company as Sportsnet – Rogers Communications – and said, “Who’s this Showdown Joe guy? Let’s bring him in.”

Humble and not at all self-absorbed, as you can clearly see.

Now let’s examine Joe’s breaking news from last week, and his supposed chat with UFC president Dana White, which he still will not confirm with any certainty in spite of repeated emails from me.

Last Monday, the UFC and the City of Vancouver were deep in meetings regarding the proposed June event after weeks of trying to get a deal done.  Now in spite of reports to the contrary (which I will cite in a second), the reason that things took so long is not because Council was holding things up, or that bureaucrats were running amok within the walls of City Hall.

Simply, the City of Vancouver will be the first host city of a UFC pay-per-view where a province or state sanctioning body does not exist.  As an example, there have been two successful UFC events held in Montreal, both of which were facilitated by the Quebec Alcohol Racing and Gaming Commission (QAC).  This provincial sanctioning body is responsible for the rules, regulations and parameters of such contests, which in turn insulates the City of Montreal from potential legal action.

Pretty simple stuff.  But in the midst of the talks about Vancouver’s UFC future, these are the kinds of headlines that started seeping out, unbeknownst to anyone involved in the negotiations at the time:

“Source says UFC Vancouver show is off, may be switched to Cincinnati”

“Vancouver UFC show likely moving to Cincy”

“UFC Vancouver show is off: source”

“UFC down for the count in Vancouver“

So who was this “source”?  Was it someone within the city?  Or maybe a representative from UFC like VP of Regulatory Affairs Marc Ratner or Lawrence Epstein, the organization’s general legal counsel?

No.  It was Showdown Joe, who allegedly received confirmation from Dana White.  As I mentioned, I sent Joe a few emails last week to find out what exactly White allegedly told him, and was greeted with complete silence.  No surprise there, I guess, in consideration of the fact that a deal was indeed reached just 3 days after Joe’s initial claims became public.

Now Joe was correct about one thing – the show in Vancouver would have been moved to Cincinnati if terms were not reached.

But I have deep reservations about what Ferraro is claiming Dana White told him.

And before Ferraro goes and claims that it was his reporting of White’s supposed utterance that changed the course of the negotiations, let me tell you that I hear it simply caused bitter feelings and miscommunication between the two parties rather than helping to speed the process along.

The fact is that talks never failed, and never stopped.  There were issues that came down to the wire, without a doubt, but at no point did the City of Vancouver back away from trying to make something happen.

As an example, the requests for indemnification and insurance protection for the city were drastically altered by City Manager Penny Ballem and her staff to ensure that Vancouver didn’t lose out on what could prove to be a cash infusion of approximately $20 million.

Take a look at this interview from Joe on the day that his network was looking for answers as to who was responsible for the “show being choked out in Vancouver.”

He claimed that “it’s the politicians over there that are apparently making this extremely difficult for the UFC and any mixed martial arts events in general from occurring on their soil.”

WRONG.  As soon as Council passed the motion lifting the ban back in December, they had little to do with the day-to-day negotiations.  Actually, the Mayor, from what I hear, was the only one who was actively encouraging, not obstructing, officials to get a deal signed.

When asked why Vancouver was any different than Montreal in terms of securing an event, Joe responded with “It’s very difficult to try figure out, only because…uh…I’m trying to understand what are the liabilities, because every commission out there, be it North America or around the world, that regulates mixed martial arts, they’ve got the same issues so why can they still hold these events?”

Well Joe, that is also WRONG.  As I mentioned above, Vancouver is breaking new ground because of the fact that the province of British Columbia has no sanctioning body for MMA, making it different from any other past UFC host city.

So no Joe, the City of Vancouver COULD NOT “follow the model that’s been successful for all these different states and provinces that continue to hold mixed martial arts events” – not without the provincial government.

Joe’s clearly one of those reporters that revels in the access he has in the big names of UFC, whether it is Dana White or Tito Ortiz.  In fact, as you can see above from the excerpt I posted from the print interview with Ferraro, he flashes his ability to “pick up the phone and call Chuck Liddell or Randy Couture” as one of his selling points.

Good for you Joe.  That is a real feather in the cap of an MMA reporter.

But next time you want to make use of those speed dial numbers you have programmed into your phone, maybe you should do a little more digging into the facts before you insert false stories into the mix and almost compromise an event of such importance – particuarly to your profession.

(the sports edition)

• This is a satisfying story to read about as a former Grizzlies fan that was crushed when that bastard Heisley moved them to Memphis.  The  team’s ticket prices are lowest in the league and attendance was second lowest in the NBA last year. Add the two together and the Grizzlies generated only $322,000 per game, which is one sixth of what the LA Lakers pull in at the gate.  Maybe it wasn’t Vancouver after all.

• I am not as happy to hear about this prediction, however.  Are sponsors, or a lack thereof, the determining factor as to whether the games are a success or not?  Not entirely.  But I have a feeling that the tourist element in Vancouver is also not going to be as strong as earlier forecasts.

• A propagandist?  Wow, thanks Charlie!  Once again, I wish that such a title was accompanied by that elusive cheque that Charlie is so hotly pursuing.  Alas, it unfortunately isn’t, which will likely force Charlie to go back to the hard hitting stories about Vision Vancouver colour schemes that has earned him the reputation that he so richly deserves.

• I am very excited about the picking of the Olympic Men’s Hockey team which will be announced on December 30 by GM Steve Yzerman.  I don’t mind these predictions, although if Stamkos doesn’t make it just like Crosby didn’t four years ago, it will be a huge mistake…mark my words.

• Don’t hold your breath, Canucks fans.  It has been a rough first half for you guys and for my  beloved Habs, although they have just won 3 in a row with the return of Markov.  If the Canucks make it, so too will the Habs.  If they don’t, I think both teams miss.  Somehow I have a feeling that their fates are linked.

• This will be fun.  In fact, pulling football (Br) and football (Am) away from the dome will be more of an impetus for myself and many other quasi-fans to make more of an effort to attend games.  I absolutely hate BC Place, and no amount of renovations are going to change that.  Like I have previously stated, this is the stadium that is going to be responsible for the worse opening ceremonies in Olympic history.

That’s it for today, and for the next few, folks.  Merry Christmas to you and your families.  I will see you back here after Boxing Day.

Reimer Against (smaller promoters boxed out, Canadian Criminal code, inherent violence in marketing)

Woodsworth Against (not enough time with staff report released yesterday particularly because federal and provincial legislation is on the way, police costs, concussion risk, gang concerns, too many serious questions unanswered)

Jang For (sport has evolved, not all about violence, positive values can be taught to kids)

Deal For (about time to move forward, report answers all possible questions)

Chow For (balances interests of citizens with practicality, and comfortable with trial basis)

Anton For (looks forward to attending the event, staff report was very informative, an in relation to Louie’s amendments, let the legal department do their jobs – Council should not get involved in setting indemnity and insurance dollar thresholds)

Stevenson (finally arrived) For (was at Metro Vancouver meeting, report is thorough and he has thought about the issue for a while, previously ambivalent but now supportive, safety concerns now have been cleared up for him, don’t impose morals on people – this is about proper regulation)

Meggs For (pros should contribute more cash to amateur sports)

The motion passes 6-3. MMA is back in Vancouver for at least two years.