SCOTT on:

   I Hope You Mean It

UFC 97 once again saw Chuck Liddell in a heap on the canvas, victim of another younger, better fighter. Liddell is one of the greatest light heavyweights of all time, but he’s lost four of his last five fights after dominating the division for nearly three years and he’s not getting closer to winning, he’s getting farther from it.

After his most recent wipeout, UFC president Dana White announced that Chuck was never going to be seen on the canvas again. With Liddell soon to turn 40 and his best days clearly far behind him, that would seem like an obvious conclusion. But there is an exception to that obvious conclusion in the case of Chuck Liddell: he sells tickets.

Despite his plummet down the rankings, he remains the most popular figure in all of mixed-martial-arts, able to sell t-shirts, tickets and pay-per-view buys far in excess of anyone else. Liddell was the first UFC star to break into the mainstream and he’s still the “face” of the organization whether the UFC wants to admit that or not.

All that means he’s still able to generate dollars when he fights and if we’ve learned anything from the history of combat sports it is this: if you can generate dollars, you can fight, no matter how used up you are.

That’s why Mohammed Ali walks around in a stupor. He was able to generate money off his fame long after his boxing skills had vanished and he was always able to get another fight, no matter how dangerous it was to his health, because he could put fans in seats.

The case of Chuck Liddell is another great opportunity for the UFC to distance itself from the sordid reputation of boxing by preventing him from fighting there despite his ability to make the company money. If the UFC stands up and says “no” to Liddell for the protection of his health and future and because he’s no longer competitive, it will do something no boxing promoter or organization ever did and that’s turn away money.

Now if Liddell wants to fight outside the UFC, and let’s hope he doesn’t, but if he did, that’s his own business. What the UFC’s business is is providing compelling fights between the greatest fighters in the world and protecting the safety of those fighters. The UFC would be betraying its mission by allowing a has-been Liddell to take another beating in the name of a few more fans in seats.

The UFC has made no bones in its history that it is a business, that it operates to provide compelling, exciting fights involving fighters fans want to see first and foremost. Putting Brock Lesnar in a championship fight in his second ever UFC fight and third ever MMA fight is proof of that. Did Lesnar deserve a title fight? Based on his popular appeal and ability to generate buzz he did. Giving Lesnar a title shot was a business decision, not an MMA decision, and it was the right one.

The UFC is upfront about its wanting exciting fights and exciting fighters, win, lose or draw. A fighter who loses spectacularly like Wanderlei Silva will continue to get fights as long as he’s competitive at a much higher rate than a fighter who never loses, but wins boring.

Chuck Liddell fights incredibly exciting fights, he generates huge interest, fans want to see him fight and will pay to do it, but the UFC needs to say “no” to Chuck and mean it. Chuck is no longer competitive and him getting back into the ring is now dangerous.

After his most recent beating, Chuck admitted he was finished, but guys who fight for a living have an uncanny ability to talk themselves into the idea they can “go” long after they can. While Liddell today says he’s through, a passage of time will almost certainly change his mind like it has every other fighter.

The UFC can not change its mind.

Its “no” has to mean “no” now and forever.

The last thing anyone wants to see is Liddell taken from the ring in a neck brace or slurring his speech and unable to remember his glory days at 50-years-old. Liddell can continue to be an important figure in MMA and the UFC and use his huge personal popularity to spread the gospel of the sport, what he can’t do any more is be a part of it in the ring and it’s the UFC’s responsibility to make sure that doesn’t happen.

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