Jim Rome of ESPN showed again today that he's one of the few members of the elite sports media who really gets mixed martial arts, using the intro of his show Jim Rome is Burning to talk about Mike Brown's win over Urijah Faber last night at WEC 36."For those of you who have not jumped on the MMA bandwagon yet, this is exactly what they're selling and what you're missing," Rome said. "Any fighter can win at any given moment. It's not any given Sunday, it's any given shot. Faber was and probably still is a top 5 fighter, pound-for-pound. He's definitely the best thing the WEC has going, and while Brown had won his last seven fights coming in, nobody expected to see the ref pulling him off Faber last night, let alone the first round. ...
"That's what makes MMA so electric. There's no margin for error, the stakes are that high every second of every fight. ... This was not a case of Faber underestimating the opponent, or not being ready for that fight. He was a world champion at the top of his game, and he got caught, and it was over before it even started. That's MMA. Get on board because you can't get that sort of thing anywhere else."
At a time when MMA is still dismissed as barbaric or irrelevant by many of the sports media elites, it's nice to know that Rome recognizes the greatness of the sport, and uses his show to spread the word.
