Dec 18, 2008 - Here's the video that the Associated Press produced about the death of former MMA fighter Justin Levens:
Like so much of the media coverage of this tragic incident, in which police believe Levens killed his wife and then killed himself, there's ignorance of MMA on display above.
No, Levens didn't compile a 7-2 record in the UFC. He went 0-2 in the UFC. And all these media reports that call him an MMA fighter would be more accurate if they called him a former MMA fighter; he hadn't competed in more than a year and wasn't under contract to any MMA organization. I would also hardly say he "made a name for himself" in the UFC; only a few hard-core fans had ever heard of him 24 hours ago.
Zach Arnold of FightOpinion.com has done good work cataloging some of the lousy media coverage, including tasteless references to Levens' "Executioner" nickname.
I like Rick Chandler at Deadspin, but it was ridiculous for him to suggest that this one incident is somehow indicative of MMA athletes as a whole, and even more ridiculous for him to suggest that the way Andrei Arlovski designs his mouth guard has anything to do with anything. In a sign of how little thought he put into it, Rick referred to Andrei Arlovski as "Sergei Arlovsky." I'm glad to see that Rick later took that bit of silliness out of his post.
So many people have preconceived notions of MMA athletes as savages that it probably never crosses their mind that tragedies like this happen to people in all walks of life.How sad.
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