Legalize Mixed Martial Arts in New York State

[Sx66gns]

legalize mixed martial arts in New York State

Less than three weeks ago, Matt Serra was in the highest profile fight of his career and one of the most successful events in Ultimate Fighting Championship history.

Serra is already back in the ring, and in a fight. But this time it’s the political ring.

And when it comes to long-term historical impact, he hopes this battle will make his April 19 loss to Georges St. Pierre pale in comparison.

Fighters Serra and Matt Hamill, along with UFC vice-president of regulatory affairs Marc Ratner and others associated with the promotion, spent several days earlier this week in Albany, N.Y., working on gathering political support to legalize mixed martial arts in New York State and put it under the regulatory authority of the state athletic commission.

“We met with about 20 legislators Monday and Tuesday,” said Ratner, the longtime executive director of the Nevada State Athletic Commission who was brought on board by UFC to get MMA cleared nationwide.

“We had no measurable opposition,” he said. “So far it’s gone very good. I’m very bullish on it.”

Bills still need to go through the state house and Senate and to get signed by Governor David Patterson. Ratner hopes, if everything runs smoothly, to be able to have a UFC event in Madison Square Garden by the end of this year or early 2009. He also noted there are plenty of cities in upstate New York that would be under consideration for a show.

One of those cities in Utica, where Hamill currently lives. Over the years at various civic events, Hamill has come in contact with State Senator Joseph Griffo (R-Utica), who has become a proponent of the Senate bill, citing both the popularity of the sport and the success it has had in border states like Ohio and New Jersey.

Ratner noted how important it was this past week for the legislators and politicians like Albany mayor Gerald Jennings to meet with the fighters, to dispel any image they may have of them being uneducated thugs.

Serra owns two jiu-jitsu academies on Long Island. Hamill didn’t let being deaf stop him from winning two Division III national wrestling championships and graduating from the Rochester Institute of Technology with a degree in engineering. As a fighter, he was originally stereotyped as “the deaf wrestler” on the Ultimate Fighter reality show in 2006. But he’s progressed to the point he’s rarely thought of as a fighter who overcame a handicap, but simply a regular on the roster, whose popularity skyrocketed after a controversial decision loss to Michael Bisping in London on September 8.

Serra came out of the meetings with a positive vibe, noting that a lot of the older senators talked with him about how their kids are really into it.

“If they weren’t fans of it, their kids were,” he said. “They were mainly concerned about safety.”

Serra noted he’s been fighting since 2001 and his worst injuries in matches themselves have been a few black eyes, and even though he’s coming off a one-sided loss to St. Pierre, a few weeks later, he feels fine.

“I’ve gotten hurt worse training than fighting,” Serra said.

Griffo’s bill is currently in the Tourism, Sports and Recreation committee and if passed, will move to the Senate floor, with the hope of passing by the end of the current session on June 23. An identical bill is in the state House of Representatives.

“When you have New Jersey and Ohio successfully running events, we are passing up major revenue and tourism,” said Griffo, “you start to ask questions.”

The big question is how things got to where they are in the first place.

When UFC was in its original form and at a popularity peak in 1995, it ran an event in Buffalo, N.Y., which nearly sold out the old Memorial Auditorium and drew a then-company record $300,000 gate.

But the sport started riding a wave of controversy after Arizona Sen. John McCain dubbed the nascent sport “human cockfighting” and attempted to get it banned nationally and taken off pay per view. It was an effort that quickly crippled the sport and came close to killing the entire industry within a few years.

Shortly after McCain became his political opponent, then-UFC owner Bob Meyrowitz was able to get a bill introduced to legalize UFC in New York and get it regulated by the state athletic commission. The legalization law was actually added onto a different bill, which passed both houses easily and became law.

Meyrowitz scheduled an event in early 1997 in Niagara Falls. His strategy was to run a few shows upstate and then, with a successful record, move into New York City. But a rival promotion booked a show immediately in the city.

Suddenly, both shows became a lightning rod for controversy, with the local media asking the question as to how such the legislature could have allowed such an event to take place.

The athletic commission didn’t have the legal power to stop the show, but did have the power to regulate it. It forced the event out by suddenly throwing a 114-page rulebook at UFC in the last days before the event, designed to run the event out of town.

The key rule was that the octagon cage had to be 40 feet in diameter, and at that late an hour, a new cage couldn’t have been built for those specifications. The commission also mandated fighters wearing boxing gloves, changing the sport because of the difficulty of grappling with them, as well as mandating boxing headgear to be used in the fights.

The night before the Niagara Falls show, after losing a lawsuit to get the new rules overturned, UFC had to charter a flight taking 200 people to Dothan, Ala., a backup site. The fighters and officials arrived at their new hotels at 5 A.M. the day of the show after flying all night. They barely got the arena ready and octagon itself set up in time for the show to go on the air as scheduled.

Between the cost of moving the show, having to give tickets away to get a crowd because of no promotion for the event in Dothan, and losing the live gate, it was estimated the move cost the promotion $700,000.

The same politicians who voted overwhelmingly to have mixed martial arts legalized and regulated a few months earlier did an about-face under intense media pressure. They rushed into passing a bill through the House and Senate, where it passed with almost no opposition, and signed by then-Governor George Pataki, to ban the sport who called the sport “barbaric,” a tag used in negative MMA media stories even to this day.

Ratner noted UFC is currently involved with pushing legislation to get MMA regulated by athletic commissions in Tennessee, Massachusetts, South Carolina and Rhode Island to add to the 32 state commissions (and the District of Columbia) currently regulating the events.

Serra himself was involved with a mass e-mail campaign to gyms and area fans.

“After fighting with 20,000 people (in Montreal on April 19) booing you, it made me really want to fight in my home state.”

[Admin]

This petition will be forwarded to elected officials of the NY State Senate and Assembly as well as the Governor of NYS. NYS legislature needs to repeal the 1997 law to ban combative sports in order for the NYSAC to sanction MMA.


http://www.petitiononline.com/WNYMMA/petition.html

[GIXXERDAD]

Bills are on there way to being passed in Maryland as we "speak." Can't wait.

It is amazing how far this sport has come in the past few years. You wonder if the UFC is doing something right?

[Phoenix]

When mma is legalized in New York, my dream card will come to fruition.

[mmaboise13]

i dont care if it get leagalized because i live in idaho and fights are doin good out west, no one would perfer to go to newyork because you cant gambal on the fights o_O

[kevz04]

They need to legalize it in Washington, DC. If this happens, there truly is a God. I actually live in Virginia but there is no way in hell it would ever be legalized here or any reason it needs to be. Virginia doesn't have anything to offer plus us Virginians go up to D.C. to watch sports events anyways.

[GIXXERDAD]

Originally Posted by kevz04

They need to legalize it in Washington, DC. If this happens, there truly is a God. I actually live in Virginia but there is no way in hell it would ever be legalized here or any reason it needs to be. Virginia doesn't have anything to offer plus us Virginians go up to D.C. to watch sports events anyways.

They already have. There has been two events already, and I went to one of them at the Patriot Center. UWC Ultimate Warrior Challenge is the only big venue thus far. Check it out sometime. Maryland is almost complete, expected to be cleared by early next year.

[GN[FDU]]

It's been legalized here in Tennessee as well. I will attend the first MMA event in TN this coming Saturday. Although I'd rather compete in it, but I fractured and broke a piece off my elbow a couple of weeks ago so I'm not cleared to fight. Sucks for me. I was really looking forward to making my debut at that event.

[kevz04]

Oh, wow. I'm not too experienced with the whole MMA scene. To be honest, I was only familiar with UFC. I didn't realize other organizations existed. Thanks for the info. I'd love if UFC came to D.C. what a treat.

[kevz04]

While we are talkin about D.C., is the Verizon Center the kind of place an MMA event would be held?

[MHJ]

The fact that MMA is illegal in some states in this day and age is outrageous. When will these athletic commissions wake up and realize the sport is safe?

[manojjonam10]

I hope that the law makers will soon understand that the MMA arts are totally safe. However it is frustrating that these famous performance are being banned in many states without a clear reason.

[Cause McDubree]

And Toronto!

[Cause McDubree]

(don't shoot the messenger!)

Poll suggests UFC's fight in N.Y. just got tougher
Steve Sievert, MMAjunkie.com
9 hours, 10 minutes ago

Score one for the opposition in the ongoing battle to legalize mixed martial arts in New York State.

Assemblyman Bob Reilly (D) this past Friday released the results of a poll he commissioned to gauge the opinion of MMA among constituents in his district in the nation's third most populous state. Nearly 70 percent of the 468 New Yorkers surveyed said they are against legalizing the sport.

"The poll found overwhelming opposition to making mixed martial arts legal in New York State," Reilly stated in a press release announcing the poll results. "Of those surveyed, 67 percent said they opposed making MMA legal in New York. Just 18 percent said they supported making ultimate fighting legal."

The sample size is not large enough to be statistically significant, but that fact will be lost on many Empire State residents who learned of the results from Albany-based media.

Another interesting note from the survey is how the question was asked. Instead of posing a straightforward question, such as "Should MMA be allowed in New York?," the question was accompanied by the background information below that could have compromised the survey's objectivity.

"Ultimate fighting, or mixed martial arts, is currently banned in New York State. There is current debate whether ultimate fighting should be permitted statewide. Do you think ultimate fighting matches should be allowed in New York State?"

The survey is the latest salvo from the opposition in an extended debate about the merits of MMA. The UFC has used an economic-impact study, an informational Web site and fighters themselves, including Long Island's Matt Serra, to make a case for the sport.

"Let me say how important New York is to our company," Lawrence Epstein, the UFC's general counsel, told the Associated Press. "New York is the world media center. When you do events in New York, you get more attention."

Lawmakers in the state remain mixed on the idea of giving MMA a stamp of approval. "I believe my district is reflective of the state as a whole and am confident a statewide poll would yield similar results," said Reilly, who's leading the push to keep MMA on ice. He added that he's more opposed to legalizing MMA now than he was last June when he helped sink the bill in committee.

Even the sponsor of the bill to legalize the sport can't be described as an ardent supporter of MMA. Assemblyman Steve Englebright, who chairs the state's Committee on Tourism, Arts & Sports Development, has been reluctant to rally additional support for the measure. Englebright says he's being "cautious" in his approach and adds that he's in no rush to push the measure through.

The UFC was hopeful for passage of a bill this year to enable the promotion to stage its first event in New York by year's end. However, in the battle of PR tactics, this survey is a setback. And, with the state grappling with more critical issues, such as rising unemployment and a $14 billion budget shortfall, the UFC's 2009 timeline appears in jeopardy.

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[iiaok]

Originally Posted by Cause McDubree

Nearly 70 percent of the 468 New Yorkers surveyed said they are against legalizing the sport.

The sample size is not large enough to be statistically significant, but that fact will be lost on many Empire State residents who learned of the results from Albany-based media.

Gotta love these "sample" surveys. 468 people in a city of over 8 million is a great sample. So let's throw a "Down With Ultimate Fighting" banquet and run a sample survey to see what the results will be, and then skew the rest of the voters' opinions with it.

Ridiculous. Unbiased media FTL!

Originally Posted by Cause McDubree

who's leading the push to keep MMA on ice...

This line made me think of something completely different...and I had a pretty good laugh. Could you imagine..." Mir / Lesnar -- ON ICE!" hahaha

Love that it's also refered to as "ultimate fighting" and not mma.

[Cause McDubree]

Originally Posted by iiaok

Love that it's also refered to as "ultimate fighting" and not mma.

that's the redflag your blowhard politico knows zilch about the sport. probably saw a few brutal KO's on highlight reels and decided to become a NIMBY on the issue in hopes of pandering to his liberal constituents. easy to spot on the dais of the town hall meeting~ look for the mormon-type geek with pink carnation on lapel.

great new (politically incorrect) t-shirt slogan:
if you're against mma, chances are you're gay.

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[ZzZ]

Btw iiaok don't forget the other 11 million of us who aren't nyc. Western new yorkers have always been shafted by nyc politics

[Sx66gns]

Update , check it here: