Michael Chiesa is the latest fighter to earn the distinction of winning The Ultimate Fighter. But is it honestly much of a distinction anymore?
After 15 seasons and 22 different “Ultimate Fighters,” popular opinion seems to be that the long-running reality TV competition is no longer of great interest or delivering the way it did in previous years. It’s hard to argue otherwise.
The show was groundbreaking when the initial season aired in January 2005, with numerous members of the inaugural cast going on to have lengthy, successful careers in the UFC.
Forrest Griffin won the light heavyweight championship, and Kenny Florian fought for a title on three separate occasions, while Josh Koscheck and Diego Sanchez each challenged for gold once, and Chris Leben has been a mainstay in the middleweight division since his time as the ‘Original Bad Boy’ of The Ultimate Fighter.
The second and third seasons also produced a solid crop of talent, including Rashad Evans, Michael Bisping, and Melvin Guillard.
After a collection of veterans populated the house in Season 4, and lightweights like Nate Diaz, Joe Lauzon, and Gray Maynard filled out teams captained by BJ Penn and Jens Pulver for Season 5, the show has experienced a dramatic downturn in the level of talent taking part in the battle to earn the six-figure UFC contract.
Over the last 10 seasons, not a single title contender has emerged from the 160 or so individuals who have called Las Vegas their temporary home. That may be a little unfair, as the contestants from seasons 14 and 15 haven’t had much of a chance to try and climb the rankings as of yet, but there are only a handful of fighters from those two groups who look capable of remaining on the roster long-term.
What accentuates the point even more are the struggles of previous winners.
Several previous winners have been released by the organisation, and that’s not even including Season 4 middleweight winner Travis Lutter. Efrain Escudero, Kendall Grove, and Joe Stevenson have all been shown the door, though Escudero returned as a late replacement last December.
In addition to the winners who have been bounced, several of their contemporaries have struggled since earning the once-meaningful moniker as well.
Mac Danzig has battled injuries and inconsistency since emerging victorious on Season 6. Same goes for Season 7 winner Amir Sadollah. Ryan Bader, Ross Pearson, and Roy Nelson have all had reasonable amounts of success since their victories, but they’ve become the exception, not the rule.
James Wilks quietly retired a few weeks back as a result of various injuries. The Brit was just 1-2 after beating DaMarques Johnson to give Michael Bisping’s team the clean sweep during Season 9.
The last five winners – one each from Seasons 11, 12 and 13, plus two from Season 14 – are a combined 1-4 over recent fights; John Dodson is the only one of the group to get a victory.
It paints a grim picture for Chiesa, who will have lofty expectations because of the cachet that winning the show still seems to carry with casual observers. Unfortunately, it’s an unfair weight to burden the most recent winner with at this stage of his career.
The days of TUF winners being title contenders ended a long time ago.
Nate Diaz is probably the last winner who has a chance to challenge for a title, and he struggled at points after winning Season 5 before starting the nice little run he’s enjoying right now.
Recently, the winner of The Ultimate Fighter ends up becoming a fixture in the middle of their respective division that gets an additional push because of their time on the show, justified or not.
Where early seasons drew from a deep pool of talented fighters competing outside of the organisation, those wells have been tapped for some time. Now, the UFC just goes out and signs the best available talent, bypassing TUF completely, leaving the show to be stocked with solid but unspectacular regional talents.
Though some cast members end up showing potential, the vast majority are fighters who will end up being “one and done” in the UFC, which makes you wonder why the organisation is keeping the program around at this point.
The ratings for this past season were the worst they’ve ever been, and the new night and channel in the States can’t be entirely to blame.
The show has become stale, even with the move to a live format this year. With so many events, it’s hard to get people interested in “exhibition” bouts week after week, especially when the expectation is that the eventual winner won’t end up being much more than a mid-card performer in the future.
Saturday’s victory was a good one for Michael Chiesa, and he shows signs of promise, but earning the title of “The Ultimate Fighter” doesn’t carry much value anymore.
It honestly hasn’t in quite some time.
E. Spencer Kyte is the author of Keyboard Kimura, the MMA blog of Vancouver’s leading newspaper, The Province. Follow him on Twitter (@spencerkyte), or Facebook.
E. Spencer Kyte
Roar Guru
I still love tournaments too, and was so happy that's how the introduced the flyweights. While they could have just picked two of the four, it was better to let four men fight it out, than have to exclude a guy like Ian McCall off the bat. Last year when there was the logjam in the lightweight division, just about every media scrum after an event included someone suggesting a four-man or eight-man tournament — people love them. They're risky, and you need a lot of luck to pull them off in a timely fashion, but as you said, great way to showcase a collection of talent, and have them fighting towards something.
Sam Brown
Roar Guru
I don't particularly love TUF but I would love to see the knockout concept used by the UFC more. They could even do an old school knockout tournament, run over a couple of nights for those low to mid card guys. The knockout tournament would build up the fighters, as it would see people going on hot streaks but also provide some exciting matchups and fights with incentive to go for a quick finish. Winner could get a sum of money, trophy or even a title shot. I guess I'm cherry picking ideas from PRIDE, Bellator and original UFC here but it is just a thought. Could potentially go down a treat in the talent rich lightweight division or be a great side-show for welterweight while the division is stagnating waiting for GSP's return.
E. Spencer Kyte
Roar Guru
I think you're right Sam — it was a useful Trojan Horse and developing ground for talent in the early years, but now it's just a collection of average regional talent who end up saddled with higher expectations because people have connected with them through 13 weeks to television. Do you think there is a need for some alternate form of proving ground/introduction tool for developing fighters - perhaps something like the Strikeforce Challengers series - or is it just time to bury TUF and focus on the events themselves?
E. Spencer Kyte
Roar Guru
I agree with you in spirit, but I think the bigger problem is that too much of the focus is directed to the coaches. It's not as much about finding emerging stars and getting the audience to connect with certain athletes as it used to be. Now, it's about building the drama for the coaches fight on PPV whenever that comes around, except in recent years, those fights have fallen apart or been delayed more often than naught. I think instead of showing generic training video, each fighter can be profiled in advance of their fight. Give each guy 20 minutes of "introduction time" so that we know something about them, and then you have some interest in the winner moving forward beyond the fact that he won his fight. What would you recommend?
E. Spencer Kyte
Roar Guru
Asked and answered in eight words, two letters, and one punctuation mark. Nicely done.
E. Spencer Kyte
Roar Guru
Thanks for the comment, DJ. I actually think the international seasons of TUF like "The Smashes" are the way to go right now. Markets like Australia have barely been explored, and this gives them a great platform to gain some exposure, and get the UFC's attention, even if it's on a "we'll keep an eye on you" level for some.
Happy Hooker
Guest
Q. Does winning the Ulitimate Fighter mean anything? A. No
Sam Brown
Roar Guru
As I have said before I do not think the sport benefits from having a rality tv show and I think you summed up one of the large reasons why here. I feel like TUF fighters get a large media profile and then end up fighting guys who are out of their depth. Some do find their feet and as you mentioned the early season where talent full. However I think the traditional way of coming up: starting in the preliminary cards and building from there, seems to produce better fighters, as they are given a chance to fight people at their level and slowly improve instead of going in the deep end. I have other reservations about the show, however it has cleaned itself up over recent years but I still don't think it is the best way to showcase the UFC.
ErinT
Roar Guru
What was interesting about this year was with the live fights, we missed a large section of the show involving the dynamic of the house. We saw glimpses here and there, such as Sicilia and Rio's cross team friendship, as well as a small showdown involving Tickle and Cruickshank at the end, but that was about it. That said, I felt like I knew more about the fighters this season than I did in season 13 - Lesnar vs. JDS. I don't think we need to go to the horrible levels of pranks that were shown in season 8, but there needs to be a middle ground. We need to connect with these fighters and find our favourites to cheer for. This is what I think has been missing in the last couple of seasons.
DJ
Guest
I think the main point you made well... Where early seasons drew from a deep pool of talented fighters competing outside of the organisation, those wells have been tapped for some time. Now, the UFC just goes out and signs the best available talent, bypassing TUF completely, leaving the show to be stocked with solid but unspectacular regional talents. and ths is the crux of the issue... good regional talent and thats about it... On from this, I worry about the Australian cast of TUF... I tink they get "SMASHed"