10 Times Wrestling And MMA Were A Bad Mix

by Andrew Soucek

1. The Brawl For All WWE.comThe Brawl for All nearly killed all of the careers of the men that took part in the tournament. Five of the 16 competitors were injured because of it, and even Bart Gunn didn’t get any benefit from winning, except getting the chance to be absolutely destroyed by Butterbean at WrestleMania 15. The tournament was set up as an MMA-like shoot fight affair, except that it seemed to come up with its own rules, like boxing gloves being used, and a points system for takedowns. Due to the competitors having no training in this peculiar style of fighting, the contests were horrendously boring, and felt really out of place on a wrestling show. It basically said “Everything before and after this is fake, but this is real!”The tournament limped to its end with heavy favorite Dr. Death knocked out, and Bart Gunn standing tall when the final bell rung. The problem is, the company had no interest in pushing Bart, so the entire thing was a giant waste of time, money, and a couple of careers.

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As Rust Cohle from True Detective said "Life's barely long enough to get good at one thing. So be careful what you're good at." Sadly, I can't solve a murder like Rust...or change a tire, or even tie a tie. But I do know all the lyrics to Hulk Hogan's "Real American" theme song and can easily name every Natural Born Thriller from the dying days of WCW. I was once ranked 21st in the United States in Tetris...on the Playstation 3 version...for about a week. Follow along @AndrewSoucek and check out my podcast at wrestlingwithfriends.com