Southpaw

What would modern MMA look like if we took away the gloves and brought back the headbutts?

We make a great case why the headbutt becomes the great equalizer, especially for shorter fighters. And gives wrestlers one more tool for striking. It's a much bigger change than just taking away the gloves. It gives one more limb for attack. It changes the clinch, the takedown, it adds one more range of striking, and so much more.

Listen to episode 7 to hear the first part where we talk about what modern MMA would look like if we took away the gloves.

Sam and Paul break down every detail of what modern MMA would look like if we took away the gloves. And you might be surprised at some of our conclusions. First of all, no, it wouldn't change that quickly. The current batch of fighters would mostly fight the same. Just as we saw with later generation of MMA fighters maximizing the rules and the first generation just fought the only way they knew how. Change happens in generation. But what would footwork look like if you couldn't use jabs and hooks to build your movement? What about eye pokes? Not only is the chin you were born with a big factor, but also your skin. Cuts will become a bigger factor. Then thin-skinned fighters will not fair as well.

Change, whether in MMA or in the world, takes generations. And unfortunately, it happens by previous generations dying off and the next generation knowing better (it took several generations for the majority of Americans to adopt seatbelts).

• As a martial artist, as a principled person, as an honorable person, how should I think about politics?
• How politics should be downstream from your principles and not the other way around
• Your moral compass should not be skewed by politics, it should be your moral compass informing your politics
• The price of never thinking about your principles or forming them before indoctrination
• How principles aren't always ethical
• Utilitarian ethics vs. nonconsequentialist ethics vs. virtue ethics
• The Right vs. the Portlandia Right (Internet New Right)
• The Leftists vs. Democrats
• How we sometimes pick identities that cut off our nose to spite the face (following people who want "Mad Max" when YOU want a utopia)
• How outliers fall into tribes
• How your individuality should not conform to your tribe—if you want a tribe, you should find one that agrees with your principles as an individual
• How to be flexible with your politics but inflexible with your principles
• Retcon (retroactive continuity) to avoid hypocrisy and to form unholy alliances
• How to prioritize as a single-issue voter
• The philosophy of Stone Cold Steve Austin

• What the point of political debates are: what it can and can't do
• Bringing back PWNAGE
• How WWE predicted everything
• Golden handcuffs: money in politics
• How to train for a political debate as if it were an MMA fight, including but not limited to: verbal sparring partners, diet, performance enhancing drugs, drinking lotion and peak performance
• Natural enemies forming unholy alliances just to own the libs
• Intellectual dark web = Bobby Heenan family
• Shilling: billionaires will give money to capitalists, not anti-capitalists
• The left is willing to duke it out amongst themselves, why not the right?
• What political debates would look like if it were done like a modern MMA tournament: rather than style vs. style, everyone vs everyone
• How the left dropped the ball on new media and everything else (winning TV but losing the internet)
• Memes and making your message easily shareable
• Winning hearts and minds vs. winning Emmys
• Celebrities = tomato cans and beating celebrities in a debate = tomato can crusher

A meta-meta-study of the career and fighting style of Renan Barao, and while we're at it, we talk TJ Dillashaw, Anthony Pettis, and Jose Aldo. Plus jokes!

On the very first episode of Southpaw, Sam & Paul go quickly from small talk, to medium talk, to deep talk, to post-talk. Elevating podcasting from the darkness to meet the light! 

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