THE PROPHET'S TUESDAY TAPOUT: WALKING ON HOT COALS EDITION

by The Prophet, ProphetFighting

Welcome to the latest installment of The Prophet's Tuesday Tapout. In this edition we'll preview this weekend's big Floyd Mayweather/Ricky Hatton fight as well as discuss the proactive steps that Chuck Liddell is taking to get his UFC career headed in the right direction. Which brings us to the picture of the chick with the fish. I Googled "hot chick walking on hot coals" and for some reason this picture came up. There's any number of punchlines to this picture, but you're on your own there.

ICEMAN GOES INFOMERCIAL TO REVIVE HIS UFC CAREER

Sometimes this job is like shooting fish in a barrel. Such was the case when fellow EC Carny BOHChris sent along this blurb from the Boston fishwrap that the favorite fighter of California's "Inland Empire"--Chuck Liddell--is seeking outside help to get his career back on track. Apparently his back to back losses to Keith Jardine and Quinton "Rampage" Jackson don't sit well with "The Iceman" and he's decided to cut back his schedule of TV appearances and partying to actually refocus himself of fighting.

Were Liddell a boxer he'd do something like break off a phone call to Teddy Atlas, who's a genius at motivating fighters, or one of the respected trainers in the game like Emmanuel Steward, Floyd Mayweather, Sr. or Freddy Roach. This is MMA, however, and where better for a MMA fighter to look for career guidance than on late night TV infomercials. And the man who'll get Liddell back to the elite level of fighting? None other than Anthony Robbins.

“I just got a call from Chuck Lidell. Chuck is finding himself in a position where he’s famous, because his sport has grown in popularity so rapidly. All of a sudden you have a posse and you’re going out to dinner before your fights and not working like you used to. He’s not as hungry as when he made it. We’re just starting the journey with him to find out what drives him.”

Here's the original article from the Boston fishwrap. It's buried in a big piece about some local football coach that's supposed to be pretty good or something.

Now you may be surprised to hear this, but I think Liddell is on the right track. Infomercials are a great place to find not only advice for professional fighters, but answers to most of the difficult questions of life. Need money? Do what Don Lapre did. Just throw up a few "tiny classified ads", set up a few 900 numbers and sit back and watch the six figure checks start rolling in. For the more ambitious, there's "no money down" real estate which is a favorite infomercial topic sold by guys like Carlton Sheets. You have to go back to the late 80's/early 90's to find the best "no money down" guru ever--that would be Vietnamese immigrant Tom Vu. The best thing about Vu is that he didn't beat around the bush--he knew what the audience watching his pitch at 4 AM on the local UHF channel wanted. Boats, broads, cars, etc. Vu would frequently give his pitch surrounded by bikini clad models. The unwritten message was crystal clear: I may be a short, unattractive, middle aged Vietnamese dude but I've got so much money that I'm banging each and every one of these bikini clad hotties on a regular basis. Sometimes he'd up the ante by taking this group of babes out on his boat. More importantly, he made the people watching at home feel like they could also be banging a retinue of bikini clad hotties if they just have the balls to break out their credit card and call. For those of you not familiar with Vu's "work" here's a profile complete with video excerpts from his infomercials:

Tom Vu teaches you all about no money down real estate

Liddell is at a crossroads in his career so its imperative that he reach out to someone with credibility, sincerity and a track record of achievement and success. That man, of course, is Ron Jeremy and the product in question is the penis enlargement solution called "ExtenZe". Unfortunately, Jeremy has been replaced and the infomercial upgraded to one with better production values but IMO its lost a lot of the credibility and gravitas that "The Hedgehog" brought to the table.

This infomercial was great for a number of reasons. First, they went out of their way not to say "penis" and, unfortunately, synonyms like "crack", "meatwhistle" or "tubesteak". They referred over and over again to "that certain part of the male anatomy". Here's some advice--never take medical advice from a doctor or, in this case, an over-the-hill porno star if they're not comfortable using the actual names of the various body parts.

Next, they knew how to amp up the credibility. I know you're asking yourself "how the hell can you *get* more credible than Ron Jeremy?" but the producers of the ExtenZe infomercial didn't stop there. If one porno star provides some credibility, just think of what a whole bunch of porno stars would do--and that's exactly what the ExtenZe commercial did: they brought in a never ending stream (insert your own pun there) of b-grade porno stars. And the funniest thing was that most of the time these porno stars weren't even on the right page--Jeremy would ask them softball questions like "how important is size" and the porno stars would give a "size isn't *that* important" speech. That may or may not be true, but you'd think that they'd tailor their answer somewhat being as they're on an infomercial selling penis enlargement products.

Finally, the guests have NO experience with or knowledge of the product whatsoever. So porno stars finally place a high value on their veracity when they're asked to appear on an infomercial? It's hilarious that none of the guests have used the product, nor do they know anyone else that does. One porno star helpfully suggests that she "knows a woman who knows a guy that does". The line of the night is reserved for (presumably well endowed) porno star Chanz Fortune who smugly suggests to Jeremy that "guys like you and I don't really need this stuff".

It goes without saying that Jeremy is in top form. At one point he's basically insulting one of his female porno star guests, implying that female porn stars aren't a particularly intelligent lot. He summarizes his argument with this great line: "There aren't very many women in the adult film business at the Johnson Space Center".

The moral of the story is that there's nothing more tedious than a bunch of porno stars hanging around fully dressed and trying to carry on conversations.

You can relive the glory that was the "Ron Jeremy ExtenZe ad" here

Bottom line--I think Liddell is on the right path with this "infomerical" approach to his sport but I think he should do a little more "due diligence" regarding his options first.

FLOYD MAYWEATHER VS. RICKY HATTON COMING UP THIS WEEKEND:

The long awaited matchup between Floyd Mayweather and Ricky Hatton happens this Saturday night. I can't see "Hook n Hold" Hatton beating the slick Mayweather. Hatton wants to do a lot of the same things that Oscar De la Hoya did, only he's not as good of a boxer. A lot of guys that fight Mayweather get so wound up trying to figure out how they're going to get through his incredible defense that they forget what a good counterpuncher and what deceptive power he has. De la Hoya's trainer Freddy Roach was smart enough to prepare his fighter to defend against Mayweather and that alone resulted in his better than expected showing. If Hatton's braintrust hasn't worked with him on a defensive strategy more refined than trying to hold Mayweather the result could be Floyd by KO/TKO. Hatton is a tough guy and its hard to call for him to get KO'd but this fight could look a lot like Mayweather v. Arturo Gatti.

I wrote a full analysis of the fight a couple of weeks ago in the "Drunken Brits" edition of the Tuesday Tapout

So that's it for this week... as always follow the latest in boxing and MMA at ProphetFighting.com. We'll also be doing a live round by round commentary of Mayweather/Hatton here at EC so check back around fight time Saturday night.