"I'm from the future. I came here in a Time Machine that you invented. Now I need your help to get back to the year 1985."
Okay, it was actually the year 1993 when the Ultimate Fighting Championship came to fruition but you get the point. With the recent slew of signings from both UFC and Bellator, it seems fans have been bombarded with a undesired dose of nostalgia, as MMA looks likely in returning to the ghost of days gone by.
2014 was the year where promotions collectivity realised that. in an over-saturated sport, it's actually pretty hard to build new headliners. If you look at the UFC, they've stumbled across a pot of gold, pun intended, in "Notorious" Conor McGregor, who just this past weekend smashed the Fox Sports viewership record for MMA, pulling in 2,751,000 viewers for his cherry pickings over Dennis Siver in Boston.
So the flux capacitor has been somewhat dormant the past several years, with all promotions globally looking to create a new superstar, a new Georges St-Pierre, a modern day incarnate of Brock Lesnar. But what happens when you are unable to do that? Better the devil you know.
It was announced at Bellator 132 that Kimbo Slice would make his return to MMA, and if the previous signings of Tito Ortiz and Stephan Bonnar are anything to go by then it's clear Scott Coker is very open in reinvigorating the past in the right way.
There isn't very much chance of us seeing Ortiz, or Kimbo fighting for a title; unless they go on a big run, they are there to serve a purpose as an attraction, to help open up the market for the younger, less known fighters. However the UFC seem to have a different method about it.
With the signing of Quinton "Rampage" Jackson, coaxing Jackson away from a grief tenure in Bellator. Also, the recent off to Mirko "Cro Cop" Filipovic at the eleventh hour, just as it seemed he was heading to the Viacom owned promotion.
For the media giant UFC, it seems that rather than bringing in old talent out of necessity, it is simply to spite their rivals over at Bellator. Does the UFC really need Rampage of Cro Cop? No, but they will likely draw good numbers for the promotion, who as of right now lack legitimate money making fighters.
The statistics don't lie, out of the UFC's top 10 highest pay-per-view buy rates, GSP and Lesnar feature in six of them. It's no secret that President Dana White is very interested in bringing both fighters back, with Lesnar's return looking imminent with a highly possible exit from the WWE post-Wrestlemania.
Since Lesnar's departure from the promotion, the heavyweight division has lacked in drawing power, with the top rivalry being a mostly one-sided affair between Cain Velasquez and Junior dos Santos. Although there is a possible big money fight between Velasquez and interim-champion Fabricio Werdum in the pipeline, it would do well to eclipse Lesnar's lowest PPV showing (535,000 vs. Alistair Overeem) in the modern PPV climate.
With Lesnar's return potentially on the horizon, there are rumours circulating of a rubber match against Frank Mir. Their rematch holds the UFC's greatest ever PPV number, at 1,600,000 buys, and saw Lesnar victorious by second round TKO.
Something similar could be said about the welterweight division, with GSP gone, the weight class' top two fighters Johny Hendricks and Robbie Lawler have one title win each over one and other, with their first bout at UFC 171 slated at a disappointing 300,000 buys, and their UFC 181 rematch only slightly better, around 400,000.
Parallel to this, the only big money fight the UFC are able to offer this year as of writing is Jose Aldo defending his featherweight world title against Conor McGregor, which if built right could land around the one million mark.
"Whatever! It demonstrates precisely how time travel can be mis-used, and why the time machine must be destroyed, after we straighten all of this out."
As Dr. Emmett L. Brown put it himself, when there was the need for the time machine, it was used. However despite the influx of legendary names into major promotions I only forsee it as a short term strategy.
With the building of talent like McGregor, Chris Weidman and the continual growth of Jon Jones, right now as the UFC nurtures there talent into potential future superstars, they must call forth the names that have helped forged the sport's popularity.
The use of those names, for now, can sustain fan interest whilst the future icons forge their own destiny.
And only then, can we destroy the time machine.
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