No Holds Barred: John Perretti on the Real Origin of Mixed Martial Arts (Part One)

On this edition of No Holds Barred, host Eddie Goldman once again speaks with lifelong martial artist, former UFC and Battlecade Extreme Fighting matchmaker, TV commentator, and our senior correspondent, John Perretti (http://www.twitter.com/ACJohnPerretti).

The issues of the history of mixed martial arts, the development of its modern structure and rules, and the origin of the term itself have again been recent topics of discussion. As has been usual for such commentary, most of it has been inaccurate, incomplete, distorted, skewed, and untruthful - and that doesn't even include the downright dishonest presentations.

Amidst this avalanche of misinformation, again it falls to No Holds Barred to try to set the record straight. We thus conducted a lengthy interview about the origin of mixed martial arts and the term itself with the man who introduced weight classes, rounds, and much more to the modern version of this sport: John Perretti. We spoke by Skype Wednesday, October 31.

In this interview, John Perretti explained not only that he was the one who coined the term "mixed martial arts", but also why it is significant to note that, other than just for historical accuracy.

"When I came to Battlecade Extreme Fighting," he said, "I started using this term as what we were doing, which was very, very different than what the UFC was doing, which was a spectacle."

In the first part of our interview, we discussed many issues including the early and continuing battles to position mixed martial arts as a sport and not a spectacle. There will be much more in the second part of this interview.

We also open by noting the postponement of numerous events in the New York-New Jersey area due to the devastation caused by Hurricane Sandy, including the MMA World Expo, which is now scheduled to take place February 16-17, 2013, at its original location, the Jacob Javits Center in New York. And we discuss some of the lessons of the 2-1, overtime tiebreaker victory by Kyle Dake over David Taylor at the NWCA All-Star Classic on November 3.

You can play or download No Holds Barred at http://nhbnews.podomatic.com/entry/2012-11-04T12_49_49-08_00 and http://archive.org/details/NoHoldsBarredJohnPerrettiOnTheRealOriginOfMixedMartialArtspart. If one link does not work, please try another.

No Holds Barred is also available on mobile phones and iPads through Stitcher (http://landing.stitcher.com/?vurl=noholdsbarred).

Also, No Holds Barred is available through iTunes at http://phobos.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewPodcast?id=150801513&s=143441.

The No Holds Barred theme song is called "The Heist", which is also available on iTunes by composer by Ian Snow(http://magicpumpkinstudios.com).

No Holds Barred is free to listen to and is sponsored by:

ONE Fighting Championship (http://onefc.com). ONE FC is Asia's largest and most prestigious mixed martial arts event. ONE FC features the best Asian fighters and has initiated the ONE Asia Partnership Network, which includes most of the major MMA promotions and MMA gyms in Asia. For more information, go to their web site, at ONEFC.com(http://onefc.com).

MMA World Expo (http://www.mmaworldexpo.com). The mixed martial arts community comes to New York City February 16 and 17, 2013, for the fourth annual MMA World Expo, featuring an amateur MMA tournament, grappling, MMA fighters, seminars with world-class trainers, vendors, panel discussions, and much more. The MMA World Expo takes place Saturday, February 16, and Sunday, February 17, 2013, at the Jacob Javits Center in New York City. For more information, go to (http://www.mmaworldexpo.com).

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American Top Team (http://americantopteam.com). Whether you're a beginner or a champion, train with the champions in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, boxing, wrestling, grappling, and mixed martial arts at American Top Team. Check out their web site at http://americantopteam.com.

Thanks, Eddie Goldman http://eddiegoldman.com

Great podcast as always Eddie. Someone should invite Perretti to global-mma.com (if he has the time to post, that is).

Thanks. John will be starting a blog soon and is on Facebook and Twitter already. I'll ask him if he is interested.

very informative and great as always.

Thanks. Wait till part two!