Two years ago, I had the honor and priviledge of attending the first-ever legal MMA event in Pennsylvania — Central Pennsylvania Warrior Challenge I — at a small wedding hall called Wisehaven, located in York, PA. On Saturday, I was fortunate to attend Cage Fight 7 in Scranton, where more than 2,700 fans packed The Ice Box arena to yell for their favorite fighters in what was the state’s first live televised MMA event.
Getting to the arena as things were still being set up, I ran into promoter Maury Nehme, who told me that one of the fights had been scrapped at the last minute because one of the fighters did not get his medicals in on time. Maury was a little disappointed, but it didn’t seem to dampen his spirits. Tonight would be a milestone.
Walking inside, I saw Tim Pane of MyHouse sports gear. Tim’s a longtime supporter of MMA in the state and of Cage Fight in particular, so it was great to see him again. Also there setting things up was Fran Evans, Locked in the Cage promoter, who also does an excellent job matchmaking for Cage Fight.
I was able to sit in on a staff meeting with all the FOX/MyNetworkTV crew. They were like a well-oiled machine, very professional, everyone knew exactly what was expected of them and did it without any problems. The crew was anxious to try out its new mobile all-digital production studio — located inside a truck that had been parked backstage at the arena. They had been planning this event for weeks, traveling around the state, filming promotion packages UFC-style, to be shown just before the fights on TV. For the fights, they had three camera guys standing on the cage apron, and two more cameras elsewhere in the arena, so this was no bush-league effort.
I also ran into Jimy “The Kid” Hettes, undoubtedly the most successful fighter to come out of the northeast yet, going 4-0 as an amateir and 7-0 as a pro, and finishing all of his opponents by submission. Jimy, along with the two guys in the main event — Scott Heckman and Joel Roberts — had tried out for The Ultimate Fighter 14 that Monday in New Jersey. I also was introduced to Dustin Pague, the only man to beat both Heckman and Roberts, who had also been at The Ultimate Fighter tryouts.
Local 125-pound fighter Dave Morgan was at the fights, but for the second Cage Fight event in a row, did not fight. In November, Dave went through several opponents, who backed out on his scheduled Cage Fight 6 fight for one reason or another. At Cage Fight 7, Dave had to bow out due to a knee injury. Dave said in an interview at cageside that he would get the winner of the Josh Aarons-Brandon Inskeep fight. The fight didn’t last long and Inskeep won — although it was not without controversy, which I hope to get into in another blog post. On a side note, Morgan has already beaten Aarons by decision, although that was in an amateur fight.
Seen in the crowd with a flaming shock of spiky red hair was UFC welterweight Matt Riddle. An Allentown native, Riddle now trains at the Throwdown training facility in Las Vegas. He was scheduled to fight earlier this month, but suffered an injury and had to bow out. He told me his next fight might be in Rio de Janeiro when the UFC returns to Brazil this year.
Seated somewhere behind Riddle was Mike Thorwart, marketing workhorse for MMA Melee, the MMA social networking site. On the site, Mike has uploaded several of the fights from that night, and in most of them, you can see the top of Riddle’s hair. Mike Malast, the man who created MMA Melee, was there as well. Mike recently announced he will be launching his own MMA promotion, MASS — Martial Art Super Sport — on July 16 in Wilkes-Barre at the Mohegan Sun arena.
Onto some of the fights, I spoke with a friend of Chase Owens’ prior to the event, who said Owens’ ground game might be his weak link, but Owens showed he had put some work in, as he submitted Matthew Perez to win the welterweight title. Afetr a successful reign as NAAFS champ in Ohio,and a subsequent move to PA, look for Owens to turn pro at middleweight. Speaking of ground games, I was impressed with the fluidity of Chad Shay’s ground, transitioning from one sub to another, on his way to a decision win over Christopher Tier.
Martin Wojnarowksi channeled his inner Kazushi Sakuraba by unleashing some Mongolian chops on Anthony Chicone from Chicone’s guard, taking a unanimous decision win and the amateur LHW title. Now at 5-0, it will be interesting to see if Wojnarowksi defends his new title, or jumps to the pros.
Another fan favorite, James Cianci, improved to 3-0 as a pro with his second-round rear-naked choke victory over Patrick Paulo. Hettes described Cianci as a Clay Guida-type fighter — constant aggressive motion, able to literally out-work his opponents.
In the main event, from those I spoke to, Roberts was definitely the underdog in his fight with Heckman; Heckman had a better record, and was coming off a tremendous win at Locked in the Cage, but Roberts had all the tools to be the spoiler. I knew they both had good ground games — the X factor in the fight, I thought, might be what these bring to the table in terms of striking. Heckman took round one with slams and ground control, and even cut Roberts near his nose. But in the second round, according to coach Anthony Colantuono, Heckman abandoned the stragey of ground, ground, ground and engaged in a brawl with Roberts. He caught a left which floored him. Smelling blood, Roberts pounced, sinking in a rear-naked choke for the tapout.
The fight capped off a tremendous night for promoters Maury Nehme and Chris Coyne. With the sold-out crowd and the prospect of FOX televising the next event, there’s the possibility Cage Fight will be moving to a bigger venue and even greater success in the northeast.
