Remember Will Smith’s jokes: Much-maligned UFC President Dana White has greenlit a new venture – the Power Slap League.
While there’s still a lot of uncertainty in the new league, slap fighting is pretty much what it sounds like: two people stand opposite each other and take turns hitting the side of the head with their open hand.
The Nevada State Athletics Commission voted last week in Las Vegas — a city known for carefully considered decisions — to oversee the slap-fighting league.
Videos this year from a competition, the Slap Fighting Championship, show some pretty brutal hand-to-face contact while the recipient just stands there and takes it. Some punches result in knockouts. Arnold Schwarzenegger sits on the sidelines: “Thank God I didn’t get a slap in the face.”
UFC chief business officer Hunter Campbell said his team spent a year working with commission officials to develop rules for the league that were based on those of mixed martial arts (MMA). “It made all the sense in the world to work towards regulation before the sport even started, for all of the obvious reasons – #1, the health and safety of competitors,” he told ESPN. Safety rules include requirements for protective equipment such as face masks and earplugs, and regulations about which parts of a face can be punched. Campbell and officials also called for blood tests, brain scans and medical personnel to be at the scene.
But even MMA enthusiasts seem to have serious reservations.
The main concern: “It’s all offense and no defense,” writes Trent Reinsmith on UFC news site Bloody Elbow. “It’s common for competitors to suffer severe concussions or be completely knocked out from the blows.” In his Substack the Fighting Life, journalist Ben Fowlkes describes the sport as “what you get when you give 13-year-old boys a new one.” sport can be invented”.
Luke Thomas, a martial arts analyst for CBS, wrote on Twitter: “If boxing is about hitting and not being hit, punching is something of the opposite, where the hitting is specifically arranged and conducted without hindrance. Nevada’s mandate is pretty shameless.” USA Today’s Simon Samano wrote, “It might as well be kicking each other in the balls.”
Slap fighting has existed in various forms for years; It was ridiculed on Fox Sports back in the early 2000s. But it gained popularity in the early days of the pandemic with the help of viral videos. Last year, a Polish competitor, Artur “Waluś” Walczak, was knocked out multiple times at an event in October and died in hospital the following month after being placed in a medically-induced coma, notes Reinsmith.
White himself has been the subject of much controversy. He has told fighters dealing with UFC payments to “shut up and fight,” and supported the organization’s decision to feature ex-NFL player Greg Hardy, who has been convicted of domestic violence, though the charges were dropped after an appeal. He is an ardent supporter of Donald Trump and spoke at the 2016 Republican National Convention.
Campbell said the Power Slap League hopes to have a “major broadcast partner” by the end of the year. It is not yet clear when the slapping will begin.
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