Brock Lesnar is a walking and breathing showcase for the power of pro wrestling. He brought some WWE into the UFC and the results speak for themselves: 1.7 million rumored PPV buys for UFC 100. But some MMA reporters still aren't sure what to think.
Brock Lesnar—I’m very conflicted over Lesnar, his post UFC 100 antics and his impact on the sport. On one level, there’s a lot of hypocrisy in condemning him and a lot of that is based in his background in pro wrestling. A common take is that ‘Lesnar is bringing WWE antics to MMA’. The problem with that is that it displays ignorance to the long relationship between MMA in the US and particularly in Japan. There are at least three UFC Hall of Famers that spent a considerable chunk of time in pro wrestling .......
On another level, his behavior *was* unsportsmanlike and pro forma it’s something we don’t like to see in fight sports. The next question is how much of that is what wrestling fans call a ‘work’ and how much is really his personality?
You can see their dilemma. On the one hand, they love Brock. He's what people expected from MMA back in 1993. He's raw and powerful and dangerous. And that's what scares them. Like the best pro wrestlers, like Johnny Valentine or Steve Williams, they know he's tough as hell and maybe just a little crazy. But how much of that is real and how much is fake?
Does it matter? It's amazingly entertaining. And in pro wrestling (or in MMA) that's all that matters.