Eye pokes are no joke.
In my time training, I’ve been poked in the eyes more times than I care to remember. On purpose or not, I’ll never know.
Although some of my old training partners think it may have been done on purpose. But that’s a story for another time.
What I do remember is the worst one.
It hurt like hell, the eye turned red, and it’s hard to open. You see both darkness and light at the same time until the pain subsides.
Then, when you finally can open your eyes, the vision is blurry. You’re always hesitant to open it right away. But you know you have to, to know if you can still see.
Once you do, and the pain subsides, you start seeing little flashes of light out of the corner of your eye. You turn to see where it’s coming from, then realize it’s a remnant of the injury still acting up.
This happened to me when I was young and stupid, so I never went to get checked out.
If it happened now, I would totally get checked out. Because our eyes, our vision, and many of our senses, we tend to take for granted when we’re younger. Losing them is a scary thought.
So what’s the point of this post?
Tom Aspinall didn’t quit
The more I see his eyes get poked at UFC 321, the more I remember how they feel.
There’s a reason it’s considered a self-defense move rather than one trained in MMA gyms. You blind someone when your life is on the line, not for sport.
Traditional martial arts trains you to keep a tight fist, and parrying a punch is defensive.
No one knows the intent of the poker, but something should be done about it. The UFC “tried” last year, but it seemed to not make for good TV.
So they scrapped.
I wrote this piece over at MyMMANews when they announced their new gloves, and in it, I mentioned other glove options. They are out there, and have been for as long as mixed martial arts has been around.
I don’t know why the UFC doesn’t want to change gloves and just slap their branding on them. It’ll still be the UFC, regardless of the gloves.
Not changing them because they want to say they had something to do with the design is selfish and stupid.
Just try something else.
Whatever they stick with, their fans will accept because they’re already programmed to take what the UFC gives them.
End rant.
Eye pokes are scary. Since it’s scary season, maybe check out my latest work of fiction, “The Father of Evil,” this Halloween. Click the pumpkin to pick it up or read for free on Kindle Unlimited.
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