MTV Beats Down a Bully

If you have not seen MTV's foray into mixed martial arts, you need to schedule a little time to watch Bully Beatdown.

Bully Beatdown is hosted by successful MMA journeyman, Jason "Mayhem" Miller, who teams with victims of neighborhood bullies as they confront their aggressors. 

In each episode, Mayhem—who apparently sucks down a six pack of Red Bull before the cameras roll, offers the offending bully $10,000 to step into the cage against "his guys"—professional MMA fighters. 

Invariably, the bully takes the bait and Mayhem reels them in.

Before the fight, Miller and professional MMA trainer, Jeremy Williams test the bully's skills both on the ground and with the heavy bag, and then he selects a fighter of comparable weight and size to beat down the bully.

The format of the fight is one round of submission grappling followed by one round of kickboxing. 

The bully starts Round One with $5,000 and for each time he is submitted in the three-minute period, he loses $1,000.  Each subtraction from the purse is given to the victim(s) of the bully.   

For Round Two, the bully only needs to survive the round without a KO, TKO, or verbal submission.  If he "prevails," he receives $5,000 from Mayhem. 

A loss sees all that money handed to his victims who play spectator to the entire event.

Full disclosure here. 

I was bullied a bit as a kid.

Not bullied beyond belief by any means, but bullied plenty.

My parents were seemingly semi-nomadic, and my brother and I changed schools nearly every year of our childhood.  When you go to 16 schools in 13 years of school, you always have the "new kid" stigma, and you always face bullies during that "testing phase." 

Like many new kids on the block, I have been jumped, punched, slapped, pushed, kicked, and threatened.  I have even been shot in the back with a blowgun!

So, when a friend recommended Bully Beatdown to me...it was doubly sweet. 

On one hand, every kid loves to see the bully get his just desserts.  On the other hand, every MMA fan loves to see martial arts fighters hand the tough guys their butts.

Not every episode is the best, but each one is entertaining.   Take a couple of hours and take in all six shows, and see if you experience the same sense of joy that I did.

Episode 1:  Bully Ryan fights MMA fighter Tony Bonello.  This episode has a nice, sweet ending.  Ah, brotherly love.

Episode 2:  6'7" bully Vince gets his backside handed to him by former NFL player now MMA fighter, Michael Westbrook.

Episode 3:  Neighborhood bully, Christian looks like he is first grappling with Marcelo Garcia and then kickboxing with Cung Le.  But alas, it is only Conor Huen—who puts on an informative grappling/striking clinic including gogoplatas and flying front-kicks.

Episode 4:  Skater bully, Jonathan faces former champion, Jake Shields.  It was nice to see that Jake Shields is a genuinely nice guy, but bully Jonathan was definitely more skater than fighter.

Episode 5:  Bully Eriq takes on standout Jon Murphy.  "Every man who thinks he is something when he is nothing, deceives himself."  Galatians 6:3

Episode 6: The bully "wins."  Check it out for yourself.

I would love to hear feedback on whether your believe this show is good or bad for MMA's image.

Photo credit: (Screen capture) http://www.mtv.com/ontv/dyn/bully_beatdown/series.jhtml