Hello. This is Chris and welcome to another MMA Squared as this week we ask:

There is a distinct parallel between the transformative nature of Babe Ruth’s home runs on the sport of baseball and the UFC championship reign of Chuck Liddell, punctuated by his four plus year streak of knockout and TKO victories.

The sport of baseball pre-Ruth was played in a different style, where batters bunted & stole bases bases while scratching and clawing their way to wins.

That conservative mode of play mirrors the Ground and Pound, wrestling based style that characterized many of the champions of MMA directly preceding Liddell.

While the records set by both Liddell and Ruth would eventually fall...

...each man would remain a symbol of their respective sports long after their primes.

Neither man went gently into the dark night. When the Iceman’s vaunted chin finally began to crumble, we can look back at the baseball writer Jim Reisler’s description of the faded legend, describing him as “merely mortal.”

Ruth hit more home runs than entire teams while ushering in a new era of offense-centric baseball, still played today. As one reporter wrote, “This new fan didn’t know where first base was, but he had heard of Babe Ruth and wanted to see him hit a home run. This same sentence could have been written in 2005, as “The average UFC fan doesn’t know what half guard is, but he had heard of the Iceman and wanted to see him knock someone out.”

Hey everyone, thanks for checking out the column. If you want to say hi, suggest topics or get some custom artwork, email me at mmasquaredcomic@gmail.com or say hello on twitter.

Chris