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By Zach Arnold | February 2, 2011

A caller asked the Sherdog radio host on his Tuesday show why Strikeforce events on Showtime feature wide-angle camera shots and a feel of ‘distance’ from the in-ring product as opposed to the way UFC produces event. Here is how Mr. Breen responded:

“It’s funny that you bring that up and would you like to know the main reason why? Because Showtime knows nothing about MMA and their production staff are incredibly worried about, literally, missing things. That’s how they explained things. Talking to them in meetings, it’s like, well, like I’ve literally heard this like word-for-word, this is verbatim from someone on the Showtime production staff, ‘What if someone throws a kick or something and we miss it?’ “Think about that for a second. They’re worried that someone might kick and they’ll miss it? I know, this is the thing and this is something that, um, the people who don’t think about this with production but the camera angles that you get, people think that like camera work and production is germane to itself, like you know, if you have good camera man and a good production set-up and a good director that whatever they shoot it’ll be good and, frankly, familiarity with the product matters. Look at HBO and how they shoot boxing. There are shots at HBO Boxing that are like super in-close with the fighters in the clinch and it’s masterful and the reason is that they have so much experience doing boxing and likewise, the UFC and the crews they use have a lot of experience of doing MMA so they get a lot better shots and you get a lot, like you feel close to the action and I’ve gotten e-mails from people about this in the past saying that, you know, Showtime, they shoot really far away and I mean that’s like that goes more centrally to what I was talking about with the whole ‘what happens if they kick and we miss it?’ They use like wide angle far-away shots so often times when you’re watching Strikeforce like you feel really far away from the action that’s happening. Same thing with Elite XC, whereas with the UFC they use camera angles that are a lot closer because the guys are a lot more experienced with shooting and they know how to change angles and stuff like that. It is night and day and it’s not just because of the people involved, um, and their skill. It’s their familiarity with MMA. They just don’t feel comfortable with it so they use all this kind of wide angle long-distance hackery that just doesn’t look as good and in the situation like TJ (De Santis) and I were in, you end up missing tons of stuff.”

Breen and De Santis were in San Jose this past weekend for the Strikeforce show and helped out with the preliminary fights that streamed live on the Sherdog web site.

“Yeah, and that’s crazy, too, because they honestly, Showtime Boxing start rounds with a lot of like wide-angle shots and stuff like that. Like, inappropriate use of like jibs and stuff like that, just shots that don’t make any sense. So, yeah, it’s something that, for a lot of people, this will come off as like pedantry and like ‘oh, like, what a stupid thing to complain about.’ But it has very real ramifications and one of the things that people complain the most about with Showtime and Strikeforce for MMA is the commentary and at times things are directly impacted by the commentary. “I mean, if TJ and I were live on Showtime, people would have absolutely destroyed us because we had no idea what happened in the Ron Keslar & Isaiah Hill fights and it wasn’t our fault. Literally, there was no camera angles to see what happened and, on top of that, it was even worse. In the Ron Keslar fight, he got the tap and then he stood up and punched the mat and looked angry and I thought, ‘Oh, did he not win? What has happened? I don’t understand what’s happening. Why is he mad?’

As for why UFC production is better…

“It’s a difference in experience and the little things add up to the big picture. There’s a reason why one of the things that Dana White says all the time when people talk about competing events is ‘we’ve been doing this a lot time, we know how to do it.’ It’s not just about knowing how to book a venue, go and make the press turnout. It’s all those little things and stuff like that like keeping an event running on schedule, knowing how and when to slip prelims in. “You know, you can talk about some of the stuff that the UFC does being substandard and there’s no question that, for instance, Mike Goldberg & Joe Rogan could be vastly improved upon as a commentary duo. But in the larger picture, everything is pretty air-tight with what Zuffa do and they don’t offer up themselves a lot of avenue for criticism on the production side. Yeah, are the aesthetics sometimes like cheesy and maybe a bit tripe, gladiator men and tribal? Yes. But from a technical perspective when it comes to shot selection and that kind of thing, it’s really, really well done and there’s a reason why often times you feel more into a fight in the UFC than at times you do in Strikeforce. And those little things, like I said, go a long way. I mean, not that Strikeforce doesn’t have great fights, but there’s a significant chance that if a great fight breaks out in Strikeforce, it not feel as great as it would in the UFC because of how it’s shot and this is something that has happened on Showtime. “It’s a real thing with boxing fans. Boxing fans will often say, you know, Showtime are putting on a lot better fights than HBO right now but I really wish it looked like HBO or sounded like HBO or whatever and that production stuff makes a big, big difference in the mass recollections of people.”

Earlier on in the radio show, a caller asked the host about his thoughts on Heavy’s growing partnership with the UFC by having a new pre-fight online show featuring Dave Farra right before UFC PPV events. Some are critical of Dave as an interview but personally I’ve always been complimentary towards what he does because he manages to get answers out of guests that other lesser-skilled interviewers can’t do or try to do but aren’t smooth enough to pull off.

The caller was not thrilled about the “Access Hollywood-ification” of the MMA media. Mr. Breen responded in this manner:

JORDAN BREEN: “I just think it’ll be another panel show. I mean the thing is, too, you have to be, it’s a bad question to ask me or I think someone in the media because to some extent it’s kind of like comedians trying jokes on other comedians. Like, um, there’s… like the kind of content that’s produced by various media outlets isn’t necessarily for other media. You know like I don’t, I mean I’m interested in hearing the thoughts of like, you know, people that I’m close to in the media and I find pretty interesting but in general like I’m not the kind of person who’s going to sit down and watch a Countdown show. Likewise, I wouldn’t expect, I don’t think like Adam Schefter really rocks to like the NFL on Fox. Like, why would he? Like, what would that offer him, you know?” TJ DE SANTIS: “It’s like us listening to other MMA podcasts!” JORDAN BREEN: “Yeah! Like people always ask like, ‘man do you listen?’ Like, no. There are times where like I might, depending, like it’s a guest or something really notable happens or if Ariel Helwani’s putting a party hat on (Alistair) Overeem. Like there are reasons why you’d want to listen or look or whatever, but by in large like it’s just not something that everyone does. Likewise, I think it’s a preposterous like I would be amazed to find out that like other people like my other media colleagues, people that I would consider myself friends with would listen to my show. Why would they? It’s just not part, that’s not the audience that I expect or would be common to listen. So, it’s a bit of a weird thing. Like, people always want to know what the media thinks about other parts of the media. But the fact is, most times it’s not positive or negative it’s just like, ‘oh, yeah, it exists,’ not necessarily indifference but just content that it exists and not necessarily interested in the product. “The good thing about it is we’re not, like it’s not in place of anything. It’s not, no one’s being forced to watch. If it’s generally, if it’s something that, you know, watching an interview with Chad Mendes for five minutes before UFC 126 makes more people want to tune in, so be it. But, like, I would have a beef if it was like replacing some kind of staple of pre-fight MMA coverage or it was somehow taking resources but it’s an addition that, you know, Dave Farra and the crew at Heavy have put together, so I mean if it’s good it’s good, if not it’s not. Like I don’t think it’s going to alter anything drastically.”

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