



The Albuquerque fight camp that once set the standard for peerless fight strategies, superior cardio, and good hard training that saw fighters the world over make the pilgrimage to Albuquerque to get world class training has dropped their last 18 UFC fights including last nights main event loss by Cub Swanson at the hands of Brian Ortega. The list does not include the N/C by Jon Jones or the draw by Lando Vanata, but the lost is as follows: 1.Cowboy x2 2.Michelle Waterson x2, 3. Anthony Hamilton 2x 4.Diego Sanchez 5. Allistar Overeem 6. John Dodson 7. Ray Borg 8. Marcin Tybura 9. Chase Sherman 10. Damian Stasiak 11. Jodi Esquibel 12. Johny Hendricks 13. Tom Duquesnoy 14. Mitch Clark 15. Jack Marshman 16. Cub Swanson 17. Tyson Pedro.

Of course the question is why? is it the loss of original Jackson coaches such as Chris Luttrell who were part of the building of the place and its system of fighting? the move to the new high tech facility? the "semi-retirement of Jackson himself who reportedly is not there full time every week? There has been a mortgaging of the family values that Jax/Wink was built on may have began declining all the way back when too many fighters were allowed to join from the same weight classes of fighters already in camp, such as GSP when Diego was already there, and perhaps most notably when Rashad Evans objected to the invitation given Jon Jones to join the squad which resulted in his ultimate betrayal after befriending Jones and eventually being replaced by him as team leader forcing Evans out and to a new team in Florida.

The Jackson Wink partnership with Chechen Warlord and human rights violator Ramzan Kadyrov have also put the gym in a negative light, and unconfirmed rumors of PED's in the gym proliferated by a Russian manager are also something that's been out on the street. Either way, one must wonder what happened to a once great team with the best coaches, the best strategies, such that their fighters in many cases less talented bested more talented fighters because of the formula that was Team Jackson's.

Writers' Opinion: Money, and the desire for it can corrupt anything, there does need to be a sense of family within these MMA teams that train them for one of the most dangerous jobs on earth, but the desire to bring in more and more fighters and get 10% of more and more fighters money, and be the biggest can prevent you from remaining "the best", it can break down the family unit that once was this gem of a gym in Albuquerque, can it rise to that level again, sure it can, whether it will remains to be seen and only the principals can decide that.