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 Joosep Lohmus vs Song Turillo is the greatest MMA Tycoon rivalry of all time and here is why!
Here is the key criteria which proves this point:
Quality of Managers:
Joosep was managed by 2 managers during this rivalry and both are in the MMA Tycoon Hall of Fame! Alex K. (84400) was his original creator and signed him up to GAMMA in the first place. He went 1-2 in GAMMA and his second fight in the org was against Song.
Billy Arseworth (74054) Took over after that and the majority of this rivalry was under his watch. Billy was also voted as the manager of the year back in 2017 and is in most peoples books a top 5 or 10 manager of all time in this game.
Song is also managed by a MMA Tycoon Hall of Famer! Also the manager of the year back in 2016. A top 10 manager at least in all people’s books. He is also the greatest manager of all time, currently in GAMMA’s history.
So you have 2 fighters managed by 3 of the best managers ever. How many times do you have 3 top level managers involved in a 1 on 1 rivalry?
Quality of the fighters
Joosep’s highest ranking is #6, Song’s highest ranking is #7. Both are likely going to end up in the GAMMA hall of fame. Joosep is also the 2017, 205lbs fighter of the year. So it is a rivalry among 2 top level fighters.
I know there have been rivalries (such as Kilo vs Karim recently), where we had 2 fighters who were higher ranking, but if we take the totality of all the criteria, there has never been a rivalry at this level before.
Quality of the Org
They are doing this all during a time when GAMMA was a top 3-4 org, PPV level. GAMMA is also one of the oldest running orgs in the game and our 205lbs title has been around since 2009. So this is happening at the highest or one of the highest levels in the game. I am pretty sure if we did deep somewhere in the regional or ID level, we had had some great rivalries, but among PPV level organizations, this is by far a unique case.
Length of the rivalry
This is a rivalry going back to 2019-11-02 and it is ongoing still. Their latest fight was last weekend, May 2022!! That is an ongoing rivalry of 2 ½ years!
Most high end rivalries could go on for a year, especially in top level organizations, because in most cases these fighters are peaked when they join. You rarely get 2 peaked fighters and future legends, join an org like GAMMA early, end up fighting as soon as they join and keep it going.
For something like this to actually happen, you usually need an ID level org and get them to fight each other, when they are just starting out.
The sheer quantity of fights between each fighter
At the moment of writing this article, they have already competed 7 times. Their 8th fight will take place in June 2022 and the funny thing is that this could not be over! Most likely it is, but Song is 36 and Joosep is 37, both are top 50ish level fighters. We had fighters compete in GAMMA well into their 40s, so who knows. At the moment they are the best in the division, so it is not impossible.
There has never been 8 fights between 2 fighters in a PPV level org and it is not as if I am trying to book them against each other! This is the first time I am booking a back to back and that is because they got a draw. With exception of one other case, there was always 2 or more fight win streaks between each fight and in each case they were the top contender. So they were fights that made a hell lot of sense.
Also, it is not as if the division was so weak during the whole period and I was forced to put them against each other all the time, during this run we had fighters such as Anthony "The Law" Falcone (327510), Robert MacArthur Jnr (302907), Damagon "Eye of the Dragon" Ench rya (326581) , Thomas Bolleke (323315), Ryan Dinu (302783) around. These are all top 10-15 level fighters. I am probably missing some others out, but the point is, there was plenty of high end competition in the division during the whole length of the rivalry.
The competitiveness between them
The current score is 3-3-1!!! Damn. It is totally equal, both with 3 wins and their last fight was a draw!!! A damn draw in a 5 rounder for the title. Getting a draw in a 5 rounder is very unlikely, I had maybe 2-3 such cases in 12 years, but to get a draw when the 2 fighters are on a DRAW of 3 wins each?
I mean, it would be tough to artificially get 2 fighters of this level on a 3-3-1. You could not get it to happen, even if you “fixed” the result, lol.
Conclusion
I am pretty sure, any one of the above criteria can be debated. You could debate that there have been rivalries between fighters who had better managers, where the level of fighters were better, where the depth of the division or the quality of the org was higher. All those points are “debatable” points based upon personal opinions. In fact, in some of those cases, I could agree with you!
But show me a case, at PPV level where we had 8 fights, 6 of which are title fights, where the first fight took place over 2 ½ years away from the last fight, where the fighters were managed by 3 HOF managers (or even show me 2 HOF managers!). Where we have a 3-3-1 record with the 8th fight deciding who is the better of the 2 fighters???
This is where you have the Royal Flush in Poker and you know you are ahead or this is like when Vince Carter completed his Dunks in the 2001 dunk contest and the commentator (Kenny Smith, for whoever knows the NBA) said – ITS OVER, ITS OVER: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kro3Caums2c&ab_channel=JimColton
Yes, ladies and gentlemen (and others, I am talking to all those dragons out there) , It is truly over. This Rivalry is the best among 2 fighters in the game’s history, end of story.
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