AOL sports Writer Michael David Smith does a thorough job pasting a bad AP story about kid's MMA and comes out strongly in favor of MMA, parents and sense:
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I'm guessing the writer means "sucker punches" in the same way he meant "bare-knuckle," which is to he doesn't mean it at all. But it's good to hear that no one was hurt and they were wearing proper padding. And so we can conclude that these little kids, who in most cases wouldn't be strong enough to do serious damage to each other even if they tried, aren't getting hurt, and we can all have a juice box and go home happy, right?
Now imagine my surprise when friend of Bloody Elbow and MMA-writer par excellence Sam Caplan posts this piece of fuzzy headed nonsense:
Ridiculous Sam. Completely untenable position and really inexcusable from someone as knowledgeable about sports and MMA as you are. The fact is that kids box in massive numbers and its pretty safe. As Smith points out -- kids just can't hit that hard. Plus headgear. Plus gloves. And then you've got all levels of kid football and baseball which are very dangerous yet rightfully celebrated as a huge part of American childhood culture.
Let's get it straight, kids training and participating in supervised MMA with proper adult supervision, rules and padding (including headgear), is a good thing. Period.
Because the alternative to kids participating in safe, sanctioned rules-based MMA isn't BJJ training, its felony fights. Personally I'd rather my kid put on some headgear and gloves and romp around in a padded environment than go out and get his head slammed onto concrete or broken glass with no adults around to get help if someone gets hurt.
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