By Joshua Jabcuga
January 16, 2002
At one point or another, every male in America has wanted “to be like Mike,” or the latest stud to come through the pipeline showing off their Bling Bling on MTV Cribs in between playoff games and signing Reebok endorsements. What is the true price of this glory, though? As can be seen in the HBO documentary, THE SMASHING MACHINE, which premiered on January 12 (replays tonight 1/15 at 10 PM on HBO and 1/17 at 10 PM on HBO2), sometimes athletes forget just why they are competing, or even, why they are living. More often than not, though, many pro athletes are simply living to compete, no matter what the cost.
THE SMASHING MACHINE chronicles two former Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) fighters, Mark Kerr and Mark Coleman. Both are friends and Olympic caliber wrestlers, but each finds themselves perhaps with different motivations for competing, and in completely different places by the conclusion of the movie. The film covers the summer of 1999 through the spring of 2000, when both fighters were training for the Pride Grand Prix tournament over in Japan, where the best fighters in the world, some former UFC winners, would battle it out for $200,000.
The film is worth going out of your way to see if you’re a mixed martial arts or pro wrestling fan, and even a sports fan in general. THE SMASHING MACHINE shows the stark realities behind pro athleticism: the fragile egos, the addiction to pain killers, and the broken relationships.
The documentary is not kind to Mark Kerr. His tale is tragic and as real as they come. He goes from being a huge force in the mixed martial arts world to being nothing more than a junkie. To the credit of the documentary, the camera never flinches, even when we see Kerr injecting himself with pain killers. Kerr mentions how his threshold of pain is basically off the charts, a statement I’ve heard many pro wrestlers or martial artists say in order to rationalize why they are popping pain pills like spearmint Tic-Tacs. Often they say, “Hey, I’m only human and I need to pay the bills.” What they forget though, is that they are still, in fact, only human.
To be honest, after seeing first-hand the punishment that these athletes take, I can’t imagine how they don’t become addicts. If it’s a choice, though, between competing in front of a huge crowd while hooked on morphine, or working as a used car salesman to support the wife and kids, maybe I should be ashamed, but I’d take the squared circle or the Octagon in a heartbeat. And some just don’t know how to do anything else. And that’s a dilemma that many pro wrestlers and martial arts competitors find themselves facing.
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Even my childhood favorite, “the Heartbreak Kid” Shawn Michaels, after walking away from Vince McMahon’s WWE because of a career-ending back injury, has returned to the glory of the spotlight, albeit nowhere near his former self, and probably risking something that few of us would play around with,--paralysis. But it’s that “orgasmic high” that Mark Kerr speaks of in THE SMASHING MACHINE, which is difficult to leave behind. The rush from the fans and the thrill of the performance is not something you can walk away from so easily. And someday, you may find yourself physically unable to do so. THE SMASHING MACHINE brings all of this to light, and that may be hard for some of us to swallow.
In September of 2000, I attended a seminar given by Dan “the Beast” Severn, just one day removed from his crushing defeat to Pedro Rizzo during a UFC event. I arrived early and there was some talk of whether or not the thing was actually going to come off, since “the Beast” had his knee blown right out from under him from some deft kicks by Rizzo. I didn’t know about the defeat from the previous night since my cable company didn’t, or wouldn’t, carry the PPV. But Severn showed up, with a noticeable limp and some swelling on his knee, and for the first time, it clicked with me: This shit is real.
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As foolish as that sounds, even with years of following pro wrestling from the inside and being a martial artist, I was perplexed. Here was a guy that was easily past his prime, who was still competing in legitimate fights on a regular basis, and having to get up the next day and give a seminar. I’m not certain why anyone would do this to themselves. Then again, what else was there, selling used cars?
For more information on THE SMASHING MACHINE, please click here.
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