"He's got the ankles. Ken Shamrock has got the ankles." You really don't want this to happen, Ken getting hold of your ankles. At first glance the Ultimate Fighting Championship looks like something designed to appeal to a species of teenage boy caught in that difficult phase between realising WWE wrestling, like Santa Claus, might not be quite the real deal and taking up a serious interest in gay porn.
It's Big Fight February on Bravo and the UFC season is being shown in full. But is it a proper sport? Officially it's As Real As It Gets - although in the world of televised brawling that probably isn't saying much. Nicknames are generally a giveaway, but this is confused by the tendency among US sportsmen to sound like they're named after a brand of mail-order knitwear. Tim "The Maine-iac" Sylvias is clearly a terrible name, but then so are Tank Abbot and Randy Couture, both of whom are apparently for real.
Don't be fooled. UFC Ultimate Submissions is horribly genuine.
Introduced by Mike Goldberg with his guest pundit Ricco Rodriguez, and with only fingerless gloves for protection, a series of the most frightening men imaginable set about each other with terrible violence inside a cage at the Mandalay Bay hotel in Las Vegas.
Doubts about the UFC's authenticity disappear with the first Achilles Lock submission hold. Oh dear. Not the face. No, not the Double Ankle Choke to the trachea.
"One thing I forget," Mike confesses, "is just how many kinds of leg lock there are." Ricco looks suitably appalled by this admission.
Asked to deconstruct the Rear Naked Choke hold (pretty much exactly what it sounds like), Ricco provides instead a manifesto for all forms of shouty televised punch-up. "We're working on your oxygen, taking it away from your brain so you can't think any more."
Never mind that, Ricco, tell us how it feels to have Dan "The Beast" Severn "going to work" on your head. "Some guys want to be on the ground. They're submissive. That's just what they love doing." Oh aye?
Cheap innuendo aside, beneath the overblown packaging the UFC is an intricate and very technical sport. These are fit-as-a-butcher's-dog ju-jitsu masters, dojo veterans and kick-box champs inflicting highly skilled pain. It's just a shame that to the uninitiated it looks like a lot of pacing up and down followed by a long sweaty hug.
Which brings us on to rugby league. On Friday night Super League came bounding back on to Sky Sports 1 like a big friendly dog desperate to be patted on the head. The dependable Eddie Hemmings was both anchorman and commentator, alongside the excellent Mike "Stevo" Stephenson, a straight to camera pundit who increasingly looks like a giant head lassoed into a shirt collar.
Sky may have jazzed up the periphery of rugby league but the game itself seems much the same. Over a firework-studded, cheerleader-laden montage Hemmings told us Super League was "back in the big time!" The camera cut to live scenes of people in anoraks sheltering from the rain.
Unlike Super Sunday and Richard Keys, always so sure that he's got exactly what you want, Super League seems a bit too keen to be told that you really do love it.
The mood in the studio was defiant, partly in response to the news that the Great Britain skipper Andy Farrell looks set to switch codes. "If the rugby union scribes want to write that rugby league is dead then this match tonight will prove that is a total lie," Hemmings blurted out at one point.
Actually rugby league looked very much alive, irrespective of the Sky production, which cancanned alongside a game featuring the world club champions Leeds Rhinos in front of nearly 20,000 people.
Like the Ultimate Fighting Championships, rugby league is quite a technical sport. Too much chest beating and you can miss the best bits.
Both could take a lesson from Euro Tour Poker on British Eurosport. What is a poker face exactly? From the looks of the professionals, it's something pasty, unshaven and hidden beneath a goofy baseball cap. Even when you have no idea what's going on, poker is a great television sport.
"Rory Liffey is rocking and the room is reeling," the commentary declared as both players maintained their near-permanent sulk. Ten minutes later the glacial Ram Verswani had cleaned up, laying his final hand even as Liffey was out of his chair and actually putting on his coat.
At the post-game debrief you finally understood the poker-face thing. Semicomatose mutes in action, both players suddenly became almost outrageously charming - flirtatious even. A dashingly handsome Ram picked up the giant plastic cheque while Liffey practically invited the blonde interviewer back to his place.
The best part of England's friendly against Holland was David Beckham saying "y'know" 12 times during his post-match grilling on the BBC. Beckham has now given 42 post-match captain's interviews. If, like me, you've watched pretty much all of them, this means you will have heard him say "y'know" at least 500 times. Each "y'know" takes around 1.5 seconds, making a total of 12 minutes of your life spent listening to David Beckham say "y'know".
Given the option, it might have been better to get it all over at once, like Lenny Henry saying "oooooooooohkaaaaaay" on Tiswas. Just make sure you get a seat near the front when it happens. A Single Reverse Guillotine Choke ought to do the trick.
