John Heffron to host MMA awards

By Allison Duck

Wednesday, Dec. 30, 2009 | 2:01 a.m.

For the first televised World MMA Awards show (stream it live on Verses.com or watch it on Versus a 9:00 p.m. January 6), the creators of Fighters Only magazine turned to comedian John Heffron to host the event at the Joint at the Hard Rock Hotel and Casino.

Both the winner of Season 2 of Last Comic Standing and an avid MMA fan, Heffron seemed an obvious choice to fill the spaces between the 19 different awards presented during the show, including categories such as Fighter of the Year, Knockout of the Year and Female Fighter of the Year.

Joining Heffron will be a who's who of MMA fighters and celebrity fight fans, including Frank Mir, Randy Couture, Dan Henderson, Roy Nelson, Gray Maynard, Antonio Nogueira, Amir Sadollah, Georges St. Pierre and Wilmer Valderrama. Though they've been let go from their UFC positions, former Octagon girls Logan Stanton and Natasha Wicks also will be in attendance, along with current Octagon girl Arianny Celeste. All are up for Ring Girl of the Year, along with Holly Madison, who made a brief stint as a ring girl at this summer's UFC 100.

Heffron is excited to meet a different MMA figure, fighter Tito Ortiz's main squeeze. "How's it not going to be cool to meet Jenna Jameson?" he said jokingly.

How did you develop an interest in martial arts?

I've always been a fan of any type of fighting even before the UFC ever existed. I've attempted to try every discipline of fighting. I travel so much I can just never get good at anything. I got into krav maga and have stuck with that for a while. It's based in the Israeli military. I use that as my golf. I enjoy going and sparring, but now that I'm getting older, I don't like being hit as much.

How are you able to keep up with your martial arts training when you're on tour so much?

I think it's time someone starts a 40-and-over gym. There's a lot of guys that are older. I used to spar when I was on the road doing stand up. I would find a gym in the town where I was, but I just wanted to do it for the fun of it and I would get these kids who just wanted a good story about how they took some dude from TV's head off. It became less and less enjoyable for me. I didn't feel like defending my life.

Some comedy critics say that Last Comic became kind of the fast track for aspiring comedians. Do you think that the Ultimate Fighter reality show is similar in that manner, that fighters don't come up the ranks like they used to?

It's sad when I hear people who say that, because, of course, there's a fast track. Those people saying that would have jumped on the fast track and would have completely used that speed train if they could have. But they didn't, so now they're going to complain about it. What? Are you going to fight the system? Their plan is to just go on a mountaintop and chant and hope a TV exec is going to find them there. It isn't going to happen. Ask someone like Forrest Griffin what is his attitude about The Ultimate Fighter. Everyone is going to have a different reality depending on how it worked out for them. With Last Comic, when I got criticism like that I would have to remind people I had been working clubs a long time before the show.

What are you looking forward to most about this show?

It's not just going to be a clips show. Awards shows suck no matter what they are, even when there are superstars hosting them. For this, I think they did a really good job, because they plan to get in and out and not make it drag. And I get to meet all these fighters I'm a fan of.

What is your stance on the "shiny shirts" so many fighters and MMA fans wear?

I remember years ago when Affliction first came out and nobody had ever heard of it. I had a couple of shirts and I thought they were cool, but immediately saw the writing on the wall and stopped wearing them. I think one of my jokes in the show is about how they're giving out an award for best MMA clothing line and I say it's the "best use of skulls on a T-shirt."