There will never be another Jordan Breen
Saying my piece about the late MMA media pioneer.
The curtain came down on the final chapter of the greatest MMA broadcaster to ever do it this week.
Mike Bohn broke the heartbreaking news Monday. Jordan Breen, the original MMA media wunderkind, had passed away at age 38.
Chuck Mindenhall reported an additional heart-breaking kick in the teeth on Wednesday:
I know that Jordan left Toronto for his native Halifax when his own mom passed away several years back. He went back to take care of his father, from what I was told, who has since died as well.
He didn’t have siblings. From what I understand, he was alone when they found him in the shelter where he was staying.
Sherdog had the basic outline of Breen’s career in their obituary:
A native of Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, Breen started at Sherdog in 2006 as a reporter and feature news columnist. When he joined the Sherdog Radio Network in 2007, “The Jordan Breen Show” quickly became a must listen for diehard fans of the sport. He became the site’s administrative editor in 2010, and his work as curator of the FightFinder was pivotal in helping make it the premiere database in the sport today. In addition to Sherdog, Breen’s work was found in outlets such as ESPN.com, The New York Times, Tatame Magazine, Portal do Vale Tudo, Fighters Only Magazine, and Bloody Elbow. He also appeared in the commentary booth for Strikeforce and Tachi Palace Fights.
I was shocked and saddened to hear the news, but not surprised.
Jordan’s passing is news I’ve been expecting, dreading, and hoping not to hear for at least five years.
But fuck that, let’s focus on the man’s accomplishments for a bit.
Jordan Breen wasn’t just a best-in-class MMA talk show host and pundit. He wasn’t just an incredible obsessive who seemed to know EVERYTHING about the sport.
Jordan Breen wasn’t just a Renaissance man able to converse intelligently and entertainingly on an incredibly wide range of subjects.
Jordan Breen was one of the best broadcasters of his generation, in any medium.
Jordan Breen was a product of a unique era in mass media when the internet opened up opportunities for outsiders to reach mass audiences based on how well they knew their subject and how entertainingly they could discuss it.
Jordan Breen was a product of a unique era when Mixed Martial Arts went from a thriving grassroots underground phenomenon passionately loved by a few hundred thousand people to a mainstream sport with an audience of millions.
We won’t see his like again because Jordan was unique, gifted, and obsessed.
We won’t see his like again because the communications environment that brought Jordan Breen his audience is long gone.
We won’t see his like again because MMA has been monopolized by Hollywood vulture capitalists who are draining the life out of the sport one slop-filled fight card at a time.
I’m glad I knew Jordan.
He was a delight, always friendly and supportive, ever-ready with an encouraging word for his peers.
I’m incredibly proud I got to work with Jordan, guesting on his shows was an honor, a treat, and not easy if you had even a smidge of imposter syndrome because Jordan Breen was for fucking real.
Jordan Breen knew the fight game better than anyone; he loved it more than anyone, while knowing it was, as he said, “a sport full of felons and liars and horrific people.”
But mostly, like hundreds of thousands of other fans, I’m grateful I got to hear him work.
It’s rare to hear a master performing at the peak of his powers, but to hear a young genius chronicling a thrilling but horribly flawed sport enjoying a once-in-a-century rise to the top, that was once-in-a-lifetime stuff.
After the jump, I’m going to parse out the incredible interview Jordan gave Bloody Elbow’s Shakiel Mahjouri in 2020.
I’m saving it for our paying subscribers because it’s painful in places, it’s very revealing of the toll that success in MMA media took on Jordan, and because I want to be free to say my piece about Jordan and his journey and the rise and fall of independent media and mixed martial arts in the first quarter of the 21st Century.