Mickey from Rocky, Yoda, Izzy Mandelbaum from Seinfeld, Splinter from TMNT, Mr. Miyagi and Chase Becotte. What do they all have in common? They are all teachers, mentors, trainers. All took misfits under their wings and crafted them like a ball of clay into something spectacular.

In the case of Chase Becotte, he was given the hardest job of all. He has been tasked with taking an old man whose gaming reflexes are deteriorating and is terrible at fighting games, and he must attempt to get him into gaming shape in one week to compete in the EA Sports MMA Mystic Tournament on November 17, 2010.

The "old man" being referenced is Operation Sports' own Christian McLeod.

The following is a first-person account full of intrigue, suspense, human emotion and an epic battle scene that makes anything you have seen in any summer blockbuster look lame.

Day One: November 10, 2010

Dear Diary,

Chase met me in the ring this afternoon and immediately told me I suck, and that my face looks funny. Apparently he thinks this constant emotional abuse will make me better at the game, or at least tougher. We set up a fight card with a variety of fighters to work on a different moves and find my style. We still don't know what weight class I'm fighting in at the Mystic event, so I need to be well rounded. In the first fight, Chase attempted to sharpen my declining gaming reflexes. During this fight I actually figured out how to reverse moves with the B button. Previously I was spamming the block button so I could not figure out why my B button taps were not registering. In a stroke of luck, I caught Chase's fighter napping and roundhouse kicked him in the face, knocking him out immediately.

Feeling good about myself, I promptly got my butt handed to me in the next two fights. I was learning how to transition during these fights, and can get up off the canvas/survive if my opponent gets the upper hand. When I ask Chase what he thinks are my strengths in the game (standup, ground, submission), he says that my standup game sucks, I don't know anything about submissions, and my only hope for victory is by working on my ground game. Sure made me feel terrible.

I tell Chase I need to get off the Xbox to make my wife dinner. He tells me that I am fat and don't need to eat, and that training for this event is more important. I begin crying but pretend that my Xbox headset is breaking up so he doesn't know his words hurt so badly. He is so tough on me but he is right. I need to train harder so I don't embarrass myself next week.

Your Friend,

-Christian

Coach's Take: I can't believe I got sucked into doing this. I'm training someone for a fight card in a video game? My college degree is clearly being put to good use. But nevertheless, Christian begged me to do this, and I obliged. My name is now tied to this pathetic piece of fail, so I have to try and mold him into a killer in the ring. To quote Lt. Kaffee from A Few Good Men, "We're gonna lose...And we're gonna lose huge."

Day Two: November 11, 2010

Dear Diary,

My homework assignment since Chase and I were unable to meet online to train today was to play against the CPU on higher difficulty levels. Since my ground game is my only hope, I decided to practice with big bruising wrestlers with steel chins. As I waged war on my opponent, I could hear Chase like the voice of Obi Wan Kenobi in my mind. "Take the fight to the ground," he said. "Wait to feel the controller rumble before tapping B." For an instant I thought I noticed a blue ghostlike apparition of Chase in my basement. Creepy. Even creepier was the fact that I noticed a house centipede scurrying along the basement floor. I yelped and ran upstairs. Thankfully, my wife killed it.

With the basement no longer in jeopardy, I went back to work. I won four of the five fights I played and felt better about my ability to position myself and counter on the ground. My submission skills are still terrible. I could keep practicing, but I'd rather venture into the jungles of Vietnam to play Black Ops. I hope Chase doesn't find out.

Everlastingly Yours,

-Christian

Coach's Take: Christian is not a smart man. Today, I gave him a homework assignment and kept track of his progress on Xbox Live. He undermined my authority by playing Black Ops instead. He doesn't know it yet, but as punishment I'm going to send him the Tower 200 workout video with Randy Couture that he must do while blaring a Body by Jake promo on repeat in the background.

Just please don't let this fight turn into another episode of 'Bully Beatdown.'

Dear Diary,

I played Black Ops way too much last night. I figure I can just tell Chase my cousin was over playing Black Ops while I was upstairs in the living room practicing my MMA moves under a different Gamertag. Bulletproof.

Love,

-Christian

Coach's Take: I am without words that adequately describe my disdain for Christian at this moment. He is a disappointing pupil, but Randy Couture will fix his wagon.

Day Four: November 13, 2010

Dear Diary,

Today I found out that I have to use a created fighter in this tournament. I am somewhat relieved knowing that I will not get stuck fighting Fedor or Classic Bas Rutten.

Chase and I decided being a "Generalist" fits my fight style the best. I really do not have any strengths at this point so we need to minimize any weaknesses. Channeling our inner Seinfeld nerdiness, we decide to name our character Tim "The Dentist" Watley.

We make Tim a light heavyweight and decide we need to max his punching power and hope for a flash KO. We also make his chin out of iron -- there's a Rocky IV joke there somewhere -- so I can last more than 10 seconds in my match.

Talk to you tomorrow,

-Christian

Coach's Take: Tim Watley looks absolutely ridiculous. But, if I'm going to train a loser, the least I can do is have some laughs at my student's expense.

Day Six: November 15, 2010

Today I found out that there was a dress rehearsal to test the servers and that I'm fighting "The Professional" from Sherdog.com. Great, not only is that way past my old-man bedtime, but my first fight is against some guy from a dedicated MMA website.

We went through our dress rehearsal fight, and I let "The Professional" submit me immediately because I didn't want to give any of my moves away. I told this to Chase, but he thought I was lying about letting him win. He can be such a jerk sometimes; I still cry nightly when he puts me down -- my wife actually caught me yesterday but I claimed I had dirt in my eye from all the manly chores I was doing around the house.

Always yours,

-Christian

Coach's Take: We met after the rehearsal fight for some more practice. I decided to just use Souza so we could work on his all-around submission skills. It did not go well, but his stand-up game and transition skills are improving.

We don't want to make prognostications but......Christian is probably the guy on the ground in this shot.

Coach's Take: I'll give Christian some slack since he lasted more than 30 seconds and was battling against a guy using buttons. Still, Christian got tapped out even though he had the better submission rating, so for shame.