Rockhold (Photo credit: Esther Lin/Strikeforce)

By Joshua Molina

As the battle to legalize MMA in New York continues, former cage fighter Nick Denis teamed up with New York state senator Brad Hoylman to write a well-argued article (for the NY Daily News) about the need to protect MMA fighters from head injuries.

Even though the UFC is big around the world, it is not legal in the most famous city in the world.

The UFC has been fighting a political battle with lawkmakers and the Culinary Workers Union — and getting crushed worse than Chael Sonnen in a Chael Sonnen fight.

Denis and Hoylman write: “Growing evidence shows a link between repeated hits to the head among professional athletes in contact sports and progressive degenerative brain disease, called chronic traumatic encephalopathy. A recent study of MMA fighters by the Cleveland Clinic correlates the number of years of fighting and reduced brain functionality.”

The 29-year-old Canadian Denis retired from the UFC for health reasons and now appears to be focused on making a difference outside the cage.

. . . In one of the most senseless main events in recent MMA history, former Strikeforce middleweight champ Luke Rockhold will fight Vitor Belfort this Saturday in Brazil.

This is a dumb fight for Rockhold, who is one of the best middleweights in the world. He has nothing to gain by beating Belfort, but if he gets caught with a kick, his career gets flushed down the toilet in his UFC debut.

Not sure why Rockhold, who hasn’t fought since last July, thought it would be a good idea to make his UFC debut in Brazil, against a Brazilian and on FX, after fighting most of his life at the Shark Tank in San Jose.

If Belfort pulls off an upset, it would likely be a defeat for the injury-prone Rockhold that would take years for him to recover from.

If he wins, Rockhold should get a quick title shot against the winner of the Anderson Silva vs. Chris Weidman UFC middleweight championship