![\"Loading](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/loading.gif\" "\\"Loading")
\u00a0Loading …<\/p>\nFight Night: Amateur MMA takes over Victoria Community Center<\/p>\n
Published 7:15 am Monday, August 4, 2025<\/p>\n
The air inside the Victoria Community Center crackled with a blend of anticipation and nervous energy. It\u2019s a Friday night, but this isn\u2019t a high school football game or a civic meeting.<\/p>\n
On this night, under the bright lights and booming sound of a temporary arena, was the latest installment of Tap or Scrap 12, a local fight promotion that is giving amateur athletes a place to test their mettle.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis was just supposed to be a hobby,\u201d Peter Morales, owner and founder of Tap or Scrap LLC, said Friday night. \u201cA hobby now turned into a full blown business, and I couldn\u2019t have done it without my wife, Kristie.\u201d<\/p>\n
Tap or Scrap LLC, the company behind the event, has made a name for itself by fostering a legitimate, safe and exciting environment for local mixed martial artists.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is months of planning, matching fights, finding a venue, getting fights organized,\u201d Kristie Garcia, Vice President of Business Operations for Tap or Scrap LLC, said. \u201cMy favorite part is watching the fights and building those connections with these fighters and coaches. This is amateur MMA, and when they [the fighters] go pro, that\u2019s an amazing high.\u201d<\/p>\n
The fights themselves are a showcase of the sport\u2019s diversity. From the blistering speed of the flyweights to the thunderous power of the heavyweights, each bout tells a unique story. In one corner, a fighter with a background in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu looks for a takedown while his opponent, a former boxer, circles and throws crisp jabs. The crowd roars with every punch, with family and friends screaming support from the front row.<\/p>\n
\u00a0Loading …<\/p>\n
\u201cWe want everyone to have a good time, but we also want everybody to be safe,\u201d Garcia said. \u201cWe always have security, but that\u2019s just the norm for any venue of this size. We have well over 1,500 people here, but we\u2019ve established a good group of folks that work with us, and that\u2019s critical.\u201d<\/p>\n
Among the night\u2019s most compelling stories is that of Greg Johnson, a 37-year-old coast guardsman who has been fighting in Tap or Scrap since 2022 and training for the past 12 years to compete for his featherweight title against Isaiah Gonzales, from Cuero..<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve grown up playing every type of sport there is,\u201d Johnson said. \u201cI treat this just as any other sport, like basketball and football. I\u2019ve never hated the person that I\u2019m looking across from, and even in this fight, I\u2019ve had very positive interactions with Isaiah. So, we\u2019re going to be shaking hands after the fight as well.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
The success of a Tap or Scrap event isn\u2019t just measured in knockouts or submissions. It\u2019s in the sold-out seats and the palpable sense of community. The fighters, their coaches and their supporters are all part of a close-knit family, bound by a shared love for the sport and respect for their competition.<\/p>\n
After the final bell, opponents embrace, showing a mutual respect that is at the core of the martial arts ethos.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy hope is that we keep growing, and we keep getting new fighters,\u201d Garcia said. \u201cGetting the name out is what\u2019s important to us; promoting these kids, these young adults about something they love. I want to watch a UFC fight and see someone who started out with us.\u201d<\/p>\n
As the night wound down and the crowd filed out, the Victoria Community Center returned to its usual quiet. But for the fighters who bled, sweat and triumphed inside the cage, the memories of this night will last a lifetime.<\/p>\n
They may not be superstars yet, but Friday night, they were champions in their own right, and the Victoria community will remember them all.<\/p>\n
Katie Steinhauer is a freelance writer for the Victoria Advocate.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Fight Night: Amateur MMA takes over Victoria Community Center Published 7:15 am Monday, August 4, 2025 The air…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":44617,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[444],"tags":[49,48,641,638,82],"class_list":["post-44616","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mma","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-fighting","tag-mma","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44616","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44616"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44616\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/44617"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44616"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44616"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44616"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}