UFC's Octagon should be a universal fixture in MMA

UFC president DanaWhite has often said that one of his major goals is to turn MMA into the biggest sport in the world. Part of that, he says, is to make it so that the same way people do MMA in North America is the same way that it is done in Europe, and in Asia, and everywhere else in the world. It's called standardization.

It's hard to argue that White has been anything but a huge help to the growth of mixed martial arts as a sport. On the other hand, White's overwhelming success at branding the UFC has been at the cost of greater standardization, specifically when it comes to the MMA battleground known as the Octagon.

Boxing rings simply aren't designed for MMA. The fighters get caught in them, the fighters sneak away using them, and the frequent pause-resets in the ground fighting take away from the overall spectator experience.

The eight-sided-cage is a nearly perfect stage for MMA contests, holding multiple advantages over the other possible Hexes, circular cages, square cages, and YAMMA Pits that have surfaced over the years.

The Hex was simply ridiculous. Circular cages work pretty much exactly the same as an Octagon. Except that they're just a little bit harder to construct and assemble. One of the good things about the Octagon, is that it is very easy to copy. In principle, that should make it easy for people around the world to reproduce it.

Square cages are a bit better than boxing rings, but can still lead to some awkwardness when the fight goes into a corner.

YAMMA Pits, despite their kind of insane genius, are the most-difficult to construct, and look gimmicky.

Other polygonal cages are fine, but if you've ever been to an even that uses a pentagon, then you know that it just isn't the same.

The octagonal mat and cage design are trademarked by the UFC owners, which prevents other fight promotions from using them without permission. UFC management has been protective of these property rights.

To this day, other fighting organizations are using pentagons, hexagons and circles out of fear or stubbornness in relation to the UFC's current ownership of the Octagon.