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Thursday media topics
By Zach Arnold | February 8, 2007
Despite a report (and claim by UFC) stating that UFC is preparing to run in the state of New Jersey, information provided to us claims otherwise. The New Jersey State Athletic Control board has supposedly not been contacted with any request to hold dates, get a venue permit, or approve matches for a UFC event in the state.
Elite XC announced that Mauro Ranallo & Jay Glazer have been added to their commentating team.
Red meat time. Weekly Pro reports Akira Maeda has announced his intentions of bringing back RINGS by the end of 2007, teasing a match between himself and Tsuyoshi Kohsaka. If you know Japanese, keep your eye out on Maeda’s blog.
Results from our last site poll question: Predict the PPV buyrate for UFC 67.
- 300,000-500,000 PPV buys – 42%
- 500,000-700,000 PPV buys – 30%
- Over 700,000 PPV buys – 16%
- Under 300,000 PPV buys – 12%
A new poll question has been added to the right side of the page.
Onto today’s headlines.
Here’s more red meat news if you follow the fight industry insiders and the gangs. Police raid gangster headquarters over series of shooting incidents.
- Sherdog: Ed Fishman interview (note the comment about Sakakibara’s future with the company and no reference to the alleged real boss, Ishizaka. And in regards to Gross’s question about the Korean TV station paying more money for PRIDE programming, that was a TV network-to-TV network transaction, not a network-to-PRIDE transaction.)
- The Prophet’s Place: UFC + PRIDE = A MMA ‘match’ made in heaven?
- The Scotsman: UK cash heist suspect Lee Murray appears in Morocco court (the even stranger part of this story is that Britain reportedly is giving up a suspected terrorist in exchange for Murray)
- Sean Salmon: Full-Time Fighter (debut column)
- KING 5 (Seattle): MMA, not just for the boys
- The Beverage Network: SPIKE Shooter launches into hardcore drink category in Colorado, Northern California (they sponsor Georges St. Pierre)
- CBS Sportsline: Five ounces of pain: Just appreciate Cro Cop’s fighting (the author also has a blog here)
Topics: All Topics, Japan, Media, MMA, PRIDE, UFC, Yakuza, Zach Arnold | 26 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
“And in regards to Gross’s question about the Korean TV station paying more money for PRIDE programming, that was a TV network-to-TV network transaction, not a network-to-PRIDE transaction.”
I didn’t really think that’s what he meant, from the way he phrased the question.
Also, http://www.sherdog.com/news/articles.asp?n_id=6714 , is the better read on Sherdog today. Bone up on your Euro MMA, motherbitches.
Tim is an excellent writer who I’ve linked to in the past.
The IFL moved their Lakeland, FL event in April to the Mohegan Sun. And the show will be live that night.
I think it is a risky move. The event comes only 4 1/2 months after the last Mohegan Sun event, and getting a big crowd is going to be difficult. It’s not like all the fans left the event with a good taste in their mouth anyways.
The 4/13 broadcast will not be live, but the tape delay will be a few hours instead of a few days or weeks.
The IFL-news was covered yesterday.
Yea critic ur blatant IFL blasting is MORE obvious than Zach’s PRIDE blasting. Give it a rest man.
I somehow missed what happened at the Sun last time :-/ Whassup?
Anyone else find it funny that Jordan Breen curses like a sailor? From reading his Complete Vale Tudo Access site, I never would have expected that. Keep on rocking, and fuck a shitcock, dude!
Thanks for the kind words guys, I appreciate it!
“Anyone else find it funny that Jordan Breen curses like a sailor?”
Gena Breen doesn’t.
Fishman talks a lot about due diligence and also talks about buynig the assets of DSE. IN other words, buynig the fighter contracts and the video library (not the shares of DSE). So DSE as a company would disappear and Fishman already talks about how his good friend Nobu Sakakibara will be stepping down. Crying shame that is, maybe he can retire to run his side business, stew restaurants
If Fishman buys PRIDE’s assets, its the end of PRIDE as everyone knows it. Fishman is talknig about buildnig a casino product not a mass market (arena) product
I wonder what Fishman will make of Ishizaka when he does his “due diligence”. You can bet that the wire transfer will be to Korea (where Ishizaka is) and not Japan (where Nobu is). This wire transfer will attract a lot of interest from a lot of people. As Fishman says, he might be ni for a few surprises
if anybody outside of japan does buy pride it would have to be the fighter contracts and vid library. i cant see japan supporting a foriegn mma product the same way america will never support a japanese brand over the ufc.
pride will learn this soon enough, dana has already stated he has no clue how to promote mma in japan – smart man
Blatant IFL Bias? I disagree. And I take the comparison to Zach Arnold as a complement.
My biggest problem is the lack of real reporting by the major MMA News Sites on this. The IFL can’t fill up 5,000 seat arenas in markets as large as Houston & Oakland. This is never even discussed. And when the topic is brought up on forums, fanboys continue to say: “It is within their business model.” I say BS to that. Any business model where your attendance stinks is a bad business model. The IFL continues to under peform as a company…. with proof happening show after show. Yet according to the media, it is doing fantastic. And I’m not sure if a TV deal will help them. WCW had a wonderful TV deal back in the day, and they had to paper arenas on a regular basis. If the product does connect with the fans, then it just doesn’t connect with the fans.
A few other things.
The UFC has put Martin Kampmann vs. Drew McFedries on the main card instead of Jon Fitch vs. Luigi Fioravanti. Jon Fitch is a legit Top 5 Welterweight. He should without a doubt be on the main card. This trend of putting top tier fighters like Fitch & Marquardt on the undercards is pathetic. It needs to stop. This is where ESPN would actually come in handy. If they had some legit reporters covering the sport, they could ask these questions, and the trends would stop. I won’t be crossing my fingers.
Also, I had to laugh listening to Beatdown Radio today. Josh Gross’s vision of the future of MMA is so far off it isn’t even funny. Here is his logic skills at work….
He thinks that fans will see Cro Cop & Rampage on TV, and immediately try to find out where they are from. They will clamor the internet to find out all the information on them. Once they know about Pride, the fans will DEMAND that the UFC champions fight the Pride champions. And that the UFC will HAVE NO CHOICE BUT TO PUT ON THESE FIGHTS.
I’m sorry, but I almost started laughing when he talked about this. He has such a skewed vision of how things work. The hardcore fans that go on websites like this will demand these fights. The vast, vast, vast majority of the casual fans will watch anything the UFC puts in front of them, and barely watch any other MMA.
I will use WCW as a way to show this. Back when Ted Turner purchased WCW in ’89 or ’91 (I forget which year), they had TV access and a few stars. They still couldn’t draw a good attendance or good buyrates on PPV. The WWF continued to get talent from WCW, yet the majority of fans didn’t care where these new wrestlers came from. It was only until a major star like Hulk Hogan switched companies did the fans actually take notice.
The same thing will be for MMA. Unless a Chuck Liddell, Tito Ortiz, or Randy Couture switched companies…. the fans aren’t going to demand to even watch these other companies. They will continue to watch the UFC and be happy. If Liddell moved companies, then these fans would follow, see another competitor, and then perhaps want to see a unification. Until something like that happens, the UFC is MMA to most fans. And the UFC Champions are the only World Champions that matter to them.
That is the way things work in the REAL WORLD.
McFedries got the upset KO win (if my memory serves me right), while Kampmann should have but didn’t finish his opponent in his last fight. Perhaps a match made for McFedries to get a highlight reel KO?
Fitch is a legitimate talent and his body of work speaks for itself. Unless they have a great fear that Fioravanti is going to make the fight boring like he did versus Chris Leben, I don’t really understand the move.
“The UFC has put Martin Kampmann vs. Drew McFedries on the main card instead of Jon Fitch vs. Luigi Fioravanti. Jon Fitch is a legit Top 5 Welterweight. He should without a doubt be on the main card. This trend of putting top tier fighters like Fitch & Marquardt on the undercards is pathetic. It needs to stop.”
While the gripe is justifiable, I think in this case (or in most PPV cases), the main card shit is overblown.
Fitch is certainly a top calibre guy and is obviously deserving of “main card” status. At the same time, Hughes is going to beat the shit out of Lytle quickly, and a lot of the other fights have finish potential. I think there’s still a very, very strong chance we’ll get to see Fitch on the PPV telecast, so even though he is getting the shaft to some extent, it may not make too much of a difference in the end.
Was that Lee Murray in that Picture?
I disagree Breen.
On the last card, we had to see the Cote/Smith fight instead of the Hoger/Machida fight. And in the end, we never got to see Machida, who is 10 times more deserving to be shown on TV.
So while you are right some of the time, there are enough times where it doesn’t work out, and legit contenders are never seen.
Heck, if you look at Fitch purely based on his UFC wins, he should actually be ranked above Sanchez. He has more impressive wins over better talent.
There’s really no point to be made with Machida/Hoger, which was a one-sided outclassing. I mean, yeah, it’s nice to get LYOTO out there, but given the time they had left, Griffin/Edgar was a no brainer, and the length of Martin/Rivera made it easy to slot in. It’s about prioritizing.
Hamill/Holman is going to be a sloppy shitshow. Dent/Tibau may offer some excitement, but is a very low priority fight. That pretty much leaves Varner/Gilliam, which is a wild card in terms of action, but again, very low priority.
Given the guys involved in the prelims, the only fight they’d be inclined to show, promotion-wise, over Fitch/Fioravanti would be Hamill/Holman, just because of Hamill. However, the fight will almost assuredly be garbage.
Fitch/Fioravanti is not only likely the highest priority prelim, it also has strong potential to be the best prelim. There’s no comparison to be made to the LYOTO/Hoger fight, just because people wanted to see LYOTO.
I think you missed my point. I had no problem with them showing Edgar/Griffin.
The problem is with putting lesser fighters on the main card. The fact that Edgar/Griffin was a good fight is irrelevant. If Hoger/Machida was on the main card, we would have never seen Cote/Smith, which would have been the right thing. Machida is ranked higher then Smith or Cote, and because of that deserves to be on the telecast.
Eh, no sense in arguing, since I don’t really disagree. I just don’t really think it’s a huge miscarriage of justice, especially in the case of Fitch, since he’ll probably wind up making the telecast anyhow, short of some catastrophic decision fest.
Yes, Gross is dreaming.
As far as Lyoto’s fight being on the ppv, anyone that saw his WFA fight would have to be hesitant about putting his fight on live ppv.
Obviously the expectations were that Cote and Smith would give it their all. This proved to be incorrect.
But looking at Smith/Cote and Lyoto/Hoger, I know which I would expect to be the snoozer.
I can understand the UFC’s logic. I guess it is more of a frustration as a hardcore fan of not seeing a guy of Fitch’s skill. I’m sure not casual fans would notice the difference, and the UFC has to cater to them too. DAMN YOU CASUAL FAN!!!
Ah thats just the way it works, Critic. From a wrestling background u should realize that by now. As for the IFL topic, the point is u have been very negative to the IFL since day -10. Granted u want to see more “informative” MMA news but c’mon it has already been noted by many source (Meltzer included) that they are facing problems…big deal! WHat newbie fed hasnt? I say give them some time…even if they go under whats it to u?
Speaking of Meltzer, there is a rumor going around that he has said that Lindland is getting 700K to fight Fedor.
Has anybody actually seen this coming from Meltzer, or is this another of those internet rumors that get credited to Dave to make it sound legit?
Lynch…it didn’t say in the last Observer, but I usually get new ones on Fridays. I’ll post tomorrow evening if I receive it.
Fitch has bigger wins in the UFC than Diego? Nope. Karo & Diaz are both top 10.
The IFL seems to be primed to lose a ton of money this year, just like they were last year. I think they’re working out the kinks and getting their deals in place (like the new MyTV deal.) The day they start in a solid weekly timeslot is really day 1 for them. Everything prior has been simply startup costs. All this other stuff has been renting the building, hiring the chef, making a menu, doing avertising, etc. When consistant TV starts, the restaurant opens.
Once they’re on weekly TV in the same time slot, it will be worth the money to shell out for legit superfights to have people tune in. If people tune in, maybe they will get turned on to the IFL’s product, maybe not. But its impossible to say, because before even hardcore fans couldnt find when the programming was on.
[…] I apologize in advance for being late on this one. I’m not sure how I missed. Anyway, we mentioned a report last week that stated the UFC had intentions of soon returning to New Jersey for an event. But according to FightOpinion.com, “Despite a report (and claim by UFC) stating that UFC is preparing to run in the state of New Jersey, information provided to us claims otherwise. The New Jersey State Athletic Control board has supposedly not been contacted with any request to hold dates, get a venue permit, or approve matches for a UFC event in the state.” […]