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Text of Golden Glory press release about #UFC business relations & Alistair Overeem
By Zach Arnold | August 11, 2011
Payment situation:
First of all we would like to thank all the support of the fans.
The Golden Glory management discussed before coming to the US about the payment situation and it was agreed to speak with a Zuffa lawyer about this in Vancouver, to find a solution.
There was a contract in place and Golden Glory and Einemo honored the UFC rules including getting the check on the fighters name (Einemo showed his check in the gym as well which was on his name and Alistair and Valentijn also confirmed their payment was done by check in their name). The Zuffa lawyer explained that the fighters could open an account at a bank were the UFC did their banking and the check would clear in only two days instead of 6 weeks till 8 weeks (that’s how long it takes to clear a check in a foreign country which was also an issue for some of the fighters) and they could then transfer the amount to the final destination at their choice. They were thankful and did this.
The reason that the Golden Glory management company is doing this business for the GG fighters for over 12 years with payment directly to the management company is for the benefit of the fighters, coaches and trainers are paid on time and the management company will take care of bookkeeper and taxes and exchange rates and legal help for the fighters.
We have many fighters from many different parts of the world and also have gyms in Berlin Germany, Liverpool England, Pattaya Thailand, California USA, Bucharest Romania, Moscow Russia and three gyms in Holland. Golden Glory is growing on an international level and we are working with one management company to coordinate these businesses.
Fighters only sign agreements with promoters if coaches, trainers, management and the fighter agree with the terms, regardless to whom the payment will be done.
The strikeforce situation was different.
Behind the scene I was preparing a great deal for corporation between strikeforce, /dream, k-1 and Glory to do something great together with Scott ( this included a tv channel and footage deal). I introduced Scott thru a partner of mine in LA to some powerful people in the US (Scott was very surprised after this meeting and exited and mailed me after his meeting with these people how impressed he was). I never could have guessed that at the same moment I was talking to Scott to make a massive move for becoming a real competitor to the UFC, Scott was already talking with the same UFC for selling strikeforce.
Scott told me that he had partners and that there were financial difficulties with strikeforce and any new TV or other deal they would welcome. As I am a producer as well ( produced more then 1000 hour of fighting content) and also made tons of other deals for promoters (like the K-1 live broadcasting on the dutch Tv Channel SBS6) I trusted Scott with some business plans as I knew Scott from the time he was a promoter for K-1 and we all wanted to move forward in the fight business.
Scott convinced me to start working with strikeforce, we always had a better deal in Japan and Europe, but as K-1 was having a lot of difficulties and Scott giving us all the terms we wanted, we started taking steps to do more and more business with strikeforce.
The problems with strikeforce was that we made some agreements with Scott which were creating headaches now Zuffa took over.
The fighters were paid in the previous strikeforce bouts to an account of the management without any problems, yet UFC claimed this was impossible. Then the fighters were loosing sponsors as the UFC took over strikeforce as they implemented their new rules. If you can sponsor the fighter you should sponsor the organization first. I understand this from a business point of few, but some companies can’t effort to pay 100K or more to an organization. And some fighters getting 5 or 10K in sponsorship is were they actually can make some good money. We just wanted the things as they were before, but it was far from what it was before. The payment was done how the UFC wanted and again we agreed and did the same as in Vancouver, so that matter was solved , so I do not understand why Dana claims we did not agree? We did not have a choice and never said we would not fight in the future or that we would refuse to work like this in the future (we worked out that problem with the Zuffa lawyer in the Vancouver and even agreed with their new sponsor policies). Maybe there is a miscommunication and Dana was not well informed that the direct payment issue was solved and no longer an issue as I myself have been in and out hospital for two weeks because of heath issues ( the reason why this press release is so late).
Anyway we regret the response from Zuffa and the releases, but it is their company and they can do what they want, we would like to keep working in the future with the UFC and with this statement I cleary say that direct payment to any of our fighter was not a problem and will not be a problem in the future. We just want to be able to produce great fighters and create great fights for the fans, we have no intention for Co-promotion deals and are even willing to make an exclusive deal for Alistair Overeem to fight in the UFC, if the terms are right.
Team Golden Glory
Topics: Media, MMA, StrikeForce, UFC, Zach Arnold | 17 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
1) A great deal between Strikeforce, DREAM, Golden Glory, & K-1? Hmmmmm…. K-1 is basically gone and DREAM is putting in small shows. Doesn’t sound like a great deal to me. And it’s more proof that Scott Coker let the inmates run the asylum.
2) The wording of this from GG is the most interesting aspect. The subtext is: “We want to make GG look good without throwing Zuffa under the bus at all so we can get back in the good graces with them.” A lot of tiptoeing….
3) The Coenen pre fight press conference issue has been interesting. She basically admitted she was late, and then still tried to blame the UFC. And then the former WEC President said he was the driver and a lot of her story is just a straight up lie. The problem for GG and Coenen on that issue is that the UFC has a great track record of fighter relations during events. Even Strikeforce fighters commented on how much more organized the events were after the Zufa purchase. And the final strike against Coehen is that all of the other fighters who were to take the ride with her were basically waiting for her and had no problems getting there.
Besides helping with the stereotype that women can’t be on time…. It shocks me that a women’s champion, who already knows Zuffa is not big on her gender’s fighting…. Would risk it at all with the time. Just shocking.
4) I fully expect Alistair Overeem to sign with the UFC semi soon. But there is absolutely a chance it might not happen. It all depends on Lorenzo Fertitta. If during their previous contract negotiations, Fertitta felt that he could not trust GG…. We might never see another one of their fighters in the UFC again.
And that is really the only roadblock to making this deal happen. If Fertitta feels like if GG gets a fighter with some name power, that they will try to pull a fast one on the UFC in the future…. Zuffa might not even want to take the chance.
This is the first I’m hearing about Marloes Coenen being late to the press conference or delaying the car that got there. Looking into the story, it certainly seems like she messed up, but my God is that a petty thing to focus. I can’t even imagine someone being fired for being late to a press conference. She was not in anyway risking the future of Women’s MMA by being late for her ride to the press conference, that’s just being incredibly silly. I doubt it fit into the Golden Glory debacle in any meaningful way.
Interesting read. Sounds like Coker screwed them. Also sounds like Golden Glory wants to be THE promotion and not just a team of fighters working for Zuffa’s orgs.
I really like Alistair and don’t care what happens to GG as long as he fights the top guys in meaningful fights.
You can almost hear the introductions for him vs Fedor on New Years. I hope he fights the Cain/JDS winner or Brock or Mir soon.
Mir is the name I think makes the most sense coming in. Both are pretty high in the rankings, and a win for either would make them eligible for a title shot.
Or Shane Carwin.
Carwin looked completely shot in his last fight but still has good name value.
It’s would be a high profile win if he didn’t get hit with a big shot….
I thought of Shane Carwin too. But it would probably be a hard sell after getting his butt kicked by JDS wouldn’t it?
I mean Carwin has to be ahead of Mir still in the rankings, and I would love the matchup. I just think fan interest changes so much from fight to fight that Mir would be a more viable option.
I think the most interesting possibility to consider here — that Overeem does want in the UFC and might leave GG if he doesn’t get a deal done.
Think there is any truth to what he is saying about “powerful people” and “real competitor to the UFC”? I find it hard to believe that he has more connections in the US than Scott. Let alone people who would be willing to go toe-to-toe with the big guys.
As for the “powerful people” thing, he’s probably talking about Frederico Lapenda. Google him. He has been Bas Boon’s business partner in just about every venture, from Golden Glory over 10 years ago to Fight Game and Paradigm Pictures.
He might not be a name every MMA fan recognizes, but he should be and he has made a mint on combat sports.
This seems vanishingly unlikely to me. Martin deJong has been one of his coaches since he was a teenager, his brother and literally all his training partners are Golden Glory. To change management he’d have to completely change his training camp, which would also entail moving more-or-less permanently to a different country since there isn’t really anywhere else in Europe he could get training of that level.
And there lies the problem with having your gym be your management.
When A-Rod didn’t like the way super agent Scott Boras was doing his new deal with the Yankees, he basically threw him to the side and talked directly to the Yankees himself. And it had no effect on him because he wasn’t his hitting or fielding instructor.
Seperation of management and trainer is essential in today’s MMA world.
edub,
If there were other options out there, this letter would have never been written.
My point was I think he isn’t being truthful when he says he had people lined up to back SF in a bigger push against Zuffa.
I think the main point of this letter was just a grab at getting support back behind them after the contract negotiations.
Another excellent example – in 2009 Buentello was training at AKA and being managed by Bob Cook. He dropped Bob Cook for another manager, and Cook responded by kicking him out of AKA during his training camp.
Even more of a conflict when you consider that the reason he dropped Bob was that they disagreed about Buentello going back to the UFC… while Cook was also working as Strikeforce’s matchmaker.
MMA = baseball
Only one fighter has ever left Golden Glory, and that fighter was a guy who didn’t fit their mold and I’m not even sure they understand why they signed him, Heath Herring.
Saki was looking to leave for a while and now he seems OK with them, nobody leaves GG, apparently.
“Then the fighters were “loosing” sponsors”
nothing worse than a sponsor on the loose
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