Comments on: Video: Affliction announces Fedor Emelianenko for their January 2009 MMA fight card

By: skwirrl

skwirrl — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 19:30:08 +0000

Have Fedor fight Kimbo and AA on the same card.

By: Lester Grimes

Lester Grimes — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 21:05:13 +0000

Sure, Fedor is a great fighter but he’s not marketable enough to sell a sizable amount of PPV’s to make a profit. Given his past history as a headliner to American Audiences(PRIDE, BODOG, & Affliction), it would probably take a miracle for this 2nd Affliction card to achieve over 100K legitimate buys.

Overall, Fedor is a great fighter but he’s also a money pit with a meager ROI (Return on Investment). Plus, it doesn’t help that he’s a Russian, who scheduled to face a Belorussian. Like it or not, Fedor is better off facing Ken Shamrock in order to generate more PPV buys.

Even though Hardcore fans, such as myself, would love to see him fight Arlovski, it is the MAINSTREAM (American) Audience that will inevitably buy most of the PPV’s and determine the success of this card.

IMHO, Affliction should stick to the fashion industry, their real core competency.

By: big boi

big boi — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 20:18:01 +0000

Who is Fedor?

That promo showcased the great champion EDOR. EDOR WILL RETURN.

By: jdavis

jdavis — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 19:26:53 +0000

Fedor is the real deal but it does seem like Affliction might be making a similar mistake that EliteXC made, you can’t put all your eggs in one superstar’s basket. For a company that has several of the best heavyweights in the world under contract it’s sort of odd that their whole event marketing revolves around Fedor. They might as well of put Arlovski’s name in a tiny font under Fedor’s in that ad.

By: cyph

cyph — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 19:25:42 +0000

Two former Soviet Republic fighters going at it? Yeah, that’s going to sell a whole bunch…

By: Michaelthebox

Michaelthebox — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 19:01:57 +0000

They badly need to ramp up some conflict between Fedor and Arlovski, as Ultimo Santa said. The standard “show badass kicking ass” ploy only works if the badass strikes some fundamental chord in a person’s soul, the way Kimbo and Tyson do. Fedor doesn’t, he’s a stocky pleasant-looking Russian guy.

They should be selling this fight on the back of Arlovski trying to take out the invincible, unbeaten god of MMA, not on “hey look at this guy kick ass!”

By: IceMuncher

IceMuncher — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 18:52:12 +0000

Perhaps, but is anyone going to remember a non-informative teaser? The event is still 3 months away, and between then and now there’s a couple of huge UFC cards.

By: kevin

kevin — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 18:10:23 +0000

For a teaser, it’s ok, still plenty of time for a future ad with a proper CTA. Needed rope stretching sound effects on the choke however.

By: IceMuncher

IceMuncher — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 18:00:05 +0000

Lol, Asa had me going at first.

By: Spencer Fern

Spencer Fern — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 16:58:55 +0000

Yeah, I think this vid is all about “hey, we got Fedor.”

I think Affliction was really afraid the Japanese would poach Fedor for NYE and make this matchup improbable.

They knew they could get Arlovski on the other hand.

It shows the weakness of their hand, and even more so just how weak the fight industry is in Japan at the moment.