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Strikeforce 11/7 Chicago (Fedor/Rogers)
By Zach Arnold | November 7, 2009
Venue: Sears Centre Arena (Hoffman Estates, Illinois)
TV: CBS
- Welterweights (170 pounds): Christian Uflacker vs. Jonatas Novaes
- Middleweights (185 pounds): Louis Taylor vs. Nate Moore
- Welterweights (185 pounds): Shamar Bailey vs. John Kolosci
- Lightweights (155 pounds): Mark Miller vs. Deray Davis
- Featherweights (145 pounds): Jeff Curran vs. Dustin Neace
- Women (145 pounds): Roxanne Modafferi vs. Marloes Coenen
- Heavyweights: Antonio Silva vs. Fabricio Werdum
- Light Heavyweights (205 pounds): Gegard Mousasi vs. Sokoudjou
- Middleweights (185 pounds): Jake Shields vs. Jason “Mayhem” Miller
- Heavyweights: Brett Rogers vs. Fedor Emelianenko
Event coverage: Heavy | MMA Torch | Sherdog | Fanhouse | USA Today | Bloody Elbow | MMA Frenzy | MMA Junkie
Strikeforce/Showtime public relations staff sent out this notice during the Chicago event:
CHICAGO (Nov. 7, 2009) — The stakes will be high when STRIKEFORCE closes out a spectacular 2009 with the return of one of the most prolific and exciting fighters in Mixed Martial Arts – unbeaten former STRIKEFORCE world middleweight champion Cung Le, who will headline a star-studded lineup at HP Pavilion in San Jose, Calif. on Saturday, Dec. 19, on SHOWTIME®.
Joining the legendary Le (6-0) will be five other outstanding and widely recognized 185-pound stalwarts, Scott “Hands Of Steel’’ Smith (16-6), “Ruthless” Robbie Lawler (16-5), Matt “The Law” Lindland (21-6) and highly regarded STRIKEFORCE newcomers Ronaldo “Jacare” Souza (10-2) and Muhammed “King Mo” Lawal (5-0), who will be making their respective highly anticipated debuts for the organization. Souza will face Lindland. Opponents for Lawler and “King Mo’’ will be announced soon.
A special pre-sale ticket purchase opportunity will take place for “STRIKEFORCE Insider” e-newsletter subscribers (www.strikeforce.com) beginning at 10:00 AM, PT Tuesday, Nov. 10, and ending at 10 PM, PT on Thursday, Nov. 12. ”STRIKEFORCE Insiders” will receive a special e-newsletter today with the pre-sale code.
Tickets, priced from $30, go on sale to the general public at 10:00 AM, PT on Friday, Nov. 13 at the HP Pavilion ticket office as well as at all Ticketmaster locations (800-745-3000), Ticketmaster online (www.ticketmaster.com) and STRIKEFORCE’S official website (www.strikeforce.com).
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TV ratings news for the event.
Topics: Media, MMA, StrikeForce, Zach Arnold | 197 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
# Middleweights (185 pounds): Louis Taylor vs. Nate Moore
Is this the correct spelling for Nate Moore or is the fighter actually Nate Mohr? Nate Mohr would make sense as he is a UFC veteran and he is also a local fighter that trains with Curran.
Can’t wait.
Really. Haven’t been this excited about a card in a while.
Not only that but the entire day is filled with fights. With the Valuev – little man, big mouth show that afternoon & the HBO doubleheader later that night.
I like the main card but I feel having a week undercard dosen’t help building for the future. Is that the same Mark Miller who looked horrible on The Ultimate Fighter?
Very intrested in Antonio Silva/Werdum and The Women’s match more so than the rest of the card.
Hope they show the Curran fight!
They won’t they never show prelims.
People assume that the untelevised undercards need to be meaningful. They don’t. From that perspective, I’m fine.
My opinion is that its Fedor for free against a real opponent. I’m happy about that. Everything else is gravy, good or bad.
I think the main card is real solid although I wouldn’t open the show with Silva vs Werdum which could be a real snoozer. It’s a shame that they weren’t able to put something in place to build a #1 contender for Cyborg.
I have to give it to CBS for advertising the fight pretty heavily during the football games yesterday and the week before. I don’t know how much weight Frank Shamrock and Josh Gross’ soundbites on Fedor’s fighting abilities carry with people who aren’t hardcore fans and therefore have no clue who they both are (in football terms it would be like writer Peter King and ex-player Eddie George doing an ad), but they did much better pushing this card than any of the Elite events last year. It’s a shame, with the starpower of Gina and Kimbo who knows what those shows could have done with this amount of promotion.
As for the card as a whole, if they’re not even going to promote it what does it matter honestly. People keep complaining that there’s no household names on the rest of the televised fights, but even if they did if they’re not going to be mentioned it won’t matter anyway. If an unannounced undercard falls in the woods and no one is there to hear it, does it still make a sound?
Hopefully Brett won’t be overconfident from his fight in St. Louis
Its a great card with the heavyweight champion defending on network TV. I hope the ratings are ok, people in the MMA community overestimate how much press CBS would actually give a event like this. Its network TV not Spike which can afford to advertise the UFC non-stop.
They should have really waited to have Cyborg-Carano on this show. It would have been a home run.
Given their history with EliteXC I can’t fault CBS for going at this in a more restrained manner. Maybe they don’t see this show as a do or die show, and are thinking in the long term way that EliteXC didn’t. Fedor should get the win, and it will get his name out there. Anyone else who shines that night is a bonus to Strikeforce going forward. I’m excited and I should have as big a crowd over as for any UFC show.
Awesome main card! Better than anything the UFC is offering the rest of the year – free or paid. This card absolutely blows away the Manchester show, IMO.
Antonio Silva vs. Fabricio Werdum
Interesting fight…Werdum is probably the favorite but I’m calling Silva for the upset. R2 TKO
Gegard Mousasi vs. Sokoudjou
Soko gasses late in R1, gets grounded, pounded, and submitted with something…probably a kimura. R1 tapout
Jake Shields vs. Jason “Mayhem” Miller
This could be an awesome fight…Shields is a submission master but Miller is very experienced and will be looking for the counters. Close fight. R3 U-DEC for Shields.
Brett Rogers vs. Fedor Emelianenko
Rogers and his trainers think Fedor is in for “a shock”, but I think Brett might be shocked himself the first time he gets tagged with a stiff shot. Rogers, at some point, will be on the ground, and his arm or neck will be exposed. Fedor wins, R2 submission.
It’s an awesome card, but UFC 107 is much better top to bottom.
Solid card on paper for free TV. As much as their are a lot of fighters we fans recognize, on paper there is really only one pick’em fight. And that is Werdum/Silva. Shields, Mousasi, & Fedor are all heavy favorites.
“I like the main card but I feel having a week undercard dosen’t help building for the future.”
It will catch up with them eventually. You can’t keep on bringing in outside talent that nobody has ever heard of and expect to produce a self sufficient, well oiled MMA organization over the long haul. Strikeforce MUST create it’s own talent, something they have failed to do.
“People assume that the untelevised undercards need to be meaningful. They don’t. From that perspective, I’m fine.”
They do. Perhaps not for the current card, but for 6 months from now. Or for a year from now.
“Awesome main card! Better than anything the UFC is offering the rest of the year – free or paid. This card absolutely blows away the Manchester show, IMO.”
As pointed out, UFC 107 is a much better card on paper. And let’s not fool ourselves. UFC events are constantly filled with even match-ups. Joe Silva has an eye for it. Most of Strikeforce’s fights end up being one sided affairs with the losing fighter barely putting up a fight.
It is unfortunate but I see Strike Force going the same way as EliteXC did. They will put on some good cards and will get a lot of viewers tuning in but the fact they seem to be hanging their hat on certain can only lead to failure. They hung their had on Gena and when she lost almost all of the talk I was hearing about Strike Force and WMMA went away. I see the same think happening to them if Fedor loses.
As for the not airing the prelims I see that as a mistake. They can be used to fill up the time in between matches so that there is non-stop action keeps the casual fan wanting to watch the whole thing. It also allows new up and coming fighters to be seen and start generating a buzz. That buzz is what allows the UFC to put on a show every month. They dont have to stack every card with all of the “Top Level” fighters they have. They give a “Top Level” main event and IMO put on some “Top Level” under cards as well.
More of my casual fan friends have expressed interest in this than in basically any UFC card other than when Brock fights. Fedor is a huge star. He’s the best fighter in the entire history of mma, and getting to see him fight for free is like seeing Mike Tyson in his prime on free television, but only if the internet had been around 25 years ago and everyone had gotten to see hundreds of his highlight clips before ever seeing him fight live.
I love it when people use a few friends to determine how successful something will be.
“Fedor is a huge star. He’s the best fighter in the entire history of mma, and getting to see him fight for free is like seeing Mike Tyson in his prime on free television, but only if the internet had been around 25 years ago and everyone had gotten to see hundreds of his highlight clips before ever seeing him fight live.”
1) Fedor is not a huge star. Not in Japan. Not in Canada. Not in the United States. Not in Russia.
2) Best in the world doesn’t mean people care to watch. Lennox Lewis, 2 Klitschko’s, and others are proof of this…
From MMA Junkie:
“As for his partners at M-1 Global, Coker said their role in making the event a success has been focused on the international level and away from the day-to-day requirements of arranging a live fight event.
“[M-1 Global’s] roles and responsibilities – because they’re so far away – were to bring Fedor,” Coker said. “We have a good team, and we’re very good at what we do. We said, ‘Lets let us be the promotional vehicle and let us run with it. Let us do what we do, and for this first fight, just bring Fedor and co-ordinate all the promotions and all the activities for Fedor.’ … The day-to-day operations, the nuts and bolts of the fight itself for the live event, was pretty much coordinated through our company.
“They were responsible for doing all of the international (marketing), which I think they have some very good news. I know this is airing on the national network in Russia, and it’s also going to be on Bravo in the U.K. They have a distribution deal in Korea and Japan and over 40 countries in the world.””
It’s nice to see Scott Coker admitting he got screwed and trying to spin it in a way that makes it sound acceptable. He can’t say he wasn’t warned…. As in Pride, Bodog, Affliction, etc….
They do. Perhaps not for the current card, but for 6 months from now. Or for a year from now.
They have the Strikeforce Challengers series for that.
As for the not airing the prelims I see that as a mistake. They can be used to fill up the time in between matches so that there is non-stop action keeps the casual fan wanting to watch the whole thing. It also allows new up and coming fighters to be seen and start generating a buzz.
Reality check; The reason why the UFC can’t make stars out of the undercard guys from PPVs until after they win big fights is because no one gives a shit about them beating each other up. Really. The only people who care about what happens in a Roli Delgado fight, no matter how ACTION PACKED~ are internet fans. Otherwise its filler, and in the case of Strikeforce, Budweiser commercials are probably about as good for that.
I’ll have to give a rare agreement to 45 on this: Fedor couldn’t get arrested in America unless the cop was Sean Gannon. He’s an icon to hardcore MMA fans (which pretty much equals the WEC ratings, or if you want to get really cynical the HDNet viewership.) I’m not saying it’s going to flop, I predict it does between 4 to 8 million viewers, but nobody is honestly excited about it because they know who Fedor is beyond the usual suspects. And two guys they probably don’t know saying he’s good probably doesn’t do much either realistically.
So Coker is basically saying that he is paying Fedor and letting M-1 take all of the international revenue. Dummy.
I think people are over-estimating Fedor’s draw. Sherdog has a poll right now where 52% of people think Fedor will outdraw Kimbo.
I’ve said it before, but I always compare Fedor’s drawing power with Anderson Silva. Both have a mystique as the best in the world, but even with the UFC backing him and a few ridiculous highlight reel KO’s, Anderson Silva can’t gain traction with the common fan. It’s not as easy as people think.
Also, Ultimo, Shields vs Mayhem is a title fight, so 5 rounds not 3. I think the extra two rounds may be what swings it in Mayhem’s favor.
“1) Fedor is not a huge star. Not in Japan. Not in Canada. Not in the United States. Not in Russia.
2) Best in the world doesn’t mean people care to watch. Lennox Lewis, 2 Klitschko’s, and others are proof of this…”
re: casual observers’ interest, it’s called a litmus test. Fedor has a huge buzz, and most fighters in the UFC don’t. I’m sorry if that hurts your feelings.
1. Fedor is a big star in Japan, I have no idea what you’re talking about. He main evented 8 cards in Japan. What is your conceivable argument? Do you think foreigners main event 8 shows in another country without being popular? He is also a huge star in America. I think only Lesnar and Liddell are more well-known here than he is. Fedor has this mythical reputation because he is so damn good and because he is Russian and doesn’t speak English and spurned your hero. He had an open workout in NYC that drew huge crowds of people waiting in line to get a glimpse of him. Millions will tune in to him fight this weekend, despite CBS doing a shitty job of promoting. If you type in Fedor on youtube there are are almost 10,000 different videos that come up. I have no idea how you define popularity, but however you slice it, he is very popular, and will only become even more popular when he knocks Rogers unconscious in about 2 minutes this weekend.
Do you speak Russian or read Russian sites or have any idea how popular Fedor is or isn’t in Russia? I’m guessing you’re just making that up. If I’m wrong, please show me how you’ve come to your conclusion. I know that Putin came to watch him fight and that he carried the Olympic torch. Perhaps if someone more important in Russia had come to watch him fight, then you would say he was a star. Maybe if Dana White had gone to see him fight in Russia, you would call Fedor a star.
2. We will have to see what the ratings turn out to be, but I would expect it to outdraw Kimbo’s showing on CBS. Anything less would be a disappointment. Hopefully CBS goes with an all out blitz and gets people interested.
They will DEFINITELY be showing tons of Fedor highlights throughout the telecast to ‘introduce’ him (aka, HYPE)
45…where did Coker say he got screwed? You’re an idiot.
David M
You wrong about Fedor. He was nowhere near CroCop, Sakuraba, Kid, Yoshida or Gomi in terms of popularity in Japan.
And do you really believe that Fedor is more well-known in US than Randy, Forrest or Tito? You gotta be kidding.
The Russia is another funny thing. I live in Eastern Europe and I more or less know how it looks like in Russia. MMA is a neiche sport there with almost no coverege in the media. Yes Putin was on the Bodog show and met with Fedor. So what. If you check russian search engines stats UFC gets more hits than Fedor.
45…where did Coker say he got screwed? You’re an idiot.
He’s making the inference that its a between the lines statement. I’ll wait to see how this actually plays out before I start claiming that it was a massive failure. Unlike a couple folks here, I have no dog in the race emotionally.
David M,
See Wolverine’s post on his popularity in Russia…
As for his popularity in general…. There is a very easy way to determine it…. And that is based on where he fights. If Fedor was popular in Russia, he would be fighting in Russia. In fact, M-1 would not be co-promoting his events and taking all the profits. If he was popular in Japan, he would be fighting in Japan.
There is a reason why Kazushi Sakuraba fights in Japan. That is his most popular market and he can get the most money from there. Same with Kid Yamamoto. Same with Hayato Sakurai.
The only reason why a guy like Yoshihiro Akiyama is fighting in the UFC is because he is trying to escape the racism that he enountered and wanted a fresh start.
And in America, he isn’t that popular either. It’s the money marks that have kept him around and inflated his value beyond what he is worth.
I’m thinking the CBS show does 3-4 million viewers overall. The Kimbo/Gina combo got between 4.5-5.0 million overall for their events, so I would expect it to fall somewhere short of that. However, if they get over 4 million, I think that’s a good first show for Strikeforce.
I agree with Jeff in his prediction. Somewhere between Lawler/Smith and Kimbo/Carano cards.
The other problem is that what do they do for an encore? Gina Carano is not available until the summer. Fedor is likely to fight in Japan on New Years. CBS has NCAA Basketball and has no room for Strikeforce in March. Are they going to do a show in April? 6 months between CBS shows is way too long and kills all momentum. The problem is that they have nobody else worthy of justifying a main event on CBS.
The other problem is that what do they do for an encore?
I dunno? For all I know they’re thinking Jacare/Dan Henderson. Maybe this should be something people care more about after the show?
I personally find the fact that no one is discussing any of the fights to be most comical of all. Antonio Silva/Fabricio Werdum is practically a #1 contender fight, but its buried by blogs endlessly blathering on about promotion and the success or lack thereof.
45, your argument regarding popularity in Russia is ill-informed and based simply off of conjecture. By stating that “if he were popular in Russia, why doesn’t he fight in Russia?”, you willfully ignore the fact that THE MONEY IS NOT IN RUSSIA. It’s why Crocop isn’t fighting in Croatia (despite being a multi-media star and serving in politics), and why the Klitschko brothers fight in Germany and the US instead of the Uktraine (despite being the primary sporting ambassadors of the country on the world stage).
I will agree that Fedor himself is not a huge international draw in the mainstream, but even casual UFC/MMA fans are well-aware of his reputation, if only from Joe Rogan’s references on UFC PPV broadcasts. But really, discounting the attendance of the Fedor-Lindland fight in Russia in conjunction with Putin’s well-established support of him (Putin is not exceptionally known as an avid fan or associate of other Russian athletes) suggests he is quite popular in his homeland.
I mean, really, this has nothing to do with who is popular where. It’s simply where the money is. Wherever one will get paid most, that is where they will fight.
Well to be fair Sakuraba also couldn’t pass a physical to get licensed in America either due to his brain damage and knows this. And who knows if Yamamoto could pass a drug test or not, that could hold him back from trying America as well.
And you just said he’ll be on the show of Japan’s biggest MMA night of the year so obviously he is popular in Japan then. Obviously he’s no Cro Cop, but being the dominant heavyweight champion during MMA’s biggest boom period counts for something. It’s more that Japan cannot afford his asking price constantly than him not being popular. I’m sure he’s asking for much more than Yamamoto, Sakuraba and Sakurai.
But at any rate it can be attributed to chasing the money where it’s good. I doubt if he’d ever consider going to America if PRIDE was still open.
“Its a great card with the heavyweight champion defending on network TV.”
Huh?
Alistair Overeem is the Strikeforce HW champion. Unless you are talking about Fedor’s WAMMA belt, and last time I checked WAMMA is not involved with this show and Fedor is not defending his belt.
Really excited about this, gonna be awesome!
Also, I don’t know if I’d consider doing the winner of Werdum/Silva against Fedor next. I think they really need to do Fedor (or Rogers if he wins) against Overeem to shut the “How can they push Fedor as #1 if he isn’t even their real champion?” crowd up. Whether Overeem takes it or not will be interesting. I have a feeling he’s going to dodge a Fedor fight like the plague.
Huh?
He’s probably referencing that Fedor is essentially the linear/true heavyweight champion according to, well, pretty much everyone.
God, I love the people who think MMA fighters are more popular then they are. Great comedy.
The Russian economy is down. So is the US economy. So is the Japanese ecnomy. Obviously Russie is worse off, but if Fedor was popular enough, he would be fighting in Russia. Plain and simple. He isn’t getting that much money here. From the rumors, he would be offered even less while fighting in Japan. If he was as popular as people claim he is, it wouldn’t be a problem to sell out an arena, put it on national TV, and have a few sponsors giving Fedor even more money. The fact that they don’t do that, speaks volumes.
Look… Take Brock Lesnar and put him in an amateur wrestling match in the middle of the country, and he is selling out a 15,000 seat arena and it would be televised live. Compare that to those Russian Sambo competitions where basically nobody shows up and nobody cares. If Fedor is so popular, then why don’t they have big crowds for those events? Simple answer…. He isn’t.
Sorry for popping the MMA bubble…. But somebody had to bring reality into the conversation.
“See Wolverine’s post on his popularity in Russia…
As for his popularity in general…. There is a very easy way to determine it…. And that is based on where he fights. If Fedor was popular in Russia, he would be fighting in Russia. In fact, M-1 would not be co-promoting his events and taking all the profits. If he was popular in Japan, he would be fighting in Japan.
There is a reason why Kazushi Sakuraba fights in Japan. That is his most popular market and he can get the most money from there. Same with Kid Yamamoto. Same with Hayato Sakurai.
The only reason why a guy like Yoshihiro Akiyama is fighting in the UFC is because he is trying to escape the racism that he enountered and wanted a fresh start.
And in America, he isn’t that popular either. It’s the money marks that have kept him around and inflated his value beyond what he is worth.”
See Zheroen’s post for why your logic re: Russia is horrendous. Why doesn’t Pacquiao fight in the Philippines? Why doesn’t Cotto fight in Puerto Rico?
Honestly I think you are a bit confused; Fedor main evented 8 shows in Japan, and is being pushed on national TV as a huge star here, but yet he isn’t popular in either country? You’re just literally making stuff up to try to sound like Dana White. I expect in your next post that you will say Fedor is a fat drunk Russian who drinks too much Vodka and that he only fights cans and hasn’t acoomplished anything recently.
Here is Fedor peddling a product in Japan: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BGlQqGenxSk&feature=player_embedded
Now I know what you are going to say, the money marks who work for Japanese companies decided to spend all that money to hire him as a sponsor even though nobody in Japan knows who he is. Right?
On an aside, Dana White isn’t reading this board, so you don’t have to say absurd things all the time to get his approval.
I agree with lots of what you say, but Fedor is not popular in mainstream America. Hopefully he will be after Saturday, but right now if you walked up to 100 people on the street in the American city of your choice and asked them who he was at the most you’d get 5-10 correct answers unless they’re walking out of a MMA event.
“God, I love the people who think MMA fighters are more popular then they are. Great comedy.
The Russian economy is down. So is the US economy. So is the Japanese ecnomy. Obviously Russie is worse off, but if Fedor was popular enough, he would be fighting in Russia. Plain and simple. He isn’t getting that much money here. From the rumors, he would be offered even less while fighting in Japan. If he was as popular as people claim he is, it wouldn’t be a problem to sell out an arena, put it on national TV, and have a few sponsors giving Fedor even more money. The fact that they don’t do that, speaks volumes.
Look… Take Brock Lesnar and put him in an amateur wrestling match in the middle of the country, and he is selling out a 15,000 seat arena and it would be televised live. Compare that to those Russian Sambo competitions where basically nobody shows up and nobody cares. If Fedor is so popular, then why don’t they have big crowds for those events? Simple answer…. He isn’t.
Sorry for popping the MMA bubble…. But somebody had to bring reality into the conversation.”
Ok again genius, why aren’t the Klitschkos fighting in Ukraine, why isn’t Pacquiao fighting in the Philippines, why isn’t Cotto fighting in Puerto Rico, and why isn’t Silva fighting in Brazil? I guess if they were as popular as teh Brock, they would be fighting in their home countries.
Re: Fedor in Japan, besides ignoring the fact that he main evented 8 shows, I just linked to one of his TV commercials there, which weakens another one of your “arguments.”
You have now just invented a fact situation in which Brock Lesnar will sell out a 15,000 seat stadium to wrestle. Is this really how you argue? Do you have any sambo attendance figures or is this just another one of your Dana-style lies that you hope people will just believe? Fedor did an exhibition in Kansas City that drew thousands of people, if that counts for anything. I know that you are convinced 10k people would watch Brock take a dump, but again I try to deal with things that have actually happened instead of coming up with things that you fantasize about but have never actually occurred. And to think, you have the gall to talk about reality when your argument is that Brock could hypothetically sell out an amateur wrestling match and it would be televised. Please don’t try to amend your argument to him having wrestled live on TV at the NCAA championships, because that had nothing to do with him, it was a TV contract between the NCAA and ESPN.
I think I understand your modus operandi now; if Fedor isn’t as popular as Brock in America (who only was the biggest star in pro wrestling for years and now has the full marketing push from the biggest mma company on the planet), then he isn’t popular. Got it. As for his popularity in Russia, based on Fedor not fighting there to get more money abroad, he also isn’t popular there either, and the president came to watch him fight by accident, and he carried the Olympic torch by accident too. He isn’t popular in Japan because he main evented lots of shows and does TV commercials there, and um, he isn’t as popular as Sakuraba. All makes sense now.
Mark Coleman also did commercials in Japan, does it mean he is a huge star?
If Fedor is such big star in Russia why none of his fights has been televised live in his homeland so far?
If he is such a huge star in Japan, why this upcoming show is not televised there?
Dave Meltzer:
“All Fedor’s wins and mystique hasn’t quite made him a top box office draw. In Japan, where Emelianenko has fought most of his career, he never had the mainstream appeal of fighters like Mirko Cro Cop, a spectacular KO artist, Bob Sapp, a freakish American who wasn’t a top fighter but had a huge personality, or Wanderlei Silva, an aggressive exciting fighter who had a legendary series of matches with national hero Kazushi Sakuraba.”
http://sports.yahoo.com/mma/news?slug=dm-fedor071108&prov=yhoo&type=lgns%29
He doesn’t need to be as popular as Brock for it to count, but if all the YouTube clips and internet fanboy worship were really enough to guarantee his CBS fight is going to be a slamdunk success, then Affliction would still be opened. They just needed 10% of the CBS EliteXC viewing audience to give them a great buyrate and they didn’t get close to that. I agree with you that he is a star in Japan and Russia, but I think you’re really overstating his American popularity. If a good chunk of it hinges on Joe Rogan saying he likes him in commentary, he also endlessly praised Cro Cop prior to his UFC deal and UFC 67 which he co-headlined hardly did giant numbers. He also tried in vain to sway the fans in Tim Sylvia’s favor and nobody cared. Lots of people don’t even like Rogan.
But with a good showing he could impress mainstream writers into praising him and become well-known overnight. But the problem is, if he blows him out people will claim it was a mismatch, and if Rogers gets anything in during the fight people are going to say he’s overrated. He has to have the Goldilocks’ porridge fight somehow.
M-1 is sueing Affliction. Oh, the drama continues. There is a potential they could end up including the UFC into the lawsuit. That would be the dumbest thing ever. Go after a company with more legal firepower? It would bankrupt M-1.
“Ok again genius, why aren’t the Klitschkos fighting in Ukraine, why isn’t Pacquiao fighting in the Philippines, why isn’t Cotto fighting in Puerto Rico, and why isn’t Silva fighting in Brazil? I guess if they were as popular as teh Brock, they would be fighting in their home countries.”
All of those guys are making huge amounts of money. Same with Beckham playing in the states. If it’s a big enough sum of cash, athletes will move over. What Fedor is getting in the states is no where close to those amounts.
The best thing is, you really lack the proof in what you are saying. As others have backed me up…. Fedor is not a big star in Russia.
Ricky Hatton had a huge number of PPV Buys. Had a lot of people fly thousands of miles to see him compete in Vegas on the big stage. Stayed up into the wheeeee hours of the morning to give his fight huge ratings. That is a STAR. Fedor has none of this.
President Bush went to the Olympics to watch Women’s Gymnastics. Does that mean those girls are huge stars in the states? NOPE!!
You talk about Russie like it is Africa. There is still some money in that country. If somebody is a big enough star, they would be able to keep them there. At least in the amounts we are talking about.
In MMA money, what Fedor made in Affliction is pretty damn good. And it’s not known what he’s making for this Rogers fight. For the man who harps on the SECRET ZUFFA PAYOFFS~! endlessly, what makes you so sure CBS isn’t going to step in to pay the big money Strikeforce can’t? Maybe not, but we don’t know. But since MMA fighters not named Brock Lesnar don’t make anywhere close to what boxers make, you can’t put up a $15 million window to say they’re not high paid unless they equal that.
Also, you cannot compare Bush going to the Olympics to Putin going to BoDog. The Olympics are about representing a country in amateur contests. BoDog was a professional sporting event. It would be more like Bush going to see a UFC fighter or boxer which no President would ever do. Obama couldn’t even go to a Bulls game without getting flack for it, so imagine what would happen if it was a combat sport.
And lastly, Hatton was not the draw of any of his big fights. You know that.
I don’t disagree with 45’s general point that Fedor is not a superstar in Russia (he is not), however;
If somebody is a big enough star, they would be able to keep them there.
That’s not true for a single international level sport in all of Russia. Not for hockey, soccer, basketball, boxing, or auto/motorcycle racing. The only sports that is different is women’s basketball, and that’s because of, in effect, one oligarch who likes the sport. Even if Fedor was a big deal in Russia, its very unlikely that he would be able to find financially worthy deals there compared to those present in countries where MMA is more often watched.
M-1 is sueing Affliction. Oh, the drama continues. There is a potential they could end up including the UFC into the lawsuit. That would be the dumbest thing ever. Go after a company with more legal firepower? It would bankrupt M-1.
Then you should be happy. If they turn out to have no case against anyone and spend all their money, Fedor will be cut free. If they do have a case, well, we can laugh then too.
I think the true way to put this in perspective is talking about his fellow Russians. The biggest athletes in Russia (well, probably biggest celebrities period outside of Yakov Smirnoff and Tatu)are female tennis players. And they flee to be trained in Florida as soon as they turn 12. It doesn’t mean they aren’t big stars in Russia, but they don’t even live there much less compete there often. Because the big tennis money is from America and Europe.
Looks like ticket sales are going well for Strikeforce:
http://mma.fanhouse.com/2009/11/03/strikeforce-expects-a-sellout/