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Dana White: Without Fedor, Strikeforce and Showtime would be nothing
By Zach Arnold | May 7, 2010
Quotes from MMAFighting.com interview with Dana White on Thursday in Montreal
The state of the relationship between Machida & Dana White given that Machida is angry about Dana saying that Shogun won the first fight
“No, we’re cool as far as I know, we’re cool, I’m sure he’s not happy that I scored it that I thought Shogun. Listen, I’m always going to be honest in who I think won and who I think didn’t and that night I couldn’t tell you. I scored that fight twice watching it on TV and I had Shogun winning the fight. You know, it’s not like I have, me and Shogun are boys and we hang out all the time. I have the same relationship with Shogun that I do with Machida, you know, I like them both. I respect them both as fighters and actually, you know, I think Machida is an incredible fighter, I love his style, his Dad is a great guy, nothing against them, I’m just being honest in the way that I scored the fight.”
The first fight in Los Angeles at Staples Center was tough to sell. The re-match should be easier to sell, right?
“Yeah, well I was happy with the results of the fight in LA, too, but you know, the sport has gotten to a place where you know you can come to Canada and headline with two Brazilians. We can go to LA, we can go to England and headline with two Brazilians, especially when you’re talking about these two Brazilians, you know, two of the best in the world in a fight that I think is going to be, I think this is going to be a completely different fight. I think they both, you know, they both learned a lot about each other and neither one of them liked the result. Machida doesn’t like the fact that people think he didn’t win that fight and Shogun doesn’t like the fact that he didn’t win that fight, so I think this is going to be a completely different fight than the first one we saw.”
Will the winner of Quinton Jackson/Rashad Evans face the winner of the Shogun/Machida fight?
“That’s not guaranteed. You know, and I don’t like to make those decisions off the top of my head, you know, we really don’t do that. Listen, I learned a long time ago and I’m sure other companies out there have now, too… You don’t look at the fight and go, ‘Ooh, this guy’s probably going to win, so if he wins and he wins, we’ll do this fight,’ you wait and you see who wins and go from there.”
Will the winner of the Josh Koscheck/Paul Daley fight Georges St. Pierre next for the title?
“Yes, the winner of Koscheck and Daley will face Georges St. Pierre for the title.”
Paul Daley posting photoshops of Koscheck on The Underground Forum and Dana has been spending more time posting on the UG.
“I think this is hilarious but, yeah, I mean, I never get involved in the trash talk between the two guys unless somebody crosses the line and gets stupid, but I’ve always been active on the Underground since day one and the reason I posted the Korean Zombie’s quote yesterday because it’s one of the best quotes that I’ve ever seen and it’s the way that I’ve felt about the sport for a long time. I agree with what he said and it really is, it’s not just Americans, it’s people all over the world. He’s saying the American fans embraced me and not because I was Korean or American or anything else but because of the fight that I put on and I’ve always believed that, no matter what part of the world we go into, it doesn’t matter where a guy is from, it’s how you fight.”
The media perception of Kimbo Slice is that he’s a regular fighter now and not a freak show.
“Yeah, what we’re not turning him into is a freak show. You know, I’m actually… I hate to say when I’m proud of guys, that sounds so condescending, but you know this is a guy who accepted my challenge, had a lot of different options where he could have stayed in the freak show circuit and made a lot of money. He took a big chance coming into the UFC and he’s actually put in the work, the time, and effort, and he’s trying to become a Mixed Martial Artist.”
Impressed with Matt Mitrione?
“Yeah, you know, when you take a guy that comes from another sport and they actually come over into this sport and do well, what I like about Mitrione is Mitrione likes to throw them, man, and he goes in there and he’s one of these guys who’s going to finish or be finished.”
If Kimbo has another boring fight (like he did the last time with Houston Alexander), will he get cut from the UFC?
“Actually, I don’t blame Kimbo Slice one bit for that last fight, all the blame lies on Houston Alexander in my eyes. He, you know, and Houston’s a guy who I like, you know, I’ve always liked Houston and you know we matched him up with Houston because we thought Houston would fight him.
You know, I can never say what’s do or die, I mean he’s got to go in and perform you know and win and we’ll see what happens.”
Thoughts on Fedor signing for another fight with Strikeforce?
“It doesn’t surprise me. These guys have nothing else, you know what I mean? I told you, I don’t know how many times I got to say that Showtime sucks, but you know that’s all they have. They have nothing else. If they would have lost Fedor, I mean they’ve screwed up every other possible thing, everything they’ve done they’ve blown so to not get Fedor would have been huge. I’m sure they offered Fedor a ridiculous amount of money to stick around, you know these guys are throwing a lot of money around. They’re the typical guys who have come up and tried to compete and get into it and just throw dumb money around and do dumb stuff and aren’t going to last long when I think over the last, you know, six or seven years, all the people with all the money they came in, if they would have spent the money the right way could have actually done something for the sport and helped out a little bit. These guys aren’t helping out. Think they’re helping out with Ontario? Think they’re helping with New York? They don’t give a shit about that. They’ll let us forge the way and then they’re going to try to build a business off of what we do, but they can’t even do that right.”
Topics: Media, MMA, UFC, Zach Arnold | 8 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
I know what White is trying to say, but he has it backwards. Without Fedor, Strikeforce would still be something. Not stretched so thin.
Fancy Pants went on The UG and asked for a lawyer to get out his contract. One of many signs of SF and Sho doing a horrible job with the talent.
Funniest and possibly most contradictory back to back answers ever from Dana:
“Will the winner of Quinton Jackson/Rashad Evans face the winner of the Shogun/Machida fight?
“That’s not guaranteed. You know, and I don’t like to make those decisions off the top of my head, you know, we really don’t do that. Listen, I learned a long time ago and I’m sure other companies out there have now, too… You don’t look at the fight and go, ‘Ooh, this guy’s probably going to win, so if he wins and he wins, we’ll do this fight,’ you wait and you see who wins and go from there.”
Will the winner of the Josh Koscheck/Paul Daley fight Georges St. Pierre next for the title?
“Yes, the winner of Koscheck and Daley will face Georges St. Pierre for the title.””
What he said was right. That you can’t bank on somebody winning. Good MMA Matchmaking is based on putting 2 good fights against each other and letting the story tell itself. Strikeforce has gotten in trouble for trying to dictate the story, and when it doesn’t happen… They look bad.
But he certainly contradicted himself. I don’t know if it is interview fatigue or just the way his brain works. He is lucky MMA isn’t bigger.
In the first case, I think he’s talking about situations where if one guy wins, he would obviously get the title shot, but the other guy might not if he wins. But you assume the guy you want to win will and tell everyone the winner gets a title shot.
If it’s a clear cut case where the winner of the fight would be next in line regardless of who wins, then it’s fine.
If Quinton vs Rashad isn’t even a #1 contender match, I’m even less interested in it.
It’s as good as a #1 contender fight. Who else are they going to put in the mix? Rampage gets the title shot if he wins, Rashad gets it if he wins big and possibly gets it if he just wins.
I think Dana is holding out hope that Shogun wins, and he can bring Anderson in for a grudge/super match.
I know thats a fight I’d rather see than Anderson vs. GSP or Machida vs. Rampage. And hell if Rampage wins you can match him up with Machida even “if” he loses.
Without dana white, zuffa’s profits would be exactly the same, or better.
Without zuffa, mma would be a sport.
kill zuffa