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UFC throws a fit and removes Kendall Grove fight from Spike TV portion of UFC 116 card; Update: BJ Penn’s web site claims Tapout backs away from Fedor
By Zach Arnold | June 25, 2010
Read the story for full context. The timing of the comments made by Kendall Grove about The Ultimate Fighter and the forum in which they were made was pretty dumb.
However, on the other hand, why is this development so petty? Because it’s basically Spike TV and UFC giving Kendall Grove the proverbial middle finger and saying, OK, you want to talk about the network that way, fine, you won’t appear on television and any sponsor money you were going to make by appearing on television is out the window. In the process, they screwed over Goran Reljic as well.
From a development perspective, UFC will argue that getting Ricardo Romero some air time against The Smoothie King will be better than Kendall Grove who could be labeled by the organization as a guy who’s not going to climb much further up the ladder. However, the irony of UFC putting The Smoothie King on television and rewarding a guy that Dana White was complaining (justifiably so) two years ago for stand-up gate is just amazing. Booking The Smoothie King reminds me of when UFC booked Sean Gannon and I’m not necessarily talking about skill set, either.
Update (6/26): Fedor now with Dan Henderson’s Clinch Gear? America and Russia holding hands…
Topics: Media, MMA, UFC, Zach Arnold | 13 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
Is it Spike, rather than the UFC, that is primarily behind all this? I was under the impression Spike got to choose which prelims they wanted to air.
In any case, talking crap about your employer is generally a very, very bad idea. I’d be in deep trouble if my boss heard me criticizing the company (bye bye promotion/raise), and if said criticism was aired over the radio, I’d be canned instantly. My employer is significantly nicer and less cutthroat than Zuffa, so I have no idea what Kendall was thinking.
Ultimately, Spike has final say on any bout airing on their channel.
I’m sure Spike made the call, which brings up discussion of networks and MMA promotions. But who cares about that?
Obviously Petruzelli is back because of the Kimbo win giving him a higher profile, but he’s a legitimately skilled gatekeeper type fighter. There’s way worse people who could be in that ring.
Every sports league in America censors their athletes to some extent.
New York Yankees are told how to shave their face. There was talk about upping the post game dress code for NBA players and it got serious press a few years back (forgot if it was actually implemented). In fact, many athletes have gotten fined for even saying bad things about officials. So have owners. So Grove being penalized for saying something isn’t exactly a big news story.
And I would hardly call it the UFC having a fit. More like putting a fighter in his place.
This hurts is Reljic, who is really being punished (lack of sponsors) for his opponents actions.
The funniest thing about Grove’s comments is that TUF gave him a career. It has also kept him in the UFC far longer then he has deserved just because he is a TUF Winner. So for him to be critical of TUF is stupid….
As a side note…. In no way is this an endorsement of TUF. I don’t watch the show anymore except for the finals. I think it’s a lot of trash.
Remember the classic YouTube rant ‘THAT’S F—ING ILLEGAL’? Well, now the guy who was actually the one who agreed to keep the fight standing is fighting in the UFC. Oh, the irony.
Yeah, he kept it standing for all 7 seconds of the fight. How dastardly.
You do know that Seth has fought in the UFC before right? and Dana probably is a big fan of Seth for saying the truth about Elite and their shady deals.
Anyways as far as Grove goes he brought this on himself you don’t bite the hand that’s fed you. You can call it whatever you want, I call it putting your foot in a guys ass that has gotten out of pocket.
Grove owes his career to TUF and the idea that he would even think about bad mouthing them on the radio shows just how stupid some of these guys are. The only people you should be calling out here Zach are his handlers who let a guy basically committ career suicide when it’s their job to make sure he has one.
Exactly. Why would you ever put it past Dana to reward a guy who single handedly took out his biggest competitor (knowingly or not.)
But you can’t stop the guy from saying dumb stuff. It’s not like he was riding over to the interview with his manager and said “Hey, I think I’m going to talk smack about Spike today.” He surely said it without warning. You can’t get into someone’s head to find out what they could blurt out in the press. If you could surely Lorenzo would have bought the system for Dana by now.
Exactly, Seth is a better kickboxer than Kimbo anyway, why would he want to take it to the ground unless he was losing? and as you said the fight lasted about 7 seconds anyway.
Randy Couture will probably stand longer than that against Toney.
http://money.cnn.com/2009/11/04/technology/cuomo_sues_intel_antitrust/index.htm?postversion=2009110413%29
“Cuomo also said Intel threatened and punished those “perceived to be working too closely with [its] competitors,” doing so by directly funding a computer maker’s competitors and ending joint venture projects.
“Rather than compete fairly, Intel used bribery and coercion to maintain a stranglehold on the market,” Cuomo said in the statement.”
Hmmm…they better be careful they don’t start creating a pattern of this type of behaviour against their sponsors/business partners.
The Fertittas’ Station Casinos are under federal indictment for the same kind of legally questionable behavior.
press release: http://www.businesswire.com/portal/site/home/permalink/?ndmViewId=news_view&newsId=20100624005837&newsLang=en
full indictment:
http://www.scribd.com/doc/33477776/NLRB-complaint-against-Station-Casinos-as-amended
I hope M1 sues UFC for tortious interference in their contract with Tapout. Extortion is still illegal, last time I checked.
How is that extortion?