Tim Sylvia: When I fought Ray Mercer, I didn’t think it would hurt my record because it was a boxing match
By Zach Arnold | May 19, 2010
Where do I start with some of what Big Tim said during his interview with Josh Gross? After getting a big one-time pay day from Affliction to fight Fedor, Tim Sylvia has found himself out in the wilderness of the current MMA scene. He has a fight coming up this Friday night against World’s Strongest Man Mariusz Pudzianowski. This fight takes place after Tim lost to Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira (in UFC), to Fedor (in Affliction), and Ray Mercer (in a bizarre Monte Cox-promoted show in Alabama). During the radio interview with Josh, Tim admitted that his options are running out in terms of getting bookings in promotions not named Strikeforce or UFC and that’s why he took this fight on Friday night:
“Basically I just wanted to fight and this was put in front of us and we took the fight. Nothing else, I played with Japan and they said they’re going to use me and use me and use me and they’ve talked to three different fights with them and they’ve all fell through so you know we finally just said you know whoever wants me to fight we’re going to get a retainer and if they don’t let me fight at least they’re going to be out $10,000 and if they do then so be it, you know.”
Sylvia indicated during the interview that DREAM was the promotion that was courting him, but that they would give him offers on two-week notice against “Top 5” guys. (Probably against Josh Barnett.)
As for an assessment about his opponent on Friday, he did try to put over Mariusz in his own unique way.
“I think he’s still very new to the sport. If this is the career he wants to pursue now I mean he really has to work hard at it. I mean he’s got a great work ethic you know he knows what it takes to become a world champion in one sport so he’s got a good drive and a good work ethic where he could possibly do well with this sport if he gets the right crew behind him and stuff but taking fights like this isn’t a good decision for his management team, I don’t believe.”
“Supposedly he was a good boxer, a good kick boxer, good wrestler, and we haven’t seen any of that out of him yet.”
The promotion that is hosting the fight is called Moosin and it’s got ex-Toughman and ex-Art Dore associates all over it, including Eric “Butterbean” Esch and Corey Fischer, who was investigated by a watchdog group linked to the Ohio Athletic Commission for having fighter Forrest Petz allegedly work amateur fights when he was a professional fighter.
“You know I met those guys (Moosin) during the press conference when we did the press conference in Boston and New York. Great guys… Butterbean’s involved so you know he’s a funny, funny character and a great guy so it’s definitely legit and for real and I’m looking forward to fighting for them Friday.”
Sylvia is still trying to recover from the loss to Fedor. The fight became a circus for so many different reasons — Affliction paid a reported $800,000 to Sylvia for the fight booking and then Tim lost in a little over 30 seconds. When Josh Gross asked Tim if he suffered from the same disease that guys who fight Fedor suffer from which is “they’re never the same,” Big Tim dismissed that notion out of hand.
“No, not at all. I would have been right back at it if they allowed me to. You know if Afflliction had me fight right after I lost to him I would have fought the next show but we were having contract problems and it didn’t happen but I don’t believe any of that. But you could also look at that and say that whenever anybody fights me they kind of problems, too, like Gan McGee, Ricco Rodriguez, Tra Telligman, Brandon Vera, many of those guys have fought me haven’t been the same either.”
“I didn’t perform. I trained my ass off at a great training camp, went injury-free you know I had minor ones but everybody has minor injuries but nothing serious, I just got out there and didn’t perform the best of my ability. I got caught early and he just kept the ball rolling and finished me quickly.”
After intimating that he wants to face Fedor in a re-match, Tim was asked about the fight with Ray Mercer. Remember, this fight was promoted in Birmingham, Alabama in a state that usually relies on Mississippi’s lenient athletic commission to regulate activities. Then, on top of that, the fight was booked as a boxing fight inside of an MMA cage. Tim Lueckenhoff, head of the ABC (Association of Boxing Commissions), put a stop to the fight as a boxing contest and it was switched to an MMA fight at the last minute.
So, naturally, Tim stood up like a boxing fight instead of going for the take down and fell down like a redwood tree when Mercer knocked him out in 10 seconds.
“That was my stupidity. It was the dumbest thing that I could have ever done. As soon as it was switched to Mixed Martial Arts I should have went in there and took him down and ended the fight in 30 seconds but I listened to his mouth run and I thought I could stand with a heavyweight boxer with four ounce gloves. Obviously, it didn’t work out the way I wanted it to but I did fight in September and that went well against a pretty decent up-and-comer (Jason Riley).”
When asked if the Mercer loss compounded on losses to Nogueira and Fedor in terms of emotional distress, Big Tim was introspective about it all.
“No, not really, I mean, the Nogueira one I made a small mistake and I was winning the fight in the first, you know all the way up to where I made that little stupid dumb mistake, so it was just a learning lesson for me on that one. Fedor, I just did not get a chance to get off and perform, so I was like ‘shit you know can I get a re-match’ can I earn my way back up to fight this guy because you know that’s what I kind of felt happened the first time I fought Arlovski, I went out there and I was still timid with the whole breaking my arm and you know he dropped me and jumped on my leg and I just tapped out immediately just because I was like freaked out and then you know when I came back and fought him you saw what happened the second time. So, you know I really truly believe that I could, I still think I can beat Fedor it’s just, I need the opportunity to prove myself again. The whole Mercer thing I was it was a [unintelligible] boxing match and I was like, ‘well, so what, boxing, again that doesn’t hurt my record at all, if I lose I lose to you know a US Gold Medalist and a very seasoned veteran and then all of a sudden it was changed to MMA and he was running his mouth and he talked me right into fighting the he way wanted to fight me.”
If Tim Sylvia is able to beat Mariusz Pudzianowski on Friday night, he has an idea of how he would like the rest of 2010 to be laid out on paper to help get back into the mid-major Strikeforce or major UFC promotion.
“I’d like it go you know win a few more fights and either go to Strikeforce or UFC. There’s guys in Strikeforce that I want to fight and there’s guys in the UFC that I want to fight. Obviously I want a re-match with Nogueira and Frank Mir and then I’d like to see what happened if I fought one of the top three or four being Dos Santos, Velasquez, Carwin, Brock you know one of those guys and you know with Alistair getting back into the States finally you know I might get a chance to fight him or put some wins together and fight Fedor again.”
Topics: Media, MMA, Zach Arnold | 5 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
Din Thomas stands up for Shine fights promoter in whole cancellation mess
By Zach Arnold | May 19, 2010
Din Thomas, who was scheduled to fight boxer Ricardo Mayorga in an MMA bout in Fayetteville, North Carolina last Saturday night, ended up getting the raw end of the deal with his fight being canceled. The state athletic commission said that there wasn’t a doctor in place for the show and also had a dispute about the promoter (Devin Price) having the sufficient funds to pay everyone what they would be owed. Dave Meltzer reported on Sunday night that the commission allegedly gave fighters the option to sign a waiver indemnifying the NC athletic commission if the fighters would allow the promoter (Shine Fights) to pay by check instead of cash. The commission reportedly wanted nothing to do with checks being used to pay fighters because of the track record of promoters in the fight game who gave fighters checks that bounce.
Josh Gross invited Din Thomas on his radio show this week and was asked to give his thoughts on what happened. Surprisingly, Thomas was not angry at the event promoter for what happened.
“Man, I tell you the truth, man, you know, a lot of people are giving the promotion and Shine a hard time but I really legitimately you know stand behind these guys. I really don’t think it was their fault and I really think they did everything they could to try to keep this card together. You know, I just think that things got out of their hands and they didn’t have the manpower or the resources to keep it together, but I mean I’ve watched these guys for months you know try to make this fight go down and then at the last you know the last possible hour, up until like an hour before the show started, they were still trying and trying and trying and then when the commission said something’s not going to happen, man there’s nothing you can do about it.”
In regards to whether there was enough funds to pay the fighters, Thomas said that all he heard was speculation and nothing concrete.
“I’m not 100% sure, I mean that’s what kind of the speculation was around the hotel and at the venue was that they didn’t have the funds there. You know I can’t say that’s what it was for sure but that’s kind of what the speculation was. But also there were saying that Devin Price was the one you know the President of the company was the one who had the funds and if he was the one who had the funds he was in court trying to keep the fight alive so I mean if he was the one with the money you know he was in court, so I mean it was impossible for you know for the funds to be there, Devin was in court.”
When asked if it was worse getting no pay day or not being able to fight Mayorga, Din almost sounded melancholy about not getting able to beat up the boxer.
“I think really, I mean kind of both. I mean I think what everybody was kind of looking forward to was seeing you know Mayorga get beat up, so I mean I think in that perspective I think everybody was robbed of that. You know as far as you know not getting a pay day, I mean that sucks but it wasn’t like… I mean, yeah, I lost money, I mean you lose money in the fact right because if you take time to train and you know you sacrifice so much to train and then you expect to get paid and it doesn’t happen, you know, that kind of sucks. However, you know, I did talk to them, well I didn’t talk to them personally but my management did talk to them and they did say they were going to be, you know I didn’t really get to talk to my management too much on the details on it but they just kind of gave me the thumbs up that everything was OK and that they were going to square up with me, so hopefully by tomorrow I’ll be squared away and I’ll get paid so I mean, so then if we do this interview again I’ll be telling you the worst part was that you guys didn’t get to see Mayorga get beat up.”
Topics: Media, MMA, Zach Arnold | 4 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
Is it really a burden to have an undefeated record in MMA?
By Zach Arnold | May 19, 2010
This question arises from a discussion that Josh Gross had on his radio show this week in which he was talking about the bad loss that Brett Rogers is coming off to Alistair Overeem. Rogers lost to Fedor last October and now has lost to Overeem and the question is whether or not Brett Rogers can make a strong comeback in Mixed Martial Arts.
When you read this passage from Josh’s radio show this week, you’ll notice something that you hear a lot in American sports and I’ll address it after you read the quote.
“For Rogers, difficult position now. This is his second loss in a row, he’s now 10-2. I think you know usually in MMA a guy gets his first loss, like a Lyoto Machida. Lyoto Machida apparently feels you know what’s the way that his camp described it to me, he felt like he was unburdened, that all of a sudden he had this pressure lifted from his shoulders of carrying this undefeated record. You can think of it that way and I guess for some guys it’s worked, but for someone like Rogers who is not terribly technical, who makes a lot of mistakes but got away with it because of his power and his size, all of a sudden he doesn’t have that sense of invincibility that he had before the Fedor fight, now especially after getting just manhandled by Alistair Overeem, you got to wonder where his head’s at and what the rest of his career is going to look like. I think he still has it in him to improve, but he’s got to get with a camp that day-in and day-out he’s sparring with people as good if not better than him, he has to get with a camp that can make him a better wrestler, he has to get a camp that can refine his striking and you know not rely so much on the power but find a way to make him more efficient. I think Rogers still has a future in MMA but I’m not sure to what end based on the last two fights that we’ve seen.”
The argument that being undefeated in MMA is a bad thing is the type of argument that you hear every year in NCAA (College) Basketball when you have a team of 18-21 year olds who go 25-0 or are on a big winning streak as they are heading into the March Madness tournament and then there may be a let up loss towards the end of the regular season and you hear coaches publicly say that the loss is good for them, that it will take off some of the pressure and it will help their team relax.
If you’re strong enough to win 10 or more games (or in this case, fights) in a row in Mixed Martial Arts, as long as the competition that you continue to fight is progressively getting better each fight out, why is losing a fight a good thing? The optimist would say that when you lose a fight, you can learn from your mistakes and become a better fighter after overcoming adversity. The pessimist says, look, you had the talent to win so many fights in a row, why is a loss supposed to relieve any pressure off your shoulders? If you’re good enough to win that many fights, why would you feel less pressure as a fighter coming off a loss? As we’ve seen in the modern MMA landscape, if you lose a few fights in a row all of a sudden the pressure mounts.
Put me in the camp that says that losing a fight occasionally is not a bad thing. I’m not saying that everyone should do it, but I am saying that given just how much parity there truly is in Mixed Martial Arts, there’s no shame in losing to other top talent. This isn’t boxing, thankfully. By the same token, a ‘great’ baseball team wins 100 games a year and loses… 60-62. Winning 8 and losing 5 per 13 games on average doesn’t sound impressive on paper but in baseball that’s a wonderful year. In basketball, if you win 50 games a year and up losing 30-32 games, a win 5 and loss 3 per 8 games on average clip is pretty strong too. I understand that there is a heavy volume of games in those sports compared to fighting, but are you really more valuable if you are 20-0 versus someone who is 16-4 but after each loss has improved their skill set and polished their game?
Topics: Media, MMA, StrikeForce, UFC, Zach Arnold | 3 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
Joe Rogan talks about judo vs. wrestling, how UFC has become a wrestler’s game, and how that will impact the Chael Sonnen/Anderson Silva fight
By Zach Arnold | May 19, 2010
Any time you get an hour-plus long radio interview with Joe Rogan, you listen to it because he’s bound to say a few things that will get a rise or a reaction out of you. He did just that on his Monday interview on Tapout radio.
The radio show hosts asked him a question about judo in MMA and if we’ll see more judokas take over as champions in the sport.
“Well, I certainly think that the top judokas can translate very easily to MMA, I mean not very easily but I think it’s an excellent form of martial art to transfer to MMA with. You know much like Greco is and you know much like wrestling is like any strong grappling background, you know (Pawel) Nastula in PRIDE he did really well and of course (Hidehiko) Yoshida had a great run in PRIDE you know two guys who are outstanding judo players. The ability to manipulate guy’s bodies and throw them around and control them which is what Judo is all about is such an important skill for MMA.
“I personally think that the very best skill for MMA is wrestling, I think that’s the number one base to come from because those guys just flat out dictate where the fight takes place. You know, a great wrestler, you get a guy in there like a (Josh) Koscheck or like GSP you know they can just dictate what [expletive] happens. If they decide to take you to the ground, you’re going to the ground. You’re going to have to learn how to fight off your back and it’s not your strong suit. Even if you train for six hard weeks working guys off your back, the bottom is line for 10 years you’ve been training in stand-up and you’ve been training in your top game and you really haven’t put that much time into working off your back and you know six months is not going to fix you for GSP. He’s going to pass your [expletive], he’s going to mount you, he’s going to beat you up, he’s going to take you down the next round and do it it all over again, so I think it’s the important skill, in my opinion.”
This answer transitioned into a question about the fact that UFC is seeing a dominant breed of “wrestle-boxers,” especially in the Lightweight division, and the problems it is posing for fighters who don’t have a strong wrestling background. Rogan mentioned Thiago Alves, someone who was being touted for his ability to stop takedowns and then… UFC 100 happened and Georges St. Pierre destroyed that image for good.
“You look at Thiago Alves, talk about Alves’ outstanding takedown defense, it’s really good but he could not stop GSP from taking him down. A guy who’s a better wrestler is going to take down a guy who’s not as good of a wrestler, it’s just the facts, it’s just the way it is so what these guys have to do is you have two options: one, you got to get really good at wrestling yourself which is what Georges did, you know when Georges first started fighting… had good submission skills but then somewhere along the line in his career he became the most successful wrestler in Mixed Martial Arts, you know I mean it’s really just the hard work that he put up there in Canada working with all those Russian guys up there, there’s some really high-level Russian wrestlers that he was working with and I talked to Randy Couture about it and he said yeah, those guys that Georges is training with he goes ‘when I found out who those guys were I knew that’s why he was getting better, those guys are animals.’ So I mean he just put in all that time and I think it’s just a huge part of MMA. If you don’t have a kill guard, if you’re not some (Shin’ya) Aoki character and now you look at Aoki versus Gilbert Melendez, he wasn’t able to do anything either, you know, the ability to be the guy who dictates where the fight takes place is so huge. And then these wrestlers become really good strikers like these Ryan Bader type characters who are you know real strong wrestlers but now all of a sudden they’re blasting dudes on their feet and it’s up to them whether or not you stand up. They’re going to be the ones deciding because you’re not going to take them down and if you do take them down he’s going to bounce right back up to his feet and if he wants to take you down, he’s going to take you down, so it’s such a huge, huge advantage.”
Another example of someone who paid the price for not having a good wrestling game was Demian Maia at UFC 112 in Abu Dhabi when Anderson Silva toyed with him for the first few rounds of their fight.
“That’s what happens when your wrestling’s not so good, you get the [expletive] beat out of you… He was getting lit up and that’s the problem with not having good takedowns, not being a good wrestler. Demian Maia is in an awkward situation because he’s much more successful once the fight becomes a grappling match but his best aspect is not being able to take guys down. His best aspect is being able to you know his ability to impose himself once the fight is already on the ground, so he’s in this terrible limbo where he can’t get a hold of Anderson and standing up with him is just suicidal so he was just getting lit up and he can’t grab the guy, you know that’s what happen when you have mediocre wrestling.”
Which, appropriately, leads us to the upcoming Anderson Silva title defense against Chael Sonnen, who is all about a dominant wrestling game and taking guys down and beating on them. Sonnen was able to beat Yushin Okami, a fighter who a lot of Middleweights had trouble facing because Okami “felt too strong” in the cage — and Sonnen outpointed him. Will Sonnen’s wrestling ability actually translate into legitimate offense against someone as crafty as Anderson?
“Well, it’s certainly an interesting match-up. I don’t know if it’s the key to beating him. It’s certainly in Chael’s opinion the key to making him fight and I love Chael Sonnen, I’m a huge fan of his. I’m a huge fan of Anderson’s as well, I think Anderson is the best pound-for-pound guy in the world but I’m a huge fan of the way Chael carries himself, that dude cracks me up. He’s [expletive] hilarious. His interviews are gold, man. He’s really funny, he’s super-smart and he’s super-honest about [expletive] like getting hurt and you know what it’s like you know when he gets tagged you know, when he thought he was in trouble that it doesn’t matter he’s just never quit like his attitude like the way he manhandled Nate Marquardt, his skill level, I mean the dude he’s finally fighting up to his true potential and the Yushin Okami fight and the Nate Marquardt fight, he really fought up to his true potential and if he can get a hold of Anderson and get him to the ground, it could make it very interesting and that’s where it’s going to be difficult, man, it’s going to be difficult. It’s going to be very difficult. Anderson is going to be coming into this fight knowing what happened in his last fight and a lot of people are sort of rooting against him and he has to kind of reestablish himself as the baddest motherf***** in the world and he’s going to know that so he’s going to come into this fight in tremendous shape, very focused. I think it’s also very possible that he might have taken the Demian Maia fight lightly. I think he felt like Demian had no chance of taking him to the ground and that stand-up wise they were so outmatched. In the case of Sonnen, Sonnen’s going to be able to get a hold of him, a [expletive] power double and if he gets a hold of dudes, he drives through until he takes you down, man, his takedowns are outstanding and you know guys have taken Anderson before. (Dan) Henderson took Anderson down, Travis Lutter took Anderson down although Travis Lutter did it 11 weeks after Anderson had surgery on his knees, but you know the point remains he took them down and if Chael Sonnen takes him down, it’s going to be hard for him to get up. He’s going to take some elbows, he’s going to take some shots, we’re going to see some [expletive] happen to him. If Chael Sonnen gets him on his back we’re going to see some [expletive] happen to him that we haven’t seen before and that’s what’s exciting about that fight.”
We’ll see a lot of “wrestle-boxers” in action in August with Sonnen vs. Anderson and the two big fights on the Boston card with BJ Penn vs. Frankie Edgar in a re-match and Kenny Florian vs. Gray Maynard.
Topics: Media, MMA, UFC, Zach Arnold | 27 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
Meet the woman who will end up fighting Cris Cyborg in Strikeforce on June 26th
By Zach Arnold | May 19, 2010
Jan Finney, who has the unenviable task of facing Cris Cyborg on June 26th in San Jose for Strikeforce, did an interview with Fightergirls (their web site is here) and talked about how she got the fight booking and what her upcoming preparation is.
Erin Toughill was originally scheduled to take on Cyborg, but she told Strikeforce that she needed some time off and was granted it. Finney, who lost to Toughill a little over a year ago, will be Cyborg’s opponent.
On the Sportsgeek radio show, Finney explained what happened in her fight against Toughill.
It was taken on last-minute notice, I didn’t have any training camp, it was like two weeks, maybe two-and-a-half weeks to get ready and you know I had been training but not like fight-training, a different attitude there but definitely I learned a lot. I mean, she’s a hard-hitter, she’s good all-around and you know just go right at her and you know it wasn’t exactly the outcome I wanted but I did learn from that loss and I’m going to take it from there.”
As for how the fight booking with Cyborg came about, Jan indicated that there didn’t seem to be too many takers.
“I have an amazing manager, I don’t know? He was on them and asking like ‘who’s going to fight Cyborg?’ and I don’t know if they really had that many people in line or what but he was on them and on them and I guess perseverance prevailed and I got this awesome opportunity, so that’s just kind of how it happened. Actually I was training like I was going to fight for Shayna (Baszler) and then this happened, so you, just switched gears and here were are.”
The fight will take place at 145 pounds and Finney normally fights at 135 pounds, but she doesn’t see it as a big problem.
“I think actually it might, it might actually really work to my advantage because I’m not really going to have to worry about cutting weight. Like right now I’m sitting about seven pounds out, so it’s the least of my worries. All I have to really do is focus on training, you know, instead of worrying ‘oh my gosh, I got to make weight and you know can I go five rounds you know cutting 15 pounds’ where I’m probably to have to cut maybe 5 pounds, so I look at it as a good thing, you know.”
She tried her best to make the case on the radio show that the upcoming fight against Cyborg will not be a squash match.
“I’m going for the title right now so I mean usually when people fight the best it brings out the best in you so it’s going to be a good one.”
“I’ve been fighting like pretty much almost every two months since October so I’m ready, I mean, each time I feel like I’m getting a little more momentum. I know she’s tough… but I’m a competitor, I’m going to give her my best.”
“Oh, it’s so much easier to be the underdog than to be the person on top. … It’s easy to make your way up the ranks than to stay up there. It’s hard to keep that level of motivation and everything all the time.”
Jan is currently looking for sponsors. You can contact her on MySpace and she will forward any requests to her manager.
UFC craziness
Rogers Sportnet has a depressing report about the politics of Vancouver and how UFC 115 could essentially be a one-and-done situation for major MMA in the city due to insurance and red-tape from regulatory matters.
Count me out as someone who is interested in the tit-for-tat between Rampage Jackson and Rashad Evans on the UFC conference call yesterday, but you can read this Sherdog article if you are interested on the cliff notes. I’m interested in the fight itself, I’m interested in the strategy and training heading into the fight, but I’m completely bored and not exactly nonplussed by the childish taunting between the two. Naturally, the broadsheet media is running hard with quotes from the conference call. OK, I guess.
Other news & notes
After not booking him for WEC’s first PPV on April 24th at Arco Arena in Sacramento, Zuffa has cut ties with ring announcer Joe Martinez.
Stephan Quadros has a quick preview of this Friday’s Showtime event with Matt Lindland vs. Kevin Casey.
The Vallejo Times-Herald has an article on Mark Munoz entering the California Wrestling Hall of Fame.
UFC Lightweight champion Frankie Edgar will host a wrestling seminar and autograph session at a fundraiser at Toms River High School East on Saturday.
Bas Rutten has some thoughts on Alistair Overeem.
Topics: Media, MMA, StrikeForce, UFC, WEC, Zach Arnold | 3 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
Matt Lindland: The reason there’s no union in MMA is because fighters are whores and cowards
By Zach Arnold | May 18, 2010
I want to point you towards a great interview that Matt Lindland did with Eddie Goldman on his radio show yesterday. I say it’s great because it is in-depth on a lot of issues about Mixed Martial Arts. Everything from the failures of MMA promotions like the IFL to the current scene with Strikeforce and UFC is covered during the interview. If you are a newer MMA fan, I would highly recommend that you listen to the interview. It’s about as strong of a recommendation as I could possibly give for it.
Matt Lindland just turned 40 years old and will be fighting Spencer Pratt’s buddy, Kevin Casey, this Friday night in Portland at the Rose Garden under the Strikeforce: Challengers banner. Here is how Matt summed up his upcoming fight on Showtime this Friday night:
“You know, I match up really well against anybody that’s a ground guy. I did have one match-up against Jacare where he got the top position and snuck a choke in but he’s one of the top jiu-jitsu players in the world. You know, I’m feeling good about this fight. Kevin’s a big, strong athletic guy. I got a feeling about the middle to the end of the first round he’s going to be tired already just trying to use you know muscle to take me to the ground so he can work his jiu-jitsu game and I’m going to out-pummel him and move my feet, move his head, and just kind of make him have to wrestle. I’ve watched the film on him, he doesn’t have the wrestling techniques but he does get guys to the ground because he’s a big, strong guy and he’ll just horse them there.”
Lindland and other Team Quest fighters are local attractions in Portland and should do well in terms of business. Matt, however, indicates that he doesn’t know what kind of money Strikeforce has put into advertising the show:
“I don’t know what kind of money Strikeforce has put into the marketing. I want as many people as I can know you know and I’m still a trainer and getting ready for my fight but unless you’re spending some money in the radio and TV and I haven’t seen those numbers, I don’t know what kind of numbers they’re spending. I would have liked to have seen those numbers and seen the station buys, I think I could have helped them out. I definitely have been able to help them with the PR locally but without knowing what kind of buys they’re doing I can’t push it too hard.”
At age 40, Matt Lindland has just about seen it all in the business — from the dark days to the current period it is at now, which is much more mainstream than he could have imagined. Despite turning 40, Lindland thinks that he has a lot ahead in his future and that he is learning new techniques all the time.
“4-0, yeah, that’s the birthday. I don’t know, when you’re 30, you think man, 40, I’m going to be old and whatever and you hit that number and you’re still doing the same stuff as you were doing and you’re smarter and you know more things about a decade later of being this sport, you know, I feel like I’m just starting to learn it. It’s hard to say. I never stop learning, I constantly continue to improve in this sport but there’s definitely going to be younger guys that are going to be, that their youth and athleticism is going to be able surpass you know my knowledge at some point and I don’t know when that date is going to come, but I’ll let you know.”
Part of his growth is adding new submissions to his skill set.
“Well, absolutely, I mean just being a wrestler you know you can say yeah I’m proud of my roots and my background and my sport and still, you know, add the submission hooks and the catches to that because that’s really what it is, it’s wrestling. They can call it Brazilian jiu-jitsu or whatever they want, it’s still going back to wrestling. You take it and put on a Gi and I guess you can really call it Jiu-jitsu, but as soon as the gi comes off and those techniques are essentially wrestling holds.”
“It’s all different styles of wrestling, in my opinion, and it always has been. That’s kind of always been has my philosophy that it’s all different styles of wrestling and you know people ask you ‘do you do jiu-jitsu training?” and my answer always has been ‘No, I’ve worked with jiu-jitsu guys before’ you know but I never really done jiu-jitsu training, you know, that was up until about a year ago I put on a gi probably five or six times and got into gi classes at the gym just to observe and be a part of those classes and see what’s going on, but not really to study the sport of jiu-jitsu, just to observe some of my coaches, the way they’re coaching in the classes and you know get involved in the classes down at the gym but not necessarily because I think the gi is going to help in what I’m doing.”
Lindland is coming off of a loss to Ronaldo “Jacare” Souza and says that he made one big mistake that cost him dearly.
“Oh, I knew what I could have done differently that night. I should have got up off the bottom a lot of quicker instead of trying to work a bottom game with one of the top guys in the world, you know. He was able to secure the top position for a moment and you know I was confident enough to try to set up a triangle and then I switched over to a shoulder-lock and you know but I should have just have been fighting for that top position and controlled a positional fight because you know as I suspected if I would have gotten him in the later rounds he would have got tired, I watched him the other night he and Villasenor. You know, Jacare is a super-talented, super-athletic guy but I did see as he went into the later rounds he did tired.”
“Jacare was super explosive. Maybe nobody would have been able to stop that explosiveness you know in the first round, but like you said it was a noticeable slowdown in the second and third rounds.”
Lindland is current fighting for Strikeforce and not UFC. However, he claims he sent feelers to UFC and the promotion wasn’t interested in booking him.
“You know the time I signed the deal with Strikeforce I reached out to UFC and was trying to find out if there’s any interest at the time and coming off a loss to Vitor I don’t think they were interested in signing me at the time.”
“I don’t know (who made the call), I can’t answer for anybody else. I don’t know who is making those decisions at the time, the matchmakers or the owners, I couldn’t tell you, I don’t know those answers.”
“Well, the reason was ‘we don’t sign guys coming off of losses’ and I was coming off a loss to Vitor and so you know I went to Strikeforce.”
Since leaving UFC, Lindland has had to take some wacky fights including one against Fedor that aired on Bodog PPV. Matt says he will fight at any weight class if it means a good pay day.
“I’ll take a fight at any weight class, I don’t know if it was politics or just that’s where I was offered fights at. You know it’s called prize fighting and the biggest prize I guess is what I’m fighting so if that’s where I’m offered a fight at 205 or heavyweight, I’ll take that opportunity.”
Most of those fights have happened in promotions that have completely folded and gone under. Now that Lindland is fighting for a mid-major promotion like Strikeforce, he sees the positives and negatives that the company is going through.
“You know, I think they’re treating the athletes good, you know I don’t think they’ve got as much organized as far as getting their venues and the marketing done, I don’t know I think they’re going through some growing pains because they went from you know a really good regional show in San Jose to the show that’s doing… I mean the show last weekend in Missouri and now this week in Portland, I think they have (to get) that machine set up where they can send a second crew ahead of time to be working one market, I think they got some growing pains to get worked out. Otherwise, they got a network deal with CBS, they got a deal with Showtime, you know I think there’s a lot of great potential here for Strikeforce and you know I’m willing to do whatever I can to help promote the events and their organization.”
A major reason he is not back in UFC is because of his documentary, Fighting Politics: The Story of Matt Lindland. In his movie and in media interviews, Lindland takes no prisoners on many issues currently impacting the business. For starters, he has some words about why judging in MMA is so bad right now.
“As long as I’ve been in this sport I’ve never seen a clear-cut criteria. It’s like you know that’s what like am I going to working towards or I can coach my other athletes strategically this is what we’re going to do to win these rounds, I mean they want to keep it an enigma on what they’re basing their judging on so they can make these calls.”
One thing that really gets under Matt’s skin is what he deems to be awful announcing on MMA telecasts.
“It doesn’t matter what these announcers and these commentators say, they have the mike so whatever they say it becomes the truth and then we have to deal with that. So, I mean, there’s really nothing you can do to change it. Whatever Joe Rogan says is right. I mean I’ve had people ask me questions based on what the commentators say, you know, and it’s like and they believe it just because it comes out of their mouth it becomes truth, it becomes fact because it’s on television. It’s a powerful medium.”
Hoping to take advantage of that powerful medium, Matt Lindland is encouraging everyone to see his documentary and learn about a business that he feels is more like the Wild West than a profession that treats fighters with decency and respect.
“You should see it because it’s a very objective film. It’s just really covers the history of the sport and some of the stuff that goes on that the fans don’t really understand, they don’t get to see first-hand that this is an entertainment business, first and foremost. You know people get confused and think that this is a sporting event. There is a sport involved but first and foremost it’s an entertainment business and that’s what at the core of this industry.”
“At least in basketball or baseball or football if you don’t like [the politics], you go to another team. If you have a players union and in this sport if you don’t like what’s going on, what’s the other team? You know, essentially you’re relegated to what is considered by the fans as the minor leagues just because you didn’t get along with the management at the time of the one team. So, it’s a completely different industry and it’s not regulated well, you can’t just go to another team, so it’s a lot different you know different stuff about just the business side of the sport.”
When asked by Eddie Goldman what could be done to change the situation, Lindland responded, “Boy, I don’t know. I don’t have those answers.” Eddie brought up Rob Maysey’s MMAFA (Mixed Martial Arts Fighters Association) project, Lindland had not heard of it but didn’t think that it would work out.
“Unless you can get the top athletes and you’re not going to do that. I mean the fighters, they’re all whores, they just fight for the biggest purse and it’s going to be tough unless you could somehow get all the fighters to agree to something like that and you know there’s always somebody going to come up underneath who’s not willing to do it. Like I said, it doesn’t matter who the best guys are, it only matters what the announcers are telling you who the best guys are and the fans are going to believe it.”
“There’s enough support (for a union) but these guys, outside of the cage or outside of the ropes, these guys are cowards, you know they would not dare stand up to the powers-that-be.”
“You only have a finite amount (of years) that you can compete and you want to make as much money as you can in that time and you don’t want to mess around with the politics of the sport.”
If you get a chance, go listen to the interview with Eddie Goldman and Matt Lindland. It is well-worth your time.
Topics: Media, MMA, StrikeForce, UFC, Zach Arnold | 19 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
Why wasn’t St. Louis native Tyron Woodley booked on Strikeforce’s show last weekend?
By Zach Arnold | May 18, 2010
I was watching this video interview that Sherdog did with Tyron Woodley last Saturday in St. Louis. That same night, Strikeforce ran their second ever event in St. Louis at the big 19,000 Scottrade Center, which used to be known as the Savvis Center or the Kiel Center. You don’t run that building because you are booking a modest show — you run that building because you want to do some serious numbers. The two times Strikeforce has ran that building, they’ve drawn around 8,000 both times. They went with a local draw in Robbie Lawler on the top of the card on the first event and for the second event they had Jesse Finney book the undercard. (This has become quite the topic de jour today on our site.)
One person who is a St. Louis native who could have helped out with business on the show was Tyron Woodley. He’s a guy who has been touted by Scott Coker as one of their big prospects and a guy who could make some noise in the Welterweight division. So, given that situation, you would have thought that the perfect scenario would be to give Tyron Woodley a platform for exposure on a main card slot for the St. Louis show that took place over the weekend and aired on Showtime.
However, you would be wrong. Woodley didn’t get booked for the St. Louis show and instead, he now finds himself taking a Challengers show booking in Portland where he will face Team Quest fighter Nathan Coy. In other words, Woodley had a chance to come off as a big star on Showtime on the St. Louis card. Instead, he got booked a week later for a Challengers show at the Rose Garden in Portland where he will face a fighter who will get a hometown pop.
Continue reading this article here…
Topics: Media, MMA, StrikeForce, Zach Arnold | 8 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
Tim Sylvia: I ruined Andrei Arlovski’s career. Hey, I want back in the UFC.
By Zach Arnold | May 18, 2010
He had a very interesting interview on Tapout Radio on Monday and I figured I’d pass along some quotes from the interview. At times he sounded like his confident self but other times he sounded very much like someone who regretted leaving UFC and now wants back in the big show.
Thoughts on his upcoming fight against Mariusz Pudzianowski this weekend
On training for the fight
“We brought in guys that weigh 325, 310, big strong wrestlers you know trying to grab me, push me in the cage, take me down, muscle me around and stuff like that and then I [unintelligible] my sparring sessions with some pro boxers and guys who are good at wrestling and good at stand-up, just trying to prepare for everything and now we got some guys who weigh 350 and stuff just lay on me and see if you know… submit them and get back up immediately, too. So, we feel real confident about this.”
Impressions on watching Mariusz’s MMA fights
“Not at all (impressed). No, I’m not impressed at all. We actually thought he would be better than he was to take this fight you know, but I don’t think so and I know he’s not going to get any better in two weeks after his last fight.”
How do you see the fight with Mariusz Pudzianowski going?
“I think that once I hit him one time with a left hook or a straight right, he’s probably going to fade real quick. I don’t think he’s been hit, you know, I don’t think anybody in Poland has punched him like I’m going to punch him.”
How is your recovery from a recent hand injury?
“It healed up great, they put a plate on my carpal and it’s real good. I probably knocked out probably six or seven guys with it since I’ve been back you know with 16 ounce gloves and headgear so it’s solid again and people are paying for it.”
“The right arm has four titanium plates in it.”
Where are you training right now?
“My home is still MFS (Miletich Fighting Systems). I’m still living in Bettendorf. This is where I train full time but this last time I’ve been in Indiana for three weeks at Team Wolfpack…” Tim stated that he will hold his training camps in Indiana from here on out.
Life outside of the major leagues in MMA
You were supposed to have a fight with Wes Sims in Eastern Canada.
“It is no longer happening. We asked for a retainer and the guy all of a sudden, ‘ I guess we’re not going to do this fight.’ So that’s the problem, I’ve had like five fights canceled so Monte finally smartened up and said, “Anybody that wants me to fight, get a $10,000 retainer” and if it doesn’t happen, we walk away with $10,000.”
Do you want back in UFC or Strikeforce?
“Oh yeah, absolutely, yeah, no one’s the UFC and no one’s really going to be and anybody who tries to be goes out of business. So, let’s just come to the fact that nobody’s going to be as good as UFC and stop trying to pretend that you’re going to be. No one’s going to be as good as NFL football, you know, that’s just the way it is. You get your NFL and you have everything else. You get the UFC and you get everything else. That doesn’t mean that there’s not quality fighters out there and there’s not good fights going on and good shows but let’s just not try to be the UFC because no one can be.”
“Yeah, I would definitely (like to) get back in the UFC or Strikefofce. We have talked with Strikeforce and you know right now we don’t know what’s going to happen but we definitely want to fight for one of them. There’s guys that I want to fight in both shows so I would imagine what would work better for me would probably Strikeforce because they’d be a little more lenient with me instead of locking you down and there’s a lot of things you can’t do when you fight for the UFC where Strikeforce I could probably fight a little more often. UFC’s just got so many guys now like all the top guys that seem to be only fighting twice a year and you know I don’t want to do that.”
The current heavyweight landscape in MMA including Andrei Arlovski’s struggles
“I want to fight Overeem, I want to fight Fedor again, you know, Werdum’s a good fight, Brett Rogers and I would have a good fight. I think Arlovski would just be number three again, me probably knocking him out again. I think he’s kind, I don’t know, I think I ruined the poor guy to be honest with you. Once I knocked him out he hasn’t been the same.”
Did you take away Arlovski’s heart?
“[Arlovski’s heart] comes in the form of a UFC Heavyweight title. I took that from him and ever since then he hasn’t been the same. Some guys can handle it and some guys can’t.”
Are you happy to see how the UFC Heavyweight division has progressed with big stars like Brock Lesnar and Shane Carwin?
“Yeah, I think it’s great, it’s great for the heavyweight division, it’s great for the sport that you got quality heavyweights there performing really well and people are starting to see the heavyweight fights against versus the 205 pound divsion and the 170 division.”
What do you think about fight fans who say Fedor needs to be in the UFC in order to prove himself?
“He’s been tested. He’s been tested. He’s fought Cro Cop. When Cro Cop was Cro Cop, the best in the world, you know, the guy killing everybody. When Nogueira at the top of his game. I was at the top of my game, you know, I just didn’t perform well. He’s fought Arlovski. You know Arlovski was coming off of what, four or five wins. You know, he’s been tested, he’s the real deal. Granted you know Brock and Carwin would be a different test for him because they’re big, strong wrestlers… The Colemans and the Randlemans that fought him weren’t in their prime. They’re still bad asses but those guys weren’t in their prime. But also Fedor being in a cage against a big strong wrestler like Brock and Carwin and it definitely would be different for him.”
Where does Brett Rogers go from here after his bad showing against Alistair Overeem?
“I like, he’s a good man, I don’t want to talk shit about that guy, he’s a good guy, he’s a blue collar man, he used to change tires, he’s done well for himself. He’s just, the only thing that I’ve seen from Brett is that he’s been thrown into some deep waters very early in his career. I wouldn’t say that he got lucky against Arlovski but everybody thought he was going to get killed and he didn’t. He knocked him out and then everybody just like, ‘Oh my God, he’s the next big thing.’ You know Brett really is still learning and he’s a ways away from guys like Fedor and Overeem. They just didn’t have anybody else to throw to those guys so poor Brett is the guy that gets thrown against him. They still need to build him. He still you know needs a half-a-dozen good fights and get more experience. He’s had only what, 10 fights? 10, but yeah 10 with the last two was Fedor (the best in the world) and then Overeem three in the world, four in the world, you know.”
Who’s the best pound-for-pound fighter right now in MMA?
“There’s just so many. I think you have to go by their actual weight division. If you’re looking right now, Fedor definitely at heavyweight. Light Heavy, you would have to go with Shogun right now I think. Middleweight, I don’t even know. I don’t even know, I mean, Rich, Wanderlei, Vitor, there’s a lot of guys in that division. I mean Anderson Silva probably, definitely the best at 85 I guess. 70 is obviously St. Pierre. 55 I would probably still say BJ and then 45 Aldo. I don’t think you can just pick one guy being the best, you know, you can’t say St. Pierre is the best fighter out there out of anybody because if you put St. Pierre against Fedor, Fedor’s going to crush him.”
Topics: Media, MMA, StrikeForce, UFC, Zach Arnold | 26 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
A discussion about Strikeforce’s continuity problems and Showtime as a business partner
By Zach Arnold | May 18, 2010
One of the more interesting conversations about Strikeforce and why the promotion is running events the way they are came on a Sherdog radio show right after the St. Louis event on last Saturday night.
I was going to divide this passage up in multiple sections, but realistically everything here runs together for a reason. The main focus points are on a lack of cohesive promotion from card to card and also a lack of being able to fully develop new prospects and make new stars, which is critical for building a promotion — especially in a marketplace dominated by UFC.
Here is the conversation between TJ De Santis and Jordan Breen about Saturday night’s card from St. Louis that aired on Showtime:
TJ DE SANTIS: “People are going to be salivating for a possible Fedor & Overeem match and I think that’s something that we hit on the Roundtable [Friday] that there is a lot of storyline, there is some drama there between you know the perspective camps and whatnot… I just… I mean I hate to get on Showtime and Strikeforce at the top of their show, but I just think they’re really bad at pushing their product, Jordan.”
JORDAN BREEN: “I’m inclined to agree, in full.”
TJ DE SANTIS: “I don’t understand why this promotion doesn’t push I think a lot of their prospects, they refuse to show prelims. … They could have shown the Shaolin Ribeiro and Lyle Beerbohm which I want to see and I think a lot of people want to see to see how and why it was scored the way it was. I mean, the UFC obviously has a much stronger brand, but that brand I think is strong, Jordan, because they promote their fighters within, they make stars out of their fighters, and those stars obviously are the face of the promotion. I think, yeah, the UFC brand alone is always going to outsell Strikeforce, but Strikeforce I mean doesn’t have the names, the poster boys, the stars really that the UFC does because they don’t push them correctly.”
JORDAN BREEN: “I think it’s a combination of that and the fact that is a product now being led by Showtime, whose familiarity is in boxing and one of the things we touched on recently with Strikeforce, not this card but their last effort in Nashville, is the fact that Showtime, the way they do their boxing product, Showtime are always kind of the #2 to HBO but the reason they are able to thrive in the boxing environment is they’ve always been very keen to really catch and scoop up the good fights that slip through the cracks. When HBO wasn’t particularly interested in Castillo/Corrales for whatever, they were there to scoop it up. Same with the Vasquez/Marquez trilogy, same for years during one of the things they’ve always done from the 90s right up until now, even back in the late 80s actually, was scooping up European title fights with world titlists in Europe. They were really, you know, home of the well-skilled but less marketable boxers before they became superstars. Bernard Hopkins before he became unified Middleweight champion of the world in supreme fashion, always fought on Showtime. So they were always very good at scooping up all the pieces and stuff that HBO didn’t want in idiocy or just overlooked and that doesn’t exist with MMA. It’s not independent promoters making really good fights and then you can just rush to the scene and choose to air it. Doesn’t work that way. So, they’re trying to hand-pick and craft a product that they really don’t know a whole lot about and that’s why we end up with Kevin Randleman on cards like this and why we have an inability to develop prospects fruitfully and why we don’t get to see prospects on cards. And why really the only major talking points we’re going to get tonight are: Can Alistair Overeem beat Fedor Emelianenko and how good can you know Jacare or Roger Gracie be? It’s less instructive and there’s less of a narrative coming out of any Strikeforce event than a UFC event partially because of what you mentioned. It’s not just that they don’t sell the product well-enough, it’s that there’s never a sense that things are leading to something larger, that the product is put together in a magnetic, compelling way that builds on its own…”
TJ DE SANTIS: “It’s funny, I mean, we’re in a time of multiple promotions having television deals, we get to see product from a variety of promotions that a few years ago we never got to see before and I think it was on Jordan Breen show where you and I discussed Bellator being better at being Strikeforce than Strikeforce is. Bellator has the right idea about promoting within, showing and showcasing their fighters and really, I mean, if Bellator was in Strikeforce’s shoes, had the television deals they do… well, maybe not, I guess it’s hard to blame Strikeforce that much for I guess what comes across especially on the Showtime product, I mean who is to blame for the downfall? I mean is it really Showtime…”
JORDAN BREEN: “Yes.”
TJ DE SANTIS: “Or is it Strikeforce for not stepping up and going, ‘yeah, I know we’re a partnership here, but we have a decent idea on how to promote fights,’ because I mean if you look at Strikeforce, Jordan, before this whole Showtime thing was going on we talked about Strikeforce as yeah, they’re a good Mom & Pop promotion, they’re regional but they’re really good at making money and promoting shows. I mean, Strikeforce, a few years ago you couldn’t talk about Strikeforce without saying, ‘hey, they’re one of the few promotions outside the UFC, pretty much the only promotion outside of the UFC in North America, that’s making any money.’ They knew how to do something right at one time, now it just seems like they’re having to cave because the suits are saying, ‘this is how we do things here.’ ”
JORDAN BREEN: “Yep. One thing that I sort of tried to express more clearly and explicitly as I’ve gone on is a lot of people get mad that I’m critical of Strikeforce and I’ve realized that I think some of my critique is a bit mislaid in that I do attribute a great amount of the failings and shortcomings to Showtime. They decide who fights who, they decide who gets on television and who doesn’t. They’re in charge of these things at this point in time and Scott Coker and his boys, obviously still you know they aren’t powerless but they’re being taken for a ride by guys like Ken Hershman and those at Showtime who are making decisions and we can see they just aren’t people who know Mixed Martial Arts that well and certainly aren’t people who have a keen sense of what belongs on television, what it takes to develop prospects from the ground up in Mixed Martial Arts and get people interested and excited about a product on all levels the way UFC is able to do.”
TJ DE SANTIS: “You know you look at the UFC and anyone that has tried to take on the UFC head-to-head in competition sort of acts like they are the UFC and they don’t have the budget or the means to be the UFC. Now Strikeforce is obviously not trying to be the UFC, but they’re so polar opposite it’s to a detriment.”
JORDAN BREEN: “Yeah, well I don’t know that it’s so polar opposite that it’s a detriment, it’s just I think it’s a confusing product. Essentially, they’re doing a better version of what they were doing two years, they’re doing it now with bigger names, consistently bigger fights, but the problem is people just expect more from them now. They’re supposed to be a UFC competitor. Before they were just the best feeder show, the best regional show, now they’re expected to be something entirely different and that’s clearly not good enough.”
TJ DE SANTIS: “I don’t just understand why you don’t show, I mean, OK, this preliminary card tonight was weak. It definitely was weak. It was, you know packed with…”
JORDAN BREEN: “Well that’s an issue in and of itself. It’s weak because they gave the book to Jesse Finney, a local fighter and essentially said, book it for us.”
TJ DE SANTIS: “Yeah, but you have the fight between Shaolin and Lyle Beerbohm who are you know national, international fighters that can be showcased. You have a half an hour, the fight is 15 minutes, why not throw it on? Why do we have to stick to, all right this is going to be our first fight, second fight, third fight, fourth fight, WRAP, I don’t care if it’s at 10:45, WRAP. I don’t get it.”
Since this conversation took place, Jordan Breen watched video of the Shaolin/Beerbohm fight (video here) and made this observation:
For those asking, I had it 30-28 Shaolin. Two judges giving Beerbohm all three rounds is irresponsible, reprehensible, and downright [expletive].
The only defense I could see in the promotion not airing the Shaolin/Beerbohm fight is that Lyle had a lot of heat on him after he wrote that post on The Underground Forum in which he asked for a lawyer to help him get out of his Strikeforce deal. I thought it was very curious that Scott Coker said after the St. Louis show that he wanted the Ribeiro/Beerbohm winner to face Josh Thomson on 6/26 in San Jose. Talk about a quick turnaround. Beerbohm, after the fight, needed to get his arm examined but said in a Strikeforce media interview that he wanted to fight Gilbert Melendez. It’s one of those situations where a promoter essentially gets called out by a frustrated fighter on an internet forum, then books him right away in a dark match with no TV exposure, and then says, OK, now you won your fight, go fight a few weeks later. And if you’re hurt? Then the other guy you fought (Shaolin) gets your slot on television and if you’re not on television, that would be unfortunate… sorry.
Yes, Beerbohm is a definite prospect and Strikeforce lacks depth in all divisions, but this is a fighter who has shown he wouldn’t mind leaving the promotion so why would someone be inclined to give him a hard push or more exposure than he (rightfully or wrongfully) deserves? Hardball. Plus, you have to ask yourself this if you’re Scott Coker — is Lyle Beerbohm the kind of fighter who, down the road, can make the promotion a lot of money? The other question is — are we going to have another Jake Shields situation on our hands here with him and if so, how do we proceed from there?
As for the Strikeforce matchmaking, ever since Javier Mendez (American Kickboxing Academy) left the booker slot… (Try to forget the Bobby Southworth fight bookings. Nobody’s perfect.)
Replying to the point about Strikeforce a lack of continuity, it’s a situation where the promotion doesn’t have a television partner that can give them weekly or bi-weekly television coverage to run hour-long shows like Spike TV has been doing for UFC. Spike TV has given the UFC plenty of real estate to build new stars and create compelling storylines. Strikeforce simply doesn’t have and unless they can figure out a battle plan to match that kind of television real estate coverage, it’s going to be difficult for them to maintain or build any long-term momentum.
Topics: Media, MMA, StrikeForce, Zach Arnold | 62 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
Alistair Overeem draws the heat for PEDs, but a lot of fighters are watching their backs
By Zach Arnold | May 17, 2010
There’s two passages from Sunday night’s Observer radio show that I wanted to highlight for you. The first passage deals with the current urine drug testing system used by the state athletic commissions. Dave Meltzer argues that even if you adopted Olympic-style drug testing like Eddie Goldman has proposed that you would still be behind the curve in terms of catching cheaters. If drug testing is looked at as an IQ test, how much more effective would a blood-based drug testing system be? That’s the debate presented here.
DAVE MELTZER: “I’ll tell you what, like, I talked to some fighters the last couple of days on the drug testing thing and it’s… you know, everyone knows the kind of drug testing you have now… it is what it is but it’s, you know, I mean, it keeps people from being on steroids the last two weeks before a fight. Does it people keep off steroids completely? No, not at all. And it catches dumb people who use you know deca-durabolin which you know can show up nine months later and then they get all mad when they get caught with it because they’ve probably been off it for a long enough time but their body like you know everyone’s body is different when it comes to that drug and you know they probably read in their little textbook that you know as long as I get off it by this date I’m fine but when it comes to that one, you know, deca and sometimes you know Stanozolol (Winstrol), which is the one that guys always get caught for, not everybody is the same as far as like clearance time and sometimes you’ll even be clean like a week before the fight and let’s say like you stopped deca, let’s say you stopped deca six months before the fight and you test yourself a month before the fight and you’re clean, that doesn’t mean that the day of the fight you’re going to show up and be clean again. Which is where a lot of guys get nailed and that’s those guys that you know you hear about the guys, ‘I tested myself the week before, I tested myself the week after, therefore this test must be screwed up,’ no, what it is it is your body screwed you.”
BRYAN ALVAREZ: “Talk about just telling the world you’re on something, by the way. Why the [expletive] would you test yourself the week before if you’ve never been taking anything?”
DAVE MELTZER: “Yeah, why would you? I don’t know.”
BRYAN ALVAREZ: “I got a fight coming up and just to make sure that I’m not on steroids, I’m going to test myself.”
DAVE MELTZER: “Yeah, under my wife’s name.”
BRYAN ALVAREZ: “Yeah, you never know when that bottle of creatine from GNC might you know just have something in it.”
The second passage deals with the heat that Alistair Overeem has been taking from the media for allegations of PEDs/steroids. The quote from Overeem about the Strikeforce-administered drug test comes from these comments.
Josh Gross sounds this ominous warning:
Missouri’s Strikeforce drug test results 1-2 days away, but they will not be released to media, says MOA Administrator Tim Lueckenhoff.
The second passage here deals with the issue that I was railing about last week, which is the complete and total hypocrisy of steroids coverage not just by the MMA media but by the sports media in general in terms of addressing the truths at hand.
DAVE MELTZER: “Yeah, but the thing is, usage of performance-enhancing drugs in MMA is very, very prevalent and you know even if they do Olympic-style drug testing, they’re still not going to catch the growth hormone no matter what the people tell you about there’s a new test. Ain’t going to happen and they’re not doing blood tests of fighters anyways. I think that maybe like at the top level when you got your championship fights, they probably should do more extensive testing but I don’t know that it’s going to happen so we’ve got this system. But you know I mean it was just funny because again like [Saturday] night with Overeem and everything, you know and he’s out there going like, ‘When I passed my test, everyone’s going to know, that’s the proof right there when I pass my test’ and it’s like, that’s not proof of anything, anything at all. You know I’m sure he will probably will pass his test. What will that mean?”
BRYAN ALVAREZ: “It means he passed his test and that’s about it.”
DAVE MELTZER: “The other thing is that again by mentioning Overeem or Brock Lesnar’s name always pop up because he’s so big and people go, ‘well he’s on steroids.’ You know the odds are that you know that there’s tons of guys who don’t even have good physiques like Josh Barnett that are just likely to be on this stuff as Alistair Overeem, you know, I mean, they’re taking it for you know I mean you know a lot of them don’t, you know a lot of the fighters do not train like bodybuilders or have the genetics of bodybuilders so even on steroids they’re not going to out there and look like Alistair Overeem. Very few of those guys could take, they could kill themselves on steroids and there’s the percentage of these guys that could look like Alistair Overeem is under 5%.”
While I am glad that there are media writers coming around to the fact that MMA has a serious drug problem, what I am perplexed by is the lack of enthusiasm for a blood-based drug testing system that would catch a significantly higher portion of the cheaters. I believe that an Olympic-style drug testing system would be beneficial for the safety of the fighters in and out of competition. Plus, if the idea is to promote MMA as a sport, then doing whatever is possible to make the field as level as you can (to an extent) is a step in the right direction.
Topics: Media, MMA, StrikeForce, UFC, Zach Arnold | 17 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
Gilbert Melendez thinks that if he beats Eddie Alvarez he could be the #1 Lightweight in the world
By Zach Arnold | May 17, 2010
KENNY RICE: “You still obviously under Strikeforce. You got their belt. Who else is left for you that you think you should defend it against, that they deserve the shot?”
GILBERT MELENDEZ: “As of now, that’s kind of up to Scott Coker to figure that out, but anyone in the Top 10 I’d like to fight, you know I think JZ’s (Calvan) up there, maybe KJ Noons who’s the Pro Elite champ, you know, anyone that could help me prove that I’m Top 10. Eddie Alvarez, who I just saw fight, I think he’s an amazing fighter and that’s why I do call you out, Eddie Alvarez, let’s unify those titles, I’d love to fight that guy and test myself. I think if I could beat him I could be maybe #1, you know, and vice versa.”
What’s interesting about this passage is that Melendez and Alvarez both look at themselves as guys who are right up there at the very top of the Lightweight division. When Bjorn Rebney (Bellator CEO) made the argument that Eddie Alvarez was #1, his argument drew nuclear heat online as “crazy promoter talk” for even making the assertion.
Topics: Bellator, Media, MMA, StrikeForce, Zach Arnold | 17 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
If Fedor doesn’t fight Overeem, will he still remain the #1 Heavyweight fighter?
By Zach Arnold | May 17, 2010
Steve Cofield started this discussion on Sunday and Dave Meltzer also alluded to this on his radio show late Saturday night:
“Overeem’s been running through everyone. I mean, like, ever since he moved to Heavyweight and ever since he went, I guess once his weight hit 230 and now it’s 253, which is actually down from 261, but I mean ever since he’s been past 230, man, he’s just throwing people around. He’s just wasting them and he wasted (Brett) Rogers, you know, and he looked good.
I mean he… I really would like to see Overeem in there with you know your cream-of-the-crop heavyweights. It would be interesting. I mean, he’s a pretty good submission guy when it comes to the ground. He can throw people around. His stand-up is very good, you know, I mean probably of all the heavyweights in MMA he may have the best stand-up, you know it would be interesting to see him and Junior Dos Santos, I guess that would be the big one. But you know he’d be a fight for anyone, I mean at least on paper and I’d like to see some of them and you know again whatever happens with Fedor and Werdum, put it this way — if Fedor beats Werdum and then Fedor avoids Overeem, I think that will be the black mark that will move Fedor down where people will go, ‘OK, he’s not number one any more,’ he’s going to have to take that fight you know or leave and fight whoever the UFC champion is, but at that point… After this fight with Werdum, to me this is Fedor’s last non-championship fight or people are just going to go, ‘OK, you know it’s like, you can’t make any more excuses now.’
So, that’s… that’s the Fall. You know, Fedor’s either going to fight Overeem or he’s going to jump his contract and go to UFC and fight you know Brock Lesnar or Shane Carwin, you know, so Fedor’s going to be at the end of this year Fedor will either prove that he’s #1 or he will not prove that he’s #1, but he ain’t getting out of this year still being #1 by avoiding that fight, that’s my opinion.”
There are two separate questions here:
- If Fedor doesn’t fight Alistair, will he still be #1?
- How would Alistair (theoretically) fare against the Top 10 Heavyweights in the world?
Let’s start with the first question. Given that Overeem is a legitimate Top 10 fighter (and one who I’ve voted in the 6-8 range for a while now) right now in an MMA Heavyweight class that lacks a lot of depth, you have to say that if Fedor doesn’t fight him that he’s no longer the number one Heavyweight in the world. I don’t think there’s much argument about that. Outside of the UFC Heavyweights, Overeem is one of the few guys left for Fedor (Barnett’s the other) who pose mild-to-difficult challenges for the Russian.
The other question is far more interesting to explore. Let’s look at the Independent World MMA Rankings from May and use it as a guide here:
- Overeem vs. Fedor — I’d peg this as a 65/35 fight for Fedor, simply because he’s got the better submission game and he’s a terrific counter-puncher who could expose Alistair’s chin like Badr Hari has. Alistair’s big advantage would be his size and length, but we’ve seen Fedor neutralize those factors in many of his past fights.
- Overeem vs. Lesnar — I’d peg this as a 60/40 fight for Lesnar. Brock’s too powerful, too strong, and too good of a wrestler. He is inexperienced and leaves himself open to getting submitted, which would be the big advantages for Overeem going in. I’m not sure about Brock’s chin, yet, and Overeem would be a hell of a challenge if the fight stayed standing up for a long period of time.
- Overeem vs. Carwin — I’d peg this as a 55/45 fight for Carwin. Shane’s wrestling would likely give him the slight advantage here. Again, we don’t entirely know yet what Shane’s chin can take from a super-powerful striker. We’ll find out on July 3rd when he faces Brock Lesnar. Overeem stands a better chance against Carwin than Lesnar due to the fact that Carwin hasn’t fought past the first round and I’m not sure how he would last cardio-wise in a long fight. Overeem’s got more high-level experience, too.
- Overeem vs. Cain Velasquez — I’d peg this as a 55/45 fight for Velasquez. We know Cain is an awesome wrestler and he could smother Overeem. The problem is that he might leave himself open for a guillotine. The bigger problem is that he couldn’t afford to leave himself open to take kicks and punches from Overeem. We’ve seen Cain expose himself and absorb punishment in the past, but he could never afford to do it against Alistair. He would pay a heavy price.
- Overeem vs. Frank Mir — Give me 60/40 odds for Alistair winning this fight. Size-wise, Overeem is smaller than Lesnar or Carwin so Frank could catch a break. Striking-wise, this would be an ugly match-up for Frank and he would likely get knocked out. Overeem knows enough on the ground to defend himself from getting submitted here. If he uses his size advantage and wears down Mir, he wins.
- Overeem vs. Junior Dos Santos — To me, a 50/50 fight. Two explosive strikers and Dos Santos is lightning fast standing-up. He’s smaller in size and if the fight went to the ground Overeem would be happy to oblige. Dos Santos could very easily knock out Alistair and no one would be surprised.
- Overeem vs. Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira — 60/40 Overeem. Nogueira beat Randy but lost to Mir and Cain. Age is not on Nogueira’s side. Neither is his size. It’s not 2002 any more and he can’t absorb the amount of punishment that he used to take in fights. This is the one Overeem vs. UFC fight that I would not want to see take place.
Based on what I stated up above, Overeem is in that 5-to-8 range (which is where I had him in the first place). I don’t think he could be the UFC Heavyweight champion, but I do think Overeem could give all those guys a real fight and cause a lot of wins and losses to be traded back and forth with all the top guys.
Do I think we will see Overeem in UFC? Dana White would unlikely allow him to do K-1 and I think that would be the deal-breaker, unfortunately.
Topics: Media, MMA, StrikeForce, UFC, Zach Arnold | 64 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
Alistair Overeem: Fedor’s not ducking me and I think the fight will happen
By Zach Arnold | May 16, 2010
The steroid comments will probably get the most play from this MMAFighting.com interview, but I think it’s interesting how confident Alistair is in the fight with Fedor happening. More interesting is how confident he is in his chances of winning that fight.
Happy with your fight performance in your win over Brett Rogers?
“Definitely, yes. Very happy and very proud. Trained my ass off for this, it was a hard training camp, every day you go at it. Yeah, like I said I was really prepared, felt really confident mentally also so… the prize is this win.”
Were you surprised at the dominant fashion of the fight outcome?
“Well, I’m prepared for anything, of course you’re prepared for a fight. This one was really easy. I’m just happy but I was prepared for a fight, you know, I could take a shot, I was prepared for that also. So, of course you’re happy that it went easy.”
Were you more nervous for this fight in the States due to the layoff here than for your fights in Japan?
“I’m not nervous any more, you know. I know how to get my body in great shape, I know how to stay relaxed and to be in the days leading up to the fight how to act, you know, what to do, so I just did that and I feel great and I’m ready for anybody.”
You noted at the press conference that 2006 was a bad year for you. Is this currently the high-water mark in your career right now?
“I would say I have (had) several really high points. This is definitely one of them. I defeated the K-1 champion Badr, that was really a nice accomplishment. I once beat Kharitoniv, he was the second of PRIDE in 2006, early 2006, that was a really good accomplishment. I became third in the PRIDE GP, that was a very good accomplishment, well 2007 I obviously became Strikeforce champion, that was a good accomplishment. So I’ve had several strong moments, several good moments. Also some dips, you know, 2006 I lost three fights consecutively. Yeah. That gives you experience, you know, how to come back, you learn how your body works, you learn how to manage stuff outside the trainings, inside the trainings. Give you mental strength also if you are able to bounce back from dips. If everything goes great, then it’s easy. But if you are losing fights and everything’s gone wrong and you manage to get out of that, that gives you a strong mental attitude.”
There are always politics when it comes to fighting Fedor. Are you confident the fight will happen?
“Actually I am. I spoke to Scott and everybody wants this fight to happen. I think, I believe even Fedor wants this fight to happen, so… I think it’s going to happen.”
“Fedor himself is a true warrior. I respect him a lot. He’s a true champion. I know him from the PRIDE days and actually we got along fine, we worked out a couple of times and a lot of respect there. His management, however, they have accused me of steroid use. They are ducking me, they are putting all sort of barriers to not have the fight happen. I think they’re the obstacle. Fedor’s not the obstacle, I’m not the obstacle, Scott wants the fights to happen, Strikeforce wants the fight to happen, Showtime wants the fight to happen, the fans want it, but Fedor’s management… different story.”
Do you think your win on Saturday night, along with the Strikeforce-administered drug test, will silence your critics?
“Yeah, it’s just a matter of time. That was just, you know, when you’re fighting in Japan obviously you know after the steroid testing in America then you can challenge the critics, so I knew it’s just going to be a matter of time, just keep your things together, focus on what you have to do, and give it time.”
Do you plan on fighting in Strikeforce again in 2010?
“Well, I’ll be going to New York tomorrow for a promotion tour. After that I will be in Dubai for some seminars and in these 10 days I’m going to make a whole plan for 2010. I’m hoping to fight here once or twice, yes.”
What about fighting in Japan in 2010?
“Not sure yet. I am qualified for the K-1 Final 16 but my priority is Strikeforce now.”
You kept your old Strikeforce Heavyweight belt and now have a new one?
“I’m really proud of my belts. I’m really proud of any cup that I win, so that has a really nice spot on my wall and this one will be coming right next to it. I have a spot reserved for all my belts and they’ll be some more hanging there.”
Topics: Media, MMA, StrikeForce, Zach Arnold | No Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |