Opinion: Major changes needed for UFC Fight Pass to be successful
By Zach Arnold | January 1, 2014
By analyst Tim Stark
Goal w/ Fight Pass' free promo is for fans to sign up, leave cred card, & be too lazy to cancel (i.e. Gyms, Netflix). Shooting for 100K subs
— MMA Supremacy (@MMASupremacy) December 31, 2013
On December 28, 2013, the UFC officially announced the “UFC Fight Pass”. The service will give fans access to Zuffa’s fight library and live international events that will not be televised on FOX Sports 1 & 2. The service is currently free to consumers until the end of February, at which time you will be charged $10 per month. You can view my previous article here about why the Fight Pass Service in its current incarnation is a poor option for consumers.
I have tinkered with the UFC Fight Pass free preview… and I am completely underwhelmed. This is a rushed-to-market product that is about 18 months or two years away from being where it should be. This is not what a pay service should look like.
The media blitz has been intense, including this article at Sherdog. UFC Chief Content Officer, Marshall Zelaznik said, “We have strategy meetings and this was, at the beginning of the year, one of the objectives we wanted to figure out how to do this and it all seemed to come together in a perfect storm.” Zelanik went on to say, “We’ve been doing 24-hour days for the last six months to make sure we’re ready, and we still have a lot of work — it’s still a work in progress — but I’m proud of it, I’m proud of all the work we’ve done.”
The UFC Fight Pass was talked about less than one year ago, and only has been worked on for the last six months. So why the rush? On January 8th in Las Vegas, the WWE is rumored to finally introduce their online digital WWE Network. This is a network they have been working on for a few years and will be in direct competition with UFC Fight Pass. With all of this information now known publicly, it is easy to see why Dana White & Lorenzo Fertitta felt the need to rush the UFC Fight Pass site to market.
As a day 1 launch product, Fertitta, White, & Zelaznik have already admitted a few of its early short comings. The first live event on January 4, 2014 will not be available to stream over a set top box like the XBOX or Roku. Instead it will only be available to stream via a computer. They have acknowledged that they are working on changing this within the next 60 days. There is no current mobile access for the UFC Fight Pass. This is unfathomable to launch a streaming service without this in place on day one.
You now have a good idea why the service is so bad right now. Here are some ways that the UFC can improve the UFC Fight Pass user experience.
Continue reading this article here…
Topics: Media, MMA, UFC | 18 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
Editorial: Time for California’s commission to make Mark Relyea Chief Athletic Inspector
By Zach Arnold | December 30, 2013
To read all CSAC-related articles, dating back to May 2012, CLICK HERE.
Since the departure of the execrable Che Guevara, the California State Athletic Commission has had no Chief Athletic Inspector. Andy Foster, as the current Executive Officer, has had to manage the front office affairs in Sacramento and lean heavily on lead athletic inspector Mark Relyea in Southern California to handle his business affairs. Relyea has many years of experience, both as a supervisor and administrator, with the LA County Sheriff’s Department in his role as a Lieutenant.
The history of the Chief Athletic Inspector position is meaningful. Dean Lohuis, whom many in the state of California greatly respected, was located in Southern California and was a great friend to those in the combat sports scene. He understood the sport of boxing and how to properly enforce the rules & regulations om behalf of the Athletic Commission. Unfortunately, he was replaced from the position by the powers-that-be at the Department of Consumer Affairs. They made a decision to replace Dean Lohuis with Che Guevara, a former boxing manager and athletic inspector who was involved in the Antonio Margarito hand-wrap controversy in 2009 at the Staples Center. Guevara got the job of Chief Athletic Inspector and stayed in Sacramento rather than relocating to Southern California where the majority of fighting events in the State occur.
The importance of having a competent Chief Athletic Inspector was emphasized when Consumer Affairs decided to push George Dodd out as Executive Officer. Until a new Executive Officer was hired, Guevara ran the commission. He ran it all right — he ran it in the ground, along with an interim Executive Officer named Kathi Burns who had no clue what she was doing. It was on Guevara’s match that the debacle in Oxnard took place in September of 2012. Until Andy Foster was hired by DCA, Guevara’s incompetence in training athletic inspectors properly on calculating box offices, inspecting hand wraps, and filling out event paperwork was on display for everyone to scrutinize.
After Andy Foster was hired, the position of Chief Athletic Inspector was left vacant. Instead of hiring a new Chief Athletic Inspector, an assistant Executive Officer in Sacramento (through Consumer Affairs) was hired to help out with front office paper work and bidding of state contracts. Her name is Sophia Cornejo. Her focus is on the front office administrative side of things.
However, not having a Chief Athletic Inspector in the commission pipeline remains a problem for Consumer Affairs. As demonstrated with the departure of George Dodd, not having a competent person at the helm to run the show can prove to be costly.
Continue reading this article here…
Topics: Boxing, CSAC, Media, MMA, Zach Arnold | No Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
With GSP & Anderson done, failure cannot be an option for UFC’s 2014 star-making strategy
By Zach Arnold | December 28, 2013
Tibia and fibula fracture on @SpiderAnderson similar to Joe Theismann and Kevin Ware. Will need rodding surgery. 6 months to recover.
— David J. Chao, MD (@ProFootballDoc) December 29, 2013
What a surreal night.
Anderson Silva met the same fate as Corey Hill, Kevin Ware, Joe Theismann, and hell, you can throw in Sid Vicious if you want. Will he come back from the horrific leg injury? I hope he does, simply because that is not the way a legend like him should have to live the rest of his life with the memory of being stretchered out of the cage.
Anderson Silva's face tells painful story. Silva breaks leg in gruesome fashion, Weidman retains belt by TKO. #UFC168 pic.twitter.com/LNknViNIu2
— SportsCenter (@SportsCenter) December 29, 2013
Now we get Chris Weidman vs. Anabolic Belfort and Ronda Rousey vs. Sara McMann. OK. That Belfort promo on the UFC FS1 post-fight telecast was a hell of a watch.
SportsCenter has given UFC168 NFL playoff-like coverage tonight. Star power of Rousey/Silva/Weidman? Impact of FS1's UFC coverage? Both?
— Richard Deitsch (@richarddeitsch) December 29, 2013
If you thought ESPN’s troll job of Fox Sports 1 with the UFC 168 coverage was a surprise, consider the following: ESPN went right ahead with the PPV results and did a remote interview with Ronda Rousey before FS1 went to the UFC 168 post-game show. Bristol was on the ball. Dana was on the Sportscenter Twitter during the main event. On one of the biggest nights for UFC, ESPN’s skeletal crew beat Fox Sports to the punch and used Dana to do it. I don’t know what the contractual stipulations are for Fox Sports with UFC — perhaps it precludes the channel from airing anything UFC related until the PPV time frame is over, but to have ESPN rub it into FS1’s face like that was something that the Mouse was probably popping champagne corks over.
To top it all off, ESPN aired a post-fight interview with Dana White to break news about Anderson Silva having immediate surgery in an hour. That Dana interview aired long before anything from him on FS1.
Lady from Home and Garden TV asking Ronda Rousey about her favorite room in the TUF house is my favorite. And now all hell has broken loose.
— Josh Gross (@JoshGrossESPN) December 29, 2013
One thing is very clear if you follow the general sports media types — tonight’s PPV had everyone’s attention and Anderson Silva’s shattered leg elicited the same kind of response that Kevin Ware’s injury at the Final Four drew. But nobody proclaimed that they would stop covering college basketball because of it.
It was interesting seeing Ronda’s temperament in his post-fight interviews. She made it very clear, in her own words, that she likes you to boo or cheer her but ambivalence is unacceptable. And she mocked fighters who always say in post-fight interviews they’ll fight anyone the company puts in front of them next.
Travis Browne's 1law logo is a personal injury law firm. #UFC168
— Jason Cruz (@dilletaunt) December 29, 2013
As for Josh Barnett losing to Travis Browne… that saved the UFC from being nervous nellies about a potential Barnett/Cain Velasquez fight with the drug testing issues. Bring on Travis Browne vs. Fabricio Werdum.
Watching Chris Leben demonstrate more sense than his corner or the Nevada officials by stopping his own fight with Uriah Hall was kind of a sad, yet reassuring thing to watch. If this was boxing, he’d be getting the Victor Ortiz quitter treatment. Getting concussed is no fun.
- Lightweights: Michael Johnson defeated Gleison Tibau in R2 in 92 seconds by KO.
- Middleweights: Uriah Hall defeated Chris Leben after the end of R1 due to TKO stoppage.
- Featherweights: Dustin Poirier defeated Diego Brandao in R1 in 4’54 by KO.
- Lightweights: Jim Miller defeated Fabricio Camoes in R1 in 3’42 by armbar.
- Heavyweights (winner fights Fabricio Werdum): Travis Browne defeated Josh Barnett in R1 in 60 seconds by KO.
- UFC Women’s 135 pound title match: Ronda Rousey defeated Miesha Tate in R3 in 58 seconds by armbar.
- UFC Middleweight title match: Chris Weidman defeated Anderson Silva in R2 in 1’16 by TKO stoppage (broken leg).
****
For those wondering what happened with our server on Saturday that prevented you from reading articles and us from posting content, to make a long story short: the company hosting our server decided, apparently without notice, that today would be a great day to upgrade old equipment and migrate the site to a server with new equipment. Hence the 404 errors. Hence why we are updating a while after the PPV is over.
Topics: Media, MMA, UFC, Zach Arnold | 14 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
What to watch at the UFC 168 circus in Las Vegas
By Zach Arnold | December 27, 2013
This much we know: there will be details released regarding the new UFC Fight Pass online channel. If you haven’t read Tim Stark’s piece on Fight Opinion about why he’s skeptical Fight Pass will be a big success, take some time to read it. I did an interview with Hot Cage Daily about my expectations for the new online channel. My initial take on the new channel: low risk, low reward proposition.
In addition to discussion about UFC Fight Pass, there are the Brock Lesnar returning to UFC rumors:
Either way, this is just a money power play. With GSP & a number of champs out for most of 2014, Lesnar's name has now resurfaced #mma #ufc
— MMA Supremacy (@MMASupremacy) December 26, 2013
One of the things I noted during UFC’s horrific handling of the GSP hiatus situation is how different UFC treated GSP than they treated Lesnar on his way out. I mean, they gave Brock everything he wanted and kept their mouths shut. Brock was the #1 PPV draw and St. Pierre the #2 draw. Now that St. Pierre is gone, here come the Lesnar rumors.
Two thoughts:
1) the fact that it’s even plausible to consider Brock Lesnar returning to UFC says a lot about where UFC stands business-wise and how bad the WWE return experiment went for Brock and
2) Anderson Silva’s camp really thinks they have amazing business leverage, despite the long-term fight contract signed, if they win against Weidman on Saturday and decide that Anderson needs a lot more motivation to fight Vitor Belfort. UFC has drawn the line in the sand that the winner of Saturday’s fight will get Vitor Belfort. Weidman vs. Belfort is a fresh fight and an exciting one. Anderson vs. Belfort is a been-there, done-that scenario with the only fresh angle to it being the prospects of the bout taking place in Brazil.
As for the odds on Saturday’s fights… the money is coming in on Anderson. He was a 3-to-2 favorite and could end up being a 9-to-5 favorite by the time the fight starts. Ronda Rousey started out as a 10-to-1 favorite over Miesha Tate and remains comfortable at an 8-to-1 margin. Josh Barnett remains a 2-to-1 favorite over Travis Browne.
Reading material
If Anderson Silva isn’t motivated for Saturday’s re-match against Chris Weidman, then nothing will motivate him. What happens if he loses?
How many lives does Josh Barnett have left and how lucky is he? This lucky. If he beats Travis Browne on Saturday, he gets a #1 contender’s fight with Fabricio Werdum. Even the idea of Josh Barnett getting a UFC title shot after what happened in the Daniel Cormier bout is really a remarkable story. Another interesting part of the Barnett story is the juxtaposition of him being a drug testing pariah while the wave of fighters getting permission to use anabolic steroids is rising. Failing a drug test is bad but getting permission to use anabolics is apparently socially acceptable. That’s the drug usage standard we have today in combat sports.
Ronda Rousey has been answering questions from the press about the way she was portrayed by the video editors on Ultimate Fighter and some of her controversial media interviews. Basically, her attitude is that as long as you cheer or boo, she’s fine with it. There’s only a problem when the fans are ambivalent or don’t react at all. As far as the expectations game is concerned, though, she has to practically mutilate Miesha Tate in order for the fans not to be disappointed on Saturday night. Breaking another arm won’t be good enough given how intense the animosity is and how high the bar has been set by Ronda’s past performances.
Not many people feel that Miesha Tate has much of a shot of beat Ronda Rousey on Saturday night, but there is one path to victory if she’s disciplined enough to utilize it. Hint: Ronda is BFFs with Nick Diaz and Miesha will have to use a plan that one of Nick’s rivals used against him. The Condit Bicycle. If Miesha takes Ronda down, she’s not powerful enough to maintain position on the ground. She can’t clinch with Ronda because Ronda will easily throw her down to the mat. Ronda’s too good at attacking the angles to get the submission she wants. So, Miesha’s going to have to make this is a striking contest. Ronda Rousey is not Cat Zingano. Cat blasted Miesha into another orbit. In the first fight between Tate and Ronda, there was no comparison between the two when it came to which fighter had effective stand-up striking skills.
- Featherweights: Robert Peralta vs. Estevan Payan
- Welterweights: Bobby Voelker vs. William Macario
- Welterweights: Siyar Bahadurzada vs. John Howard
- Featherweights: Dennis Siver vs. Manny Gamburyan
- Lightweights: Gleison Tibau vs. Michael Johnson
- Middleweights: Chris Leben vs. Uriah Hall
- Featherweights: Diego Brandao vs. Dustin Poirier
- Lightweights: Jim Miller vs. Fabricio Camoes
- Heavyweights (winner fights Fabricio Werdum): Josh Barnett vs. Travis Browne
- UFC Women’s 135 pound title match: Ronda Rousey vs. Miesha Tate
- UFC Middleweight title match: Chris Weidman vs. Anderson Silva
Remember, the price tag for this PPV has increased.
Topics: Media, MMA, UFC, Zach Arnold | 10 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
California commission tried to implement new testosterone policy without public comment
By Zach Arnold | December 26, 2013
To read all CSAC-related articles, dating back to May 2012, CLICK HERE.
If you were offline for Christmas, you missed our report about some of the major changes being proposed by the California State Athletic Commission for 2014. I would strongly advise you to read it first before continuing on with this article.
But, for the sake of brevity, a quick summary of some of the modifications coming:
- At the discretion of Andy Foster (through proposed modifications of California rules & regulations), all judges & referees who work MMA events will have to, at minimum, will have to have earned a BJJ blue belt to work non-title fights. For title fights, the requirement is bumped up to a purple belt. What’s the online reaction been so far? Check out Reddit and The Underground Forum. As there is more awareness of the new policy, expect the polarization to sharpen and grow nastier in tone.
- There is a budget crunch and the two lawsuits against the commission (including the potent age discrimination/retaliation lawsuit by Dwayne Woodard) are eating away at the budget because the Attorney General’s office in Los Angeles is sending some hefty bills to CSAC.
- There will be a new consensus regarding the way the 10-point must system will be used to score MMA fights. Call it the Dave Meltzer approach. 10-8 round for a clear winner. 10-7 round for a clear winner in brutal one-sided beatdown. 10-9 round for a close winner. 10-10 score if the judges can’t pick a winner in a round.
- No modifications on the boxing side of the equation for changing judging criteria or minimum standards for boxing judges.
All of these are very important items worth discussing and they will impact the product you see on television and at live events. However, the much larger & over-arching theme of the December 16th CSAC meeting in Sacramento at DCA HQ was about the political takeover of the commission & who the power players are.
We know the Department of Consumer Affairs in Sacramento controls the administrative side of affairs. Andy Foster is the Executive Officer. We know that Big John McCarthy now has the pipeline in regards to giving a thumbs up or thumbs down for officials in regards to training & qualifications. We know that Martha Shen-Urquidez, the colorful lawyer who used to work with the LAPD on training issues & with the Los Angeles Housing Authority, is the commission fixer for the Andy/BJM side of the equation. Her name is on practically all the sub-committees on the Athletic Commission. She’s there to be the enforcer, the fixer, the bad cop, whatever label you want to use.
Continue reading this article here…
Topics: Boxing, CSAC, Media, MMA, UFC, Zach Arnold | 3 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
Major changes coming for California regulation — and nobody knows about it
By Zach Arnold | December 25, 2013
Athletic commission hearings are often some of the strangest political board meetings you can ever watch in action. What you see in front of your eyes isn’t always reality. And if nobody is around to follow what is happening, then you get blindsided by surprises you never prepared for.
Last week, the California State Athletic Commission held a meeting at Consumer Affairs HQ in Sacramento. I took a pass on the hearing because I wanted to focus on Dwayne Woodard’s age discrimination/retaliation lawsuit in Los Angeles Superior Court. His lawsuit, along with former front office worker Sarah Waklee’s harassment lawsuit, are hanging over CSAC like the Sword of Damocles. Someone is going to pay a price. Now it’s just a matter of who, when, and how much. One thing is for sure: California taxpayers will be the losers (again).
So, I started watching the video of the CSAC Sacramento hearing and there were some really big developments coming out of it that nobody has comprehended or discussed yet.
Continue reading this article here…
Topics: Boxing, CSAC, Media, MMA, UFC, Zach Arnold | 2 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
Opinion: Why you should say no to UFC Fight Pass
By Zach Arnold | December 24, 2013
By analyst Tim Stark
The inimitable Ross Finkelstein broke the news on Twitter about UFC’s new online network called UFC Fight Pass. A detailed announcement is expected to be discussed this weekend at UFC 168 in Las Vegas. The rumored price is $10 a month for approximately 15 B-level and C-level fight cards along with access to Zuffa’s MMA library which includes both PRIDE & Strikeforce content. In other words, it’s a glorified upgrade of what they’ve been doing with the Comcast On-Demand service.
So, how does this deal compare to the current online network landscape amongst streaming services available from major sports leagues? Let’s start off with a basic chart of the established sports leagues and then go from there:
- MLB.tv – $130 (2430 Games)
- NHL Gamecenter – $169 (1230 Games)
- NFL Sunday Ticket – $300 (256 Games)
- NBA League Pass – $200 (1230 Games)
- MLS Live – $60 (230 Games)
The prices listed are for the most expensive online packages. MLB has a cheaper option for non-mobile consumers. Many of the current packages are not without their flaws. The NBA blacks out games that air on ABC & Turner Sports. There are additional local blackout restrictions for live broadcasts. However, you can view about 95% of the games within a 48 hour time span if you purchase any of the sports packages.
Throw in a “zero TV” package with sports packages online to complete your cord-cutting. For comparison’s sake, here are prices for some of the “zero TV” services:
- Netflix – $96 Per Year
- Hulu Plus – $96 Per Year
- Amazon Prime Instant Streaming – $79 Per Year (with free shipping)
In comparison to other online sports packages & zero TV options, the UFC is asking you to pay nearly $600 for 13 annual PPV events plus $120 (or more) for 15 B-level & C-level shows airing on UFC Fight Pass.
I order the PPVs. $64.99 Canadian for each PPV x 13 PPVs = $845. Plus $10 x 12 for Digital Network = $120. So $965 to watch all UFC in 2014.
— Adam Martin (@MMAdamMartin) December 24, 2013
Over $700 a year to watch MMA? This is crazy. That’s more than double what the NFL charges and you can watch at least four NFL games for free on broadcast television every week. UFC Fight Pass looks like small potatoes compared to other online sports packages available for consumers heading in 2014.
Enter the WWE Network
While the UFC is playing small ball, WWE is going for a home run. A major announcement — in Las Vegas, home to UFC, of all places — will be made in January to discuss details about the upcoming WWE Network. It originally was going to be a cable operation but now it’s going to be an online channel. There’s no suger-coating the fact that a significant portion of UFC’s audience also watches WWE. The rumored price tag for the WWE Network is $15 a month. You can view the proposed WWE Network details here. It will be an online channel that features a massive video library, all current WWE content, and B-level PPVs. The channel will shrink the WWE’s annual PPV calendar and restore some sanity for wrestling fans who were shelling out a ton of cash to buy crappy PPVs.
Even at $15 a month, that price point is affordable. You can already watch RAW & Smackdown on Hulu. WWE is looking to make a deal with a major media conglomerate to bring digital media rights to the internet platform of their next partner. The amount of exposure WWE is looking to achieve is remarkable in scope. If you include the price tag for the WWE Network subscription and WWE’s big four PPVs (Royal Rumble, Wrestlemania, Summerslam, and Survivor Series), it’s about a $400 yearly bill. Compared to what UFC is offering, it’s a winner.
There is no current service available in sports/entertainment that is as bad of a purchase as the UFC Fight Pass for the money they are charging.
Pay walls suck for exposure — just ask the newspapers
Who will get hurt the most by being relegated to the UFC Fight Pass subscription channel? The young fighters who UFC plans on spotlighting & recruiting. The UFC is in need of new stars and the only way you do that is by creating as much exposure as possible. Fighting only on PPV or behind an online pay wall is a disservice for young prospects.
Take Alexander Gustafsson for example. He had an amazing fight with Jon Jones for the UFC Light Heavyweight title in Toronto. The fans voted him to be on the cover of the upcoming UFC video game. And instead of fighting on Super Bowl weekend or on a Fox broadcast show, he’s going to be fight on a show airing on UFC Fight Pass. The UFC wants him to be a main event attraction. So they’re putting him on a show nobody is going to pay to watch.
Fighting only on PPV hurts. Fighting behind an online pay wall hurts. And, so far, the Fox Sports 1 experiment has demonstrated wildly inconsistent ratings for fights. However, one thing is for sure — there has been an impact on UFC’s PPV buy rates featuring their biggest fighters. Anderson Silva’s fight with Chris Weidman drew around 525,000 buys. GSP’s fight with Johny Hendricks drew around 650,000 buys. Those are healthy numbers but they are not superstar numbers that UFC’s former aces were pulling in. The combination of the new guys not attracting mainstream appeal along with the FS1 platform has exacerbated UFC’s concerns in building real stars.
With international talent being shoveled onto UFC Fight Pass, the majority of fans will have no access to watch these fighters in action. We’re reaching a point where UFC fighters with 7 or 8 wins could be complete unknowns to UFC fans. They may as well not exist.
What needs to change
In order for UFC Fight Pass to work, the promotion needs to adopt some of WWE’s business tactics and shift some of their B-level PPVs online. Make it a $15/month subscription service that includes 6 or 8 PPVs. It would level out the purchase cost of UFC Fight Pass plus the bigger PPVs to around $500 a year. At least you would be increasing the amount of live fights that cord cutters would be able to watch outside of the Fox Sports universe.
The UFC may be the only major player in the MMA space right now but they are facing stiff competition in the general sports space for digital content marketing. The manner in which UFC Fight Pass is currently constructed is set up for minimum risk but also minimum gain. It’s simply not a competitive solution against what their general sports rivals are up to. We’re used to seeing big & bold decisions from the UFC. The UFC Fight Pass falls short of expectations.
Topics: Media, MMA, UFC, Zach Arnold | 10 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
GLORY 13 at Ariake Colosseum: Was that really a Japanese event?
By Zach Arnold | December 21, 2013
Watching #Glory13 and listening to @mauroranallo on play by play. Hey, Mauro I was off this weekend! 🙂 Let's do one of these some day.
— Jim Ross (@JRsBBQ) December 22, 2013
What a strange show that was on Sunday afternoon at Ariake Colosseum in Tokyo. Looked like the building was half-full, but Ariake Colosseum is one of those mid-sized arenas that is easy to configure and can look very respectable if you do the production right.
The production of the GLORY shows, sans the one at Madison Square Garden, look largely the same. The Tokyo show looked the same as the Chicago event. GLORY is basically a really vanilla version of K-1 with judging that ranges from OK to just downright awful. And it was interesting to note how few, if any references there were to K-1 on the TV side of the equation.
I still am always amazed to see foreign promoters bring shows to Japan and pretty much promote them the way they would elsewhere. They used Tim Hughes as the ring announcer rather than hire a Japanese ring announcer. Two decades ago, pulling off a stunt like this would earn you major scorn in the press — including Western writers. Now, nobody says much even though the impact is still the same with it comes to appealing to Japanese tastes. Other than a Felix Communications ad sign on the side of the ring, you wouldn’t have known it was a Japanese show because there weren’t any graphics in the native language.
As I said a couple of days ago: if I had not received any sort of English-language PR notices about this show, I would have not known that a show was taking place at Ariake Colosseum. Seriously. I saw nothing about the event in any of the sports sections of major Japanese papers.
The only fighter the local Japanese fans really got worked up about was Peter Aerts and that’s because he was a K-1 superstar. But they wouldn’t or couldn’t say K-1. And he faced Rico Verhoeven, who won by split decision. The crowd was buying into the “this may be Aerts’ last fight” angle and then when the SC was announced, the confetti popped and the fans went from boisterous to dead silent.
For what it's worth Peter said this wasn't his retirement. Glory apparently offered him a new contact after this fight as well
— Liver Kick (@LiverKickdotcom) December 22, 2013
Daniel Ghita pummeled Errol Zimmerman into a nasty position and watching the leg bend after the knockdown was brutal.
Nieky Holtzken had quite the battle with Joseph Valtellini and then we had the “Joe Rogan portion” of the Spike broadcast where people on social media went after Duke Roufus for his pro-Dustin Jacoby commentary against Makoto Uehara, although that 30-27 score in favor of Uehara was ridiculous.
Main takeaway from today’s show? The general concept of the GLORY shows works for the Spike audience. The problem is their one-size-fits-all approach when it comes to matchmaking, marketing, and tailoring towards the crowds they are running events at. K-1 was very masterful at figuring out how to promote kickboxing as a spectacle, an event, a social happening. PRIDE very much in the same way. When they ran shows, they tried to book as many locals as possible. They used booking for nationalistic purposes. GLORY runs from market to market with the same product, high quality, with a lot of foreign fighters and it becomes really difficult for fans in those live event markets to build a sentimental attachment. PRIDE was a “movement” organization. K-1 was a “movement organization” as far as proving that Japan was the best in the world for showing how kickboxing is done. GLORY has the feel of an international organization that has the best kickboxing talent — and that strategy has its pluses and its minuses. It may work or may not work in America. In Japan, it’s a real challenge. In Europe, it’s got some potential. I’m just not sure that, as we speak, we are seeing the successful finalized blueprint for GLORY as an event promotion company. Clearly there is a lot of money being spent. The question is how much money and for how much longer before there’s second-guessing about what the business strategy should be.
Topics: Japan, Media, Zach Arnold | 11 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
Top So. California athletic inspector arrested for DUI in September, but did anyone at CSAC know?
By Zach Arnold | December 19, 2013
In September of 2012, one of the biggest screwjobs ever in the history of the California State Athletic Commission took place for a boxing show in Oxnard, California. You can read the summary of what happened here. The bottom line is that you had deadbeat promoters who, by their own classification, were supposedly violating the Ali Act by managing & promoting a fighter they had an interest in on the card. Other fighters on the card were paid by tickets and if they didn’t meet a certain quota of tickets sold either got paid less or were led to believe they may wouldn’t get paid.
Ticket sales didn’t go the way the deadbeat promoters thought they would, so they canceled the show within hours of it taking place and left everyone out to dry. The deadbeat promoters had a history of not living up to the standards set by the California commission and were on a temporary license that was issued by… Che Guevara.
Some of the fighters sought legal representation, including boxer Crystal Morales who ended up hiring… Farzad Tabatabai, the legal eagle that is representing Dwayne Woodard in his age discrimination & retaliation case against Consumer Affairs & CSAC. Result? Andy Foster hit the deadbeat promoter’s bond and they supposed got crushed for 5-figures — and deservedly so.
The lead athletic inspector who oversaw the event was Anthony Olivas. Olivas was a top conduit in Southern California for (now) former Chief Athletic Inspector, Che Guevara. Two peas in a pod. Guevara resigned in August of 2013. Guevara is now working as a go’fer/recruiter of heavyweight boxers for Michael King, the rich man behind King World Productions. King was involved in the rise of Oprah Winfrey and is a major Hollywood bundler for President Barack Obama. King has a mansion in Pacific Palisades, California. Guevara is currently working for King at his office in Brentwood.
While Che Guevara found his golden parachute with Michael King, Anthony Olivas remained as a top athletic inspector for the California State Athletic Commission. The Department of Consumer Affairs in Sacramento controls CSAC. Olivas works for Consumer Affairs, both as an athletic inspector and also for his day job by being an inspector for Cosmetology. When the controversy over time-and-a-half pay broke out amongst the athletic inspectors, Olivas ended up unscathed because he got his time-and-a-half back pay.
You would think that someone who was involved in a complete and total debacle like Oxnard a year ago would do his best to keep himself out of trouble. Apparently, you would be wrong. According to an investigative tip we received, Olivas was arrested for DUI in Sacramento County in September of 2013. A year after Oxnard.
Continue reading this article here…
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Bigfoot Silva using testosterone: just another damning indictment on UFC’s drug problem
By Zach Arnold | December 17, 2013
if you allow TRT why not HGH, benzo's if they get stressed out, opiates if they need pain relief, amphetamines if they need extra energy.
— The Pit (@Pit_Master) December 18, 2013
Antonio “Bigfoot” Silva failed a post-fight UFC drug test after his bout with Mark Hunt. Wonder what the pre-fight test results looked like then? If there was a difference between the two tests, then what happened in between that time frame?
Marc Ratner, Jeff Davidson, Lorenzo Fertitta, and Dana White sure are cracking down on those anabolic steroid users. So much so that Bigfoot is just the next top UFC guy to be granted permission to use testosterone because of “Low T.” On an overseas show, of course. I’m sure the foreign athletic commissions decided on their own accord to open the testosterone flood gates. Right.
Wait, you mean the UFC self-regulates some of their shows?
Funny how guys, both “clean” in the past and those who have failed drug tests, are allowed by UFC to use testosterone (anabolic steroids). There’s a reason I keep saying UFC is as dirty as horse racing or cycling.
Continue reading this article here…
Topics: Media, MMA, UFC, Zach Arnold | 22 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
A peek at UFC’s three January 2014 fight cards
By Zach Arnold | December 17, 2013
According to Joe Rogan, 30% of MMA fights booked end up canceled. Oh well.
Event: UFC Fight Night in Singapore (Saturday, January 4th at Marina Bay Sands)
- Bantamweights: Leandro Issa vs. Russell Doane
- Bantamweights: Dustin Kimura vs. Jon Delos Reyes
- Lightweights: Mairbek Taisumov vs. Tae Hyun Bang
- Bantamweights: Dave Galera vs. Royston Wee
- Lightweights: Katsunori Kikuno vs. Quinn Mulhern
- Featherweights: Max Holloway vs. Will Chope
- Bantamweights: Kyung Ho Kang vs. Shunichi Shimizu
- Welterweights: Kiichi Kunimoto vs. Luiz Dutra
- Featherweights: Crusher Kawajiri vs. Sean Soriano
- Welterweights: Tarec Saffiedine vs. Hyun Gyu Lim
Event: UFC Fight Night (Wednesday, January 15th in Duluth, Georgia at Gwinnett Arena)
TV: Fox Sports 1
- Lightweights: Isaac Vallie-Flagg vs. Elias Silverio
- Flyweights: John Moraga vs. Dustin Ortiz
- Lightweights: Vinc Pichel vs. Garett Whiteley
- Middleweights: Derek Brunson vs. Yoel Romero
- Lightweights: Ramsey Nijem vs. Justin Edwards
- Welterweights: Jason High vs. Adlan Amagov
- Middleweights: Trevor Smith vs. Brian Houston
- Middleweights: Lorenz Larkin vs. Brad Tavares
- Bantamweights: TJ Dillashaw vs. Mike Easton
- Featherweights: Cole Miller vs. Sam Sicilia
- Middleweights: Luke Rockhold vs. Costa Philippou
Event: UFC on Fox 10 (Saturday, January 25th in Chicago at the United Center)
TV: Fox Sports 1/Fox broadcast affiliates
- Heavyweights: Jared Rosholt vs. Oleksiy Oliynyk
- Lightweights: Daron Cruickshank vs. Mike Rio
- Heavyweights: Walt Harris vs. Nikita Krylov
- Bantamweights: Eddie Wineland vs. Yves Jabouin
- Bantamweights: Hugo Viana vs. Junior Hernandez
- Welterweights: Pascal Krauss vs. Adam Khaliev
- Lightweights: Donald Cerrone vs. Adriano Martins
- Bantamweights: Chico Camus vs. Yaotzin Meza
- Featherweights: Darren Elkins vs. Jeremy Stephens
- Heavyweights: Stipe Miocic vs. Gabriel Gonzaga
- Lightweights: Ben Henderson vs. Josh Thomson
Topics: Media, MMA, UFC, Zach Arnold | 7 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
Age discrimination/retaliation lawsuit against California State Athletic Commission clears hurdle
By Zach Arnold | December 16, 2013
A Los Angeles Superior Court judge rejected a motion for summary judgment requested from the California Attorney General’s office during a Monday court hearing to determine the status of athletic inspector Dwayne Woodard’s age discrimination & retaliation lawsuit against the Department of Consumer Affairs & the California State Athletic Commission.
The court ruling on Monday clears the path for Woodard’s legal team to apply pressure on top political fixers at Consumer Affairs in regards to decisions they made that impacted his career as a veteran athletic inspector. Many of the top fixers at DCA are former chiefs-of-staff or legislative aides to top politicians in the California Democratic Party.
The judge’s ruling on Monday clears the path for pushing forward a case that, on paper, appears to rely on documents & inter-office memos as evidence. Translation: witnesses can change testimony but documents & facts don’t change at trial.
Continue reading this article here…
Topics: CSAC, Media, Zach Arnold | 4 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
How much will raising the UFC 168 PPV price tag impact the buy rate?
By Zach Arnold | December 16, 2013
A lot, a little, or no impact?
Here’s the fight card as it currently stands:
- Featherweights: Robert Peralta vs. Estevan Payan
- Welterweights: Bobby Voelker vs. William Macario
- Welterweights: Siyar Bahadurzada vs. John Howard
- Featherweights: Dennis Siver vs. Manny Gamburyan
- Lightweights: Gleison Tibau vs. Michael Johnson
- Middleweights: Chris Leben vs. Uriah Hall
- Featherweights: Diego Brandao vs. Dustin Poirier
- Lightweights: Jim Miller vs. Fabricio Camoes
- Heavyweights (winner fights Fabricio Werdum): Josh Barnett vs. Travis Browne
- UFC Women’s 135 pound title match: Ronda Rousey vs. Miesha Tate
- UFC Middleweight title match: Chris Weidman vs. Anderson Silva
There was some advertising for the 12/28 show on the Fox broadcast on Saturday night, but I was surprised that the PPV didn’t get plugged more. Then again, I also thought that the Fox broadcast show would draw some eyeballs with no college football competition. Instead, the curse of the small guys struck again as far as killing the ratings:
Biggest takeway from last night's UFC on FOX show? It's now the lowest rated show w/ NFL promotion. Those averaged 4M+ before Sat #mma #ufc
— MMA Supremacy (@MMASupremacy) December 15, 2013
Any advertising is better than none, but between the poor ratings for Saturday’s event in Sacramento and the way the Ultimate Fighter season played out with Ronda Rousey, I am not sure this is what Zuffa envisioned as far as the way they would close out the year. One of the tools UFC used so effectively in the past to generate PPV sales was their Primetime series. However…
"They are so expensive to produce"… limited viewership since moving to Fox Sports 1 have made the shows no longer cost-effective #mma #ufc
— MMA Supremacy (@MMASupremacy) December 15, 2013
So, a couple of questions about UFC raising the PPV price for the NYE show:
1) Dana White says that the price increase was Lorenzo Fertitta’s idea and that if you an issue with it, invite a couple more friends over to help pick up the tab.
Is the price increase going to be limited to NYE PPVs (e.g. dynamic pricing as MMA Payout spelled out) or…
2) Is UFC considering increasing the price of PPVs with Ronda Rousey on the top of cards because of their heavily male audience wants to watch her in HD, so make ’em pay for it? Would that be brilliant & capitalistic, sexist & exploitative, both, or neither?
And if the pricing increase works, does any extra money go towards Ronda & her opponents? If the price increase hurts the buy rate, does that mean Ronda and her opponents make less money?
Tate tweets about toy drive for kids, UFC fans respond with “Can I eat your tits” & “Please sit on my face”. Classy: http://t.co/1Ngs8VUl5t
— Fight_Ghost (@Fight_Ghost) December 13, 2013
It reminds me of the debate as to how much of the UFC fan base is made up of women. A Fox suit told Sherdog a few months ago that it was 20%. Dave Meltzer estimates that it is 30%. Dana White was pushing a much larger number.
If the price increase is going to be for Ronda’s fights, I get the logic — although I think it’s kind of over the top but, hey, if they can pull it off… more power to them.
Topics: Media, MMA, UFC, Zach Arnold | 7 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |