(He’s wearing a hockey jersey! What more do Canadians want?)
So you thought you could keep the UFC out forever, eh, Toronto? You and the whole province of Ontario, just hanging out, watching hockey and that bullshit Canadian football, thinking you’re safe from MMA just because it’s technically illegal there. Well there’s one thing you didn’t plan on: Dana fucking White. And now he’s coming for you, and he won’t take no for an answer:
“I’m going after Canada after (I get approval in) New York and Massachusetts. I’m attacking Canada. I’m going to spend so much time in Canada I’ll have to buy a house. I’m going to live here until it’s done. I’m going to be sitting on the porch every day they come to work.”
You see what you’ve done, Toronto? You’ve forced Dana White to start stalking you. It’s like you’re Heather Locklear and White is me circa 1995. What can I say, it was a phase. Then she got old and starting appreciating the attention and I moved on with my life. It’s a whole thing I’d rather not get into. The point is, Toronto, I doubt you’ll be so lucky.
As much as Canadians seem to love MMA, it’s hard to understand the resistance to it at this point. But I guess you could say the same thing for New York. Eventually they’ll all give in, and they know it, so why not just quit stop screwing around and accept it. Unless this is all an elaborate ploy to see if Dana White will really buy that house. And he will. But damn, is the real estate market that bad even in Canada?
“Countdown to UFC 91″ airs tonight on Spike TV at 11 pm EST/PST. In this brief taste we get an idea of what the storyline between Randy Couture and Brock Lesnar is going to be, but somehow it still feels like less than an all-out promotional blitz for an event Dana White predicted would top one million pay-per-view buys. Maybe they think this one sells itself. Maybe they think the wrestling fans will come out in droves to buy this one like they never have before. Maybe they finally realized that the undercard is caught somewhere between mediocre and painfully weak, and they’re already thinking about hyping UFC 92.
After the jump, Matt Lindland stops by to give his analysis of the Couture-Lesnar matchup.
(’Oh, the bruises? It’s not her fault. I just make her so mad sometimes. She’s really very sweet. You don’t know the things she says to me when we’re alone’.)
“I’ve been in camp for over eight weeks and I’ve been pushing myself hard. It’s one thing if [it happens] two months out from a fight, but two weeks? It’s devastating. Even if I lost, worst case scenario, (including sponsorship money) I would still be out close to $40,000. Until all the paperwork and everything is done I’m not going to be cleared to fight somewhere else before the end of the year. It’s close to the holidays, I got a mortgage to pay, I’ve got two kids, it’s tough.”
Damn, Scott. Now I just feel terrible. There may have been a lot of small failures and a few colossal ones behind EliteXC’s demise, but you sure as hell can’t put any of it on Smith, whose clashes with Robbie Lawler were among the most memorable (for the right reasons) bouts in EliteXC’s brief history.
So if it ain’t Scott Smith’s fault, dammit, whose fault is it? Former Pro Elite VP of Home Entertainment Turi Altavilla doesn’t explicitly say it was Jared Shaw’s fuck-ups that did them in, but he certainly doesn’t absolve $kala from responsibility either. Apparently after Jared’s father, Gary Shaw, left the company under the condition that his son would stay on, things took a turn for the stupid:
“Jared would try and make it very clear that both he and the matchmaking team were calling the shots with the matchmaking,” says Altavilla. “There wasn’t even any pretending that they would try and throw us a bone. There were times when others had different ideas for matches that were clearly better ideas, and he’d make it clear that that wasn’t going to happen.”
[…]
“At the end of it all, you’re talking about guys with years and years of experience that have seen and done this on many levels, and then you’re talking about Jared, who was basically a fan,” says Altavilla. “It often seemed to me like he was a fan who won some reality show and got to be a part of an MMA company.”
[…]
“I think a lot of us were guilty of keeping our mouths shut, because we thought it was a matter of time before Jared was going to get the boot,” says Altavilla. “We thought it would be any week. Obviously, that never happened.”
Altavilla also criticizes the younger Shaw for becoming a part of Kimbo Slice’s entourage, for making their contract dispute with KJ Noons both public and personal, and for being a general jackass who preferred to show up and steal the limelight rather than do the actual work that makes an MMA event happen. Somehow I remain completely unsurprised at these accusations.
As for what ultimately went wrong with EliteXC, Altavilla said they simply “blew it.” Some more than others, it would seem.
(’Come on, Brock. What did we talk about? A little foundation is fine, but you go piling it on like this and it just makes you look desperate.’)
If you don’t like seeing Brock Lesnar in the UFC, and if you didn’t enjoy his appearance on E:60, you’re really not going to like this.
Maybe you hoped Dana White would give up on the former WWE star if he fails to beat Randy Couture. Maybe you just hoped he and his enormous traps would get stuck in a doorway somewhere in a remote part of Minnesota and he’d never be heard from again. Unfortunately for you, the second scenario is starting to sound more plausible than the first. Judging by Dana White’s remarks to The Sun, he seems to be absolutely smitten with Lesnar:
“It’s such an interesting fight because Couture is so good at coming up with plans for finding weaknesses in guys’ games and exposing them. But Lesnar’s such a different animal, this guy is so big, so strong and so fast at that weight it’s just phenomenal.
“For what he lacks in technique and knowledge, he makes up for in size, speed and power. Lesnar could go on to be the best heavyweight and the longest-reigning heavyweight - who knows what could happen with him.”
Who knows, indeed. He could go down in history as the greatest MMA fighter who ever lived. He could beat every heavyweight in the world, then travel into space to defeat intergalactic heavyweights. Instead of dying like a mortal man he could ascend to heaven on a winged white steed while angels sing a glorious song that churns the seas into a golden froth. Man, I have got to stop doing peyote in the afternoon.
The point is, it seems a little premature to get so worked up about a guy who’s 2-1 and has a bad habit of quitting stuff to go do other stuff, right? And then you hear this little afterthought thrown in there:
“If Couture loses to Lesnar, I don’t know how much more interest there is in a Fedor v Couture fight. I think you’d be looking at Fedor going up against whoever the best heavyweight at the time is.”
Okay, now I get it. White’s hedging his bets. If Couture wins, he’s still the champ and the UFC still has him under contract for two more fights. If Lesnar wins, it not only fits this heavyweight messiah storyline but it also kills the interest in a Fedor/Couture fight, or so Dana hopes.
You know who’s not so crazy about this plan? Fedor’s manager, Vadim Finklestein, who had this to say in a statement offered to FightLine.com:
Dana says UFC’s doors are wide open. Maybe they are. But these doors also shut tightly once the fighter signs with the organization. Randy Couture came back to the UFC and what now?
Instead of fighting the best in the promotion he has to fight a young upstart with 2-1 pro-record. Couture might not survive all the three contractual fights. I’m afraid that’s being made in order to finish the star which is Randy and not let him fight Fedor.
Finklestein goes on to say that Fedor doesn’t need to prove anything to anyone, that he can just hang out and fight Andrei Arlovski and Josh Barnett, and he likens Dana White to “a man with a big tasty pie who’s afraid that someone comes and bites a piece of it.”
I’m not sure that analogy helps make his point. If I had a big tasty pie, I doubt I’d want anyone biting pieces of it, either. You let one person do that, then pretty soon the whole neighborhood’s biting on your pie, and it’s so delicious, and word gets around, and…wait, what kind of pie is it? Goddamn peyote.
(’Hey, just because the company has gone under that doesn’t mean we can’t still hang out, right big guy?’ Photo courtesy of Esther Lin.)
If you’re wondering why we haven’t heard from Jared Shaw (aka: “little rapper kid”) since the collapse of Pro Elite, there’s a good reason. $kala has not been heard from because $kala does not want to be heard from. He has retreated from the media spotlight, as our friends at MMA Rated learned when they attempted to get him on the phone and instead got this outgoing voicemail message:
“This is the voicemail of Jared ‘Skala’ Shaw. Leave me a message and I will return it at my earliest opportunity. If this is a member of the media, I will not be returning your call. I’m sorry. Namaste.”
Seriously, Jared? Namaste? Does that mean you won’t return calls because you have a yoga class to get to?
Not that I blame $kala for not wanting to talk to the media right now, but it is something of a chickenshit move. Maybe it’s because he knows he doesn’t have any good answers to give. Maybe it’s because he doesn’t want to hear the inevitable questions about what role his cageside freakout might have played in the whole ordeal, and whether Pro Elite was truly forced to keep him on in order to get his father out. Who knows.
What we do know is that not returning calls isn’t going to keep people from talking about you, so wouldn’t you at least like a chance to give your perspective? Who would have thought that this is how Jared Shaw would go out. Freaking Namaste.
(Luis Cane’s pimp-slap, straight left combo. No one ever expects it. Props, UG.)
- Apparently the hip new trend for youngsters on the internet is to film themselves making UFC predictions and then throw it up on YouTube. Fightlinker spotted the very enthusiastic WishKid12 doing her thing, and decided to see how her picks matched up against those made by professionals like us. We’re proud to report that both Bens (weirdly, we made the exact same picks) soundly defeated this precocious prognosticator. While she went 2-3 on the night, we went 4-1 (curse you Cane, and your bitch-slapping awesomeness). The only one in this impromptu contest to beat us was Fightlinker, with a perfect 5-0. So basically we’re smarter than a twelve-year-old girl but dumber than drunk Canadians. That’s still better than either of our families ever expected.
- Patrick Cote tells MMA Mania that the UFC did not have him sign a contract extension prior to his title fight against Anderson Silva at UFC 90 this Saturday night. That’s notable since he’s at or near the end of his current contract, and typically the UFC makes sure they have a guy locked up before they take a chance on him becoming a belt-holder. At least, that’s what they do when they think the challenger has a chance in hell of winning.
- In case you were wondering, Dana White says he will reward Josh Koscheck with a shot at the welterweight title if he beats Thiago Alves this weekend. We all know how much White loves guys who are willing to step in on short notice, and Koscheck has a chance to turn Diego Sanchez’s misfortune into a big break for himself. Not that anyone’s really clamoring for GSP-Koscheck II at this point.
- MMA Payout takes issue with the UFC’s insinuation that Brandon Vera voluntarily sat out a year and then returned a different fighter. They point out that Vera was an early victim of the “Zuffa Freeze Out” and that by running around comparing the old Vera to the new one, Dana White may be unwittingly calling the wrong kind of attention to his own negotiation practices. Damn revisionist history.
(At first he claimed to have other plans that night, but no one was buying that.)
The fates of Diego Sanchez and Josh Koscheck are indeed intertwined in mysterious ways. The UFC sent out a release today announcing that Diego Sanchez has been forced to withdraw from his UFC 90 bout with Thiago Alves due to torn rib cartilage. Stepping in to face Alves on short notice will be Sanchez’s TUF 1 buddy, Josh Koscheck.
From the official release:
“There is nothing worse than having a great fight and then having one of the fighters drop out at the last second,” said UFC President Dana White. “But the one thing the UFC has proven time and time again is our ability to replace fights with ones as good as or better than the original fight, and we’ve done it again with the highly-ranked Josh Koscheck stepping up to replace Diego Sanchez against welterweight wrecking machine Thiago Alves. Hats off to Josh and Thiago, as not many fighters would agree to a matchup this tough on such short notice.”
[…]
“Josh Koscheck is a great fighter and I think he’s an even better matchup for me,” said Alves. “I’m looking forward to fighting him, and I’m gonna knock him out.”
[…]
“I think he’s a tough opponent,” said Koscheck. “He’s on a tear right now in the UFC and for me to step up and fight him, I think it’s gonna be an exciting fight. I’ve been in training since Chris Lytle, I haven’t taken any time off, and he’s a tough guy, so I’ve got to come in and fight him at my ‘A’ game.”
Alves is a tough opponent to step in against on short notice, but how could Koscheck resist such a golden opportunity to grind salt in Sanchez’s torn rib cartilage? The only thing worse than having to pull out of a big fight is having a rival swoop in and take it.
As late replacements go, Koscheck probably makes the most possible sense. Instead of throwing Alves against someone far lower on the welterweight totem pole, he gets someone at right about the same level. This bout, in terms of both quality of competition and future ramifications on the division, has simply made a lateral move. How many times have we been able to say that?
Dana White is downright pissed off. He’s so mad at EliteXC in this video, one camera angle is insufficient for capturing his rage. He lays into EliteXC for the Seth Petruzelli “knockout bonus” scandal and suggests that Jeremy Lappen and the Shaws should look into the kickboxing business if they want to keep fights off the ground so badly. I couldn’t agree more.
For his part, EliteXC Head of Operations Jeremy Lappen changes his story yet again in a talk with AOL Fanhouse. First, Lappen told Si.com that Petruzelli was offered a knockout bonus, but the company doesn’t offer submission bonuses. Then he told ESPN.com that Petruzelli was offered a KO bonus, a submission bonus, and a fight of the night bonus. Now he says both stories misquoted him:
“They’re both wrong,” Lappen said. “We have given submission bonuses in the past but they’re not as common as knockout bonuses. If the question is, ‘Have we ever given submission bonuses?’ The answer is yes. But we give knockout bonuses more often. We gave Seth a knockout bonus before the fight started. That was part of the deal.”
Hold up, you gave him a knockout bonus before the fight started? As in, before he had knocked anyone out? Goddammit Lappen, I sure as hell hope you were “misquoted” yet again. At the very least I hope it’s just poor phrasing on your part and what you meant to say was you told of him of a potential knockout bonus before the fight. But either way, it’s still bullshit. You offered him an incentive to win a fight in a very specific manner, not an incentive to simply finish the fight.
Not to mention, this is the third time you’ve changed your story. Nobody gets misquoted this often. Not unless they keep changing their story so often that they can’t keep all the versions straight in their own mind.
(Just saying guys, my birthday is coming up here pretty soon.)
In the UFC’s efforts to capitalize more on marketing and merchandising opportunities, they’ve been trying to get fighters to sign agreements which have come under fire for being a little too — surprise — one-sided. Sports Illustrated’s Josh Gross criticized the merchandising rights agreements for clauses that require fighters to sign away rights to their likenesses in perpetuity. In other words, the UFC owns that ass and depictions of said ass, and can do what they want with it. Several fighters — and by fighters we mean fighters’ agents — refused to sign. Now the UFC is turning up the heat on them by sending letters directly to the fighters in question, something of an ethics no-no:
Multiple sources have indicated that UFC officials are now sending letters to fighters who have not yet signed the Merchandising Rights Agreement. The letter warns fighters that if they do not return the executed Merchandising Rights Agreement by the end of the week, the offer will be rescinded, and the fighter will not be included in the UFC’s licensing program.
Even more outrageous, UFC officials are directly contacting fighters, instead of the fighters’ selected agents. Fighters are told that they are hearing only one side of the story from their selected representatives, and that the UFC’s Merchandising Rights program really is a great deal. By not signing the Merchandising Rights Agreement, fighters are told they are leaving money on the table.
The guys over at MMA Payout are calling this an attempt to “dupe” fighters, and likening it to the “moral morass that is the boxing scene, and not something that MMA promoters should be mimicking.”
Funny they should mention that, since Dana White reminded us just yesterday that one advantage the UFC has is that it doesn’t have to put up with boxing’s “political bullshit.” It’s all great timing, especially with the return of Couture, who said he first tussled with Zuffa over ancillary rights. One can’t help but wonder if he signed the merchandising rights agreement along with his new contract…
