Dana White Laid Ground Work for Lyoto Machida vs Quinton Rampage Jackson in 2006
by Kid Nate on May 24, 2009 9:27 PM EDT
in MMA News
Email
Print
You can't say Dana White doesn't take the long view in running the Zuffa fighting empire. Last night at the post-UFC 98 press conference he announced Lyoto Machida's first title defense will be against Quinton "Rampage" Jackson, per MMA Weekly:
The victory on Saturday was a validation of his investment in the Machida's tactical, karate-based style, which drew early criticism from fans.
"We bought the WFA to acquire his contract and Rampage's," added White. "I've always thought this kid was talented."
Dana made that investment back at the end of 2006 and Rampage was already well-enough known to be part of the story when the purchase was made, but Lyoto was not, from MMA Weekly:
Sources close to the situation told MMAWeekly.com that Quinton Jackson and Heath Herring are two of the fighters that are part of the deal and will soon be fighting in the UFC. Comments from UFC President and Zuffa co-owner Dana White in Zuffa's press release would seem to support that information: "Zuffa is committed to giving our fans the best fights between the best fighters in the world. This acquisition helps us continue fulfilling that goal... bringing the WFA fighters into the Zuffa family is the best thing that could happen for the fighters - and for the fans."
Its interesting to note that the WFA purchase has now produced two champions in the marquee 205lb decision division while the much more heralded and expensive PRIDE acquisition has only produced one interim champion in Nogueira.
34 comments
|
0 recs |
Do you like this story?
Comments
WFA>Pride (ducks and covers)
Keep firing Assholes!
This is a dream competition for me. I drink as much coffee as I want, and eventually I hallucinate.
I wish Dana would stop giving me reasons to like him – it takes all the fun out of bashing him.
Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try Again. Fail again. Fail better. -Samuel Beckett
by Scott C. Broussard on May 24, 2009 9:56 PM EDT reply actions
I think he meant division. I’m going to edit it. If I’m not here tomorrow, you know why.
by Cannon Jacques on May 24, 2009 10:49 PM EDT up reply actions
I understand that the last statement in this article is specifically talking about what the purchase of WFA versus PRIDE did for UFC, and Rampage may have come directly from WFA to UFC, but get serious, Rampage IS a PRIDE product. The last statement in this article seems more like an excuse to make a cheap shot at PRIDE than anything else. I apologize if I’m wrong about the intent of the statement, but it does sound that way. It just seems like a bit of an unfair statement.
I think...
it’s just a statement that the more subtle WFA deal has produced bigger results than the more high profile PRIDE deal.
Contributing Editor - BloodyElbow.com - SBNation's mixed martial arts headquarters.
http://CurseOfRonKarkovice.blogspot.com/
by Brent Brookhouse on May 24, 2009 11:58 PM EDT up reply actions
Nate is a notorious Japanese MMA fan...
so I really doubt it was a cheap shot.
Contributing Editor - BloodyElbow.com - SBNation's mixed martial arts headquarters.
http://CurseOfRonKarkovice.blogspot.com/
by Brent Brookhouse on May 24, 2009 11:59 PM EDT up reply actions
what Brent said
I just realized that the WFA deal has produced more champions than the PRIDE deal and I thought it was interesting.
"the spirit of your average dumbass with more overblown rhetoric" OR "the self-appointed savior of MMA"
It doesn’t mean that at all, it’s a point about contracts they got directly from buyouts (althought the Big Nog reference is a mistake as he signed before the Pride buy out). Rampage may of fought a lot in Pride but the UFC directly aquired his services from WFA not Pride and I’m pretty sure that was the whole point.
Well when you get down to it Nogueira signed with the UFC before the Pride acquisition too, he wasn’t part of that deal either.
Well...
Anderson was nowhere near being a part of the PRIDE acquisition. Nog was.
Contributing Editor - BloodyElbow.com - SBNation's mixed martial arts headquarters.
http://CurseOfRonKarkovice.blogspot.com/
by Brent Brookhouse on May 25, 2009 12:27 AM EDT up reply actions
Nog was a free agent when the UFC bought Pride, his signing was unrelated.
Although Frank and Lorenzo Fertitta now own the Pride Fighting Championships, Nogueira was not simply "assigned" to the UFC. In fact, he was not yet under a contract with any organization and White had expressed interest in luring Nogueira to the UFC in the past.
http://www.mmaweekly.com/absolutenm/templates/dailynews.asp?articleid=3747&zoneid=1
By "Nog was"
I mean…it was in the same general time frame. He was very much someone I would consider a “PRIDE fighter” at the time whereas Jackson was not in any way.
Contributing Editor - BloodyElbow.com - SBNation's mixed martial arts headquarters.
http://CurseOfRonKarkovice.blogspot.com/
by Brent Brookhouse on May 25, 2009 12:48 AM EDT up reply actions
I was just pointing out that the Pride acquisition didn’t produce Big Nog either, like Cro Cop he was already a free agent and a separate signing at the time not someone who came over in the Pride buyout(funny note: both of them’s last contracted Pride fight was Josh Barnett too). People may consider him a “Pride fighter” but he wasn’t part of the deal at all.
The point was to kill Pride. Mission accomplished.
by Derek Suboticki on May 26, 2009 9:32 PM EDT up reply actions
With the PRIDE purchase, Zuffa and the UFC became the only place for all of these free agents to sign. Even though many of these fighters like Nog and Mirko didnt come directly with the PRIDE Package, it made the UFC the only major player at the table for them to fight for. There was no more leverage for the fighters to use at the negotiating table because the only other major MMA organization they could sign with was just bought up by the UFC.
That happened because of the Pride scandal not the UFC purchase of Pride. Pride wasn’t able to re-sign top paid guys once they lost their tv contract, even if the UFC hadn’t of bought Pride they were already done. Of course there was still K-1 Heroes in Japan for guys to sign with and WVR started a short time after that too. In the US there was EliteXC making a lot of waves and throwing around some money for fighters during that timeframe too. Bodogfight even jumped in there and gave Fedor a PPV fight at that time.
Heck it should be noted that very few former Pride fighters ended up in the UFC after all this went down as most waited until they were free agents again and signed someplace else. Far from the UFC having leverage the UFC couldn’t even sign the majority the guys they had tied up because of the Pride deal. Instead of locking up the industry the Pride deal seemed to free up a lot of talent that helped other orgs grow stronger. Besides Hendo, Shogun and Wanderlei who did the UFC actually pick up out of the Pride deal?
actually everyone had to sign new deals… not one fighter came over from with the actual pride purchase.
The purpose of buying Pride was to own the video library. Thus making any fighters who didn’t decide to sign with the UFC unable to market themselves (or be marketed) ala Fedor.
Fedor is a great fighter but unknown in the USA because very few people have seen him fight and there is no easy way to remedy that.
We still don’t see Pride fights of guys that signed with the UFC played by the UFC either, your lucky if you get a couple of small clips from those fights shown during the hype. Oh and aparently Fedor owns his own footage too so that’s not really an issue for him but you still don’t see those fights circulated. It’s not about controlling the footage it’s about the fact that casual fans don’t know or care about what happened in Japan and they don’t watch old Pride fights(does FSN still show the old Pride clipshow? You don’t see those fights shown anywhere else). The UFC is very good at hyping up fighters to the casual fans, even without showing old footage they know how to sell a fighter.
WFA purchase
wow I totally forgot that Machida was in WFA King of the Streets fight card. that fight was quite forgetable,like his first 4 UFC fights.I hope that the Hitman Martin Kappmann has the same success as Rampage & Machida.it would be awesome if the WFA purchase produced 3 champions.I sure hope that he gets a fight against a top 5-7 fighter soon and continues his climb into title contention.
Comments For This Post Are Closed
Secondary Sidebar
User Tools
FanPosts
Community blog posts and discussion.
Recommended FanPosts
Recent FanPosts
MMA Rankings
Certain photos copyright © 2012 by Associated Press or Getty Images. Any commercial use or distribution without the express written consent of Associated Press and Getty Images is strictly prohibited.
