Does Excellence Draw? Jake Shields and the Anderson Silva Paradox

I think Shields will be popular in the UFC, people under estimate him all the time.

He has had boring fights, but he is not a boring fighter at all. His match ups over the years have been limited, now that he is in the UFC they can afford to make stylistic match ups that are more exciting.

The big wild card here is elbow strikes, can they turn Jakes pillow fisted GnP into some Jon Jones style wrecking machine?

We all know Shields looks for the full mount in almost every fight, his stand up is pretty sloppy, and that can make for some interesting wars if the opponent he is facing has good TD defence.

I still think Kampmann is going to beat him though.

Perhaps his problem with Strikeforce was not only his style, which is just as dynamic as many more glorified, less effective UFC fighters, but the nagging feeling on the part of fans that he was not in there beating the best, and therefore, even as champion, was not the best. There’s a built-in fascination when it comes to watching a fighter that is universally regarded as the best at what he does within his weight class. Unfortunately, in the past, Shields has not benefited from it. As for Silva, his nationality and his personality are a huge factor.

chuck had an episode of entourage, espn the magazine and plenty of sportscenter, brocks always on espn, gsp has gatorade and under armour ads, rampage is in the A team

its not a coincidence that they’re the top draws

For Shields as a draw from here on it will depend not on if he wins but how he wins or loses.

When one realizes that the average payperview sales cited by Snoweden is for all events and that Anderson Silva’s fights were title events which have historically done even better it really brings to light what a non-draw he is. I personally find it sad, because he really is a magical fighter. But I shouldn’t be surprised, Stallone and Schwarzenegger easily sold more tickets than De Niro or Pacino.

What I find fascinating, but what everyone seems to be missing, is that while the UFC is obviously seen a growth in their payperview revenue, they are not seeing that growth universally distributed across all events but rather from Spikes in a few events per year.

Here are the average and medians for every year since 2006:
2006: average 526,000, median 463,500
2007: average 453,182, median 425,000
2008: average 522,083, median 505,000
2009: average 611,923, median 500,000
2010 (so far): average 605,000, median 510,000

The bulk of the UFC’s sales are dependent on several cards that really breakout. Here is the ratio for number of events per year against those that do above 700,000:
2006: 10:2
2007: 11:0
2008: 12:2
2009: 13:3
2010 (so far): 8:3

And if one looks at the fighters on those 7 cards that sold 700,000 plus since 2006, the same names spring up again and again -GSP (3 times), Brock (3), Rampage (2), Forest (2), BJ (2) Mir !!!(4). As the UFC grows in popularity the new fans seem focused solely on a few cards and the fighters that appear on them.

Is that Shields tries to finish fights. He moves to side mount, moves to mount, then tries to rain down punishment or get a sub, and gets reversed – because the guys he is fighting are top fighters.

Fitch seems happy to sit in half-guard and pound out a decision whoever he fights, even if it’s Ben Saunders. That’s why I hate watching Fitch fight – once it’s established that the opponent can’t stop his game, you might as well fast-forward to the decision. By contrast, I’ve loved Shield’s last two fights, because you could never quite tell what would happen.

As the article says, Anderson Silva, despite being hugely popular on sites like this, is not a draw when it comes to selling pay per views.

Jake Shields, like every fighter outside of the UFC who wasn’t named Kimbo or Gina, has never shown to be a draw.

However, the conclusion that Jake Shields will not draw in the UFC is a flawed one.

To start, let’s look at why Anderson Silva is not a draw:
1) He’s Brazilian. This automatically loses him points with a lot of US fans.
2) Despite having fought here for 5 years, he doesn’t even speak some English (like Nog, Silva, etc.)
3) His antics in the ring have moved past boring and into insulting to the fans.
4) He’s in the weakest division in the sport, and none of his opponents are going to make up for his lack of drawing power with their own.

Now, let’s look at Jake Shields:
1) Handsome, California based fighter. He’s well spoken and has an interesting backstory which will make him marketable to fans
2) Riding an insanely long win streak with a laundry list of titles behind him. Again, if this angle is pushed and marketed well, this will go over big with fans.
3) His style is very similar to one of UFC’s most popular fighters, GSP. GSP, who catches a lot of shit on message boards like this, still consistently draws a ton of PPV buys. Why? Because he’s classy, good looking, and dominant.
4) He’s coming into the deepest division in the sport, and will be able to fight a who’s who of talent that is more popular, and more likely to put on a better fight than most of the guys at 185.

Jake Shields just would not have the problems that Anderson Silva has. He’s in a better division, has a better backstory, and doesn’t have the attitude problems that have alienated so many people from Anderson Silva.

The only thing this example shows is the huge disconnect between polling people on MMA sites and what actually sells when the $50 is on the line.

What’s the best course of action then — to not sign him?

If SF were able to resign him of say Dream landed him exclusively, it would be a signal to writers that Zuffa was in trouble because they couldn’t get the best talent.

Shields dominates fights just as Silva dominates. The problem was with Strikeforce that the overall talent pool was way too shallow for them to put Shields on CBS and expect people to watch him headline a card which turned out to be all decisions, 3 of which were 5 round snoozers. Even when he fought on EliteXC cards his fights always seemed to not fit the 3-ring circus-esque atmosphere of the CBS cards. Strikeforce does not have many options, and while they do have fights and fighters that I actually enjoy watching, they lack that superstar with mass appeal to be able to push their product on national TV. I think they were hoping that Henderson would come in and recreate his Bisping KO with Shields, it almost happened, but ended up, more or less, exposing Hendo as an aging veteran with no gas tank. I personally like watching Jake fight because he seemingly relishes the underdog role and goes in there and wins…decisively. What makes his fights any different than GSP’s or Anderson Silva’s? yah it sucks having to waste another big name on a Silva headlined PPV. Hopefully Shields will step up his game and develop some effective striking, I think then he would be a fun fighter to watch

I’ve worked in business strategy most of my career, and sports/entertainment for part of it, some of that overlapping.

On competition and whether it’s good for fans/fighters, the standard line is that competition is generally GOOD for consumers, and monopoly is BAD. The reason is that you only have one choice of provider of MMA, and the prices will be high as a result.

Is strong (i.e. intense) competition at the promoter level good for fighters? Yes, because if the rivalry is strong, then the prices paid to fighters (in this case, “suppliers” or “employees” to the MMA promoter industry) will be high. If there is only ONE employer worth considering, it doesn’t have to pay high rates to suppliers/employees.

Generally, its a numbers game. If there are FEW fighters and MANY promoters, then the fighters receive high pay. The thing is, fighters are segmented into “stars” (weak draws) and “others” (weak draws). There is a separate overlay of course due to skill level, so Anderson can be a champion (therefore he must be employed) but can still be a poor draw. I would argue that the current state of affairs (with UFC dominant and Anderson a weak draw) would suggest that Anderson should earn less than other belt-holders with stronger draws. He may even earn less than popular fighters that are only contenders.

Sports has at least one special characteristic that counters all this. The fact that, with high fragmentation at the promoter level, the quality of the product is diminished. In plain English, if all your top fighters are spread out across 10 promotions, you’re going to mostly see crappy fights where the top guy beats everyone he faces easily. So from a product point of view, maximum quality is achieved when all the top fighters are concentrated in one promotion. Even if you have two sizable promotions that split the top talent between them, frustration exists among the fans (i.e. “why don’t we get to see Fedor fight Brock?”… and we also probably enjoy Overeem taking on the top HWs).

Therefore, on balance I believe the overall best for the industry is actually a single dominant promotion that owns the top talent; and perhaps several 2nd tier promotions that serve as development for fighters. Think NFL and College Football. In Australia, where I come from, the national football league is called the AFL and there are regional football leagues in each state forming the 2nd tier. All the best teams and players are in the AFL. Overall the fans prefer it that way.

Imagine how it would be if, in Boxing, each of the major promotions had exclusive rights to some of the top fighters in each weight class. It would be pretty bad.

Add it all up, I come down in favor of UFC holding the top talent, and regional promotions developing new and exciting up-and-comers. They should contract these up-and-comers, and be prepared to sell any time remaining on their contracts at an agreed price to the UFC; if UFC chooses not to buy out these contracts, then the regionals will keep the fighter, benefiting from their increasing brandname/draw and skill during this period.

Well managed, the various promotions can survive at a decent level; while the UFC dominates the big side of town and makes excess profits. Sure, right now it feels like they are sitting pretty while fighters get hurt to earn the $ for the organisation. But think about how much hard work and investment and risk those business owners went through to reach this point. And the business smarts they used to get there. A good return on investment is warranted.

I would argue that UFC probably is a little more community minded than many corporates, its community being the MMA community. Some of those large profits do go back to the fighters in terms of investment/career management seminars, extra bonuses, and probably various kinds of insurance. I’d not be surprised if a UFC fighter gets KIA, Zuffa would take good care of his family.

Market forces in the end determine who gets what slice of the pie. If the risk/return tradeoff as a fighter is poor, then people won’t pursue that career, and Zuffa will have a weak roster. That means they HAVE to pay attractive enough rates that good fighters want to join up. Realistically, any skilled fighter ought to make pretty decent money in this day and age, and any fighter who can’t make a decent living commensurate with the damage he his taking, ought to hang up his gloves.

Sorry, long winded I know… but this is one of the rare occasions when I think I have something valuable to contribute :P

Excellence on its own will not draw as big as excellence coupled with personality/charisma/ x-factor, and promotional effort.

You could come up with a Cola product better than Coke. But if you don’t have some interesting advertising and promotion, if you don’t invest any time and money in driving sales, you will never sell more than Coke.

I think any fighter that wants to make the big bucks and be relevant to the UFC and the fans (and SPONSORS!!!! think Agassi, Federer, Nadal, Sharapova) should put some effort into self-promotion and shaping their image. If they are skilled enough to make good bucks without it, and don’t care to make more, that’s OK too. But it’s more fun if they DO make the effort, IMHO.

The LPGA insists all their golfers learn English. While this seems a tough and unfair ask, just think in commercial terms. If the UFC wants this as a contract term, it’s part of the negotiation. A good manager could perhaps squeeze some extra cash out of the UFC in return. And the fighter ultimately benefits, being a better draw and better sponsorship material in the English dominated world.

Jake had one "bad’ fight against Mayhem, a fight he dominated. He didn’t get the finish largely because Strikeforce has a NO ELBOWS rule, elbows would have made it easy for Shields to flatten out Miller and do damage from inches instead of feet.