Strikeforce's Afromowitz: Commission Reps Say John Woods' Tests Never Sent
by Brent Brookhouse on Aug 14, 2010 4:36 PM EDT
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Strikeforce's Mike Afromowitz sends the following along:
We DID NOT lose the blood test results of Christian Grosinsky's opponent. Strikeforce did not handle the licensing of the fighters on the undercard. The commission informed us that John Wood's blood test results were not turned in and, therefore, ruled him ineligible to compete. I will gladly have someone from the commission verify this information for you.
More details to come as they become available.
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It is becoming obvious that Strikeforce had nothing to do with it. When you outsource to another company, you aren’t responsible for their employees getting paid. However, in this situation, even though there was no wrongdoing on Strikeforce’s behalf (I believe), it will be a PR nightmare for them, especially with casual fans who don’t know the industry well. It might behoove them to just pay the guy and move on. If I were them, I wouldn’t be too quick to jump back into bed with RITC either.
Fighting is actually the best thing a man can have in his soul.
You can delegate authority, but you can never delegate reponsibility.
This is the inherent problem with Strikeforce. They have lost control of so many parts of what makes up the Strikeforce product, yet fail to realize that since it is their product it still reflect terribly on them when those parts fuck up.
I like Fedor, it’s just his fans that are intolerable...and his management.
by Razreshat on Aug 14, 2010 6:20 PM EDT up reply actions 6 recs
You mean that there's another side to the story
that people jumped on to shit all over Strikeforce instinctively? Shocking! They’ll be embarrassed to see this!*
*No they wont. It’s still Coker’s fault somehow.
"Someone is WRONG on the internet. What do you want me to do? LEAVE? Then they'll keep being wrong!"
-Randall Munroe
by pdl on Aug 14, 2010 5:02 PM EDT reply actions 1 recs
I can just shift all the blame to Kid Nate, right?
Nick Garcia is the Brian Russell of MLS but 10 times worse.
Kid Nate supplied Shane Carwin with PEDs.
"Someone is WRONG on the internet. What do you want me to do? LEAVE? Then they'll keep being wrong!"
-Randall Munroe
It’s not Strikeforce’s fault that they didn’t license all the fighters on their card?
When a true genius appears in the world, you may know him by this sign, that the dunces are in a confederacy against him. - Jonathan Swift
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by Derek Suboticki on Aug 14, 2010 5:26 PM EDT up reply actions
I’m not sure if I understand the question but I believe you are implying that Strikeforce should not outsource their undercards to other organizations. I agree, they shouldn’t. But, the fact that they did doesn’t give them any culpability in this other then making a misjudgment about RITC. Assuming Strikeforce fulfilled their obligation, if any, to RITC, then this falls on the shoulders of RITC, that’s it. Unfortunately, it probably won’t play out that way in the minds of the casual fans who get wind of this.
Fighting is actually the best thing a man can have in his soul.
It doesn’t play out that way to me – the only way to make sure something is done correctly is to do it yourself. If Zuffa had outsourced something this sensitive and a fighter got burned as a result, we’d throw them on the fire for it. Why? Because it’s the right thing to do.
When a true genius appears in the world, you may know him by this sign, that the dunces are in a confederacy against him. - Jonathan Swift
Contributor for WatchKalibRun.com
Still Subo at Fightlinker.com
by Derek Suboticki on Aug 14, 2010 5:45 PM EDT up reply actions
I agree that if you want something done right, you gotta do it yourself. I think out-sourcing prelims is a terrible idea. This is a perfect example of why. However, depending on contract wording, I really don’t think Strikeforce has any liability here in the legal sense. As I stated before, it would probably be in their best interest to just pay the guy themselves and spin it as them being the hero coming in and doing something they didn’t have to because it was the right thing to do. In my eyes, I really can only hold them at fault for picking a business model that isn’t what I consider to be ideal.
Fighting is actually the best thing a man can have in his soul.
Legally no, they probably don’t owe the guy anything. Morally, I think they should at least give the guy some sort of restitution.
by ufc4 on Aug 14, 2010 6:23 PM EDT via mobile up reply actions
coker
so many people are anti Coker, its kinda sad. He’s a legit MMA fan and promoter trying to grow his company. Clearly this whole blood test fiasco wasn’t his or SF’s fault, and everyone needs to chill the eff out.
by phillynix on Aug 14, 2010 5:26 PM EDT up reply actions 2 recs
I feel like asking if you think Dana White is a legit MMA fan and promoter trying to grow his company.
When a true genius appears in the world, you may know him by this sign, that the dunces are in a confederacy against him. - Jonathan Swift
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by Derek Suboticki on Aug 14, 2010 5:29 PM EDT up reply actions
That is entirely relevant!
a kitten dies every time you compare an individual sport to a team sport.
by Marvin Malehooves on Aug 14, 2010 5:39 PM EDT up reply actions
I have nothing against Coker and/or Strikeforce. I don’t think they did anything wrong here. I’ll be a fan for as long as they keep putting on the fights that I want to see…. oh, wait, crap. Well, they occasionally put on fights that pique my interest. Oh, and it’s free. So, there’s that. Yeah.
Fighting is actually the best thing a man can have in his soul.
this is sad
Looking at the previous article, its clear that there’s a ton of people out there ready to crap all over Strikeforce at the slightest hint of a problem or controversy. Clearly, as fusion stated, this was not Strikeforce’s fault, and therefore they shouldn’t be blamed for the lack of proper blood test results. This is clearly a fabricated and poorly researched story. I wish journalists in all fields would try to get the all their facts before going off on something.
Now that I’ve said that, I hope that we hear from that commission to confirm what Afromowitz said
Always another side
Yeah, I agree with QuickJack and fusion. People are always way too quick to jump to conclusions. I actually really liked the Challengers thing last night that SF put on, and its sad that a lame, probably untrue story about SF losing blood test results (aka not being organized) has been put out there to smear the otherwise successful event.
Why is it that all these "miscommunication" & "misunderstanding" never seem to happen to the UFC?
Honest question…is it that they just have more people making sure things don’t fall through the cracks…or perhaps people are more diligent because they don’t want to get on the UFC’s bad side.
GSP is an alien sent here to humiliate our men and mate with our women
Of course they happen to the UFC too. Only, Zuffa has the resources to fix problems quickly and efficiently which renders said problem a moot point and not worthy of being publicized by any of the folks they do business with. Also, being who they are, they keep as much as possible internal so we just don’t hear about it.
Fighting is actually the best thing a man can have in his soul.
Also, the UFC and Zuffa maintain control over all aspect of their product.
They don’t outsource very important parts and then act like its not their fault when those parts of their product end up a mess.
Anyone who has ever held a leadership position of any kind should have any easy to seeing why Strikeforce rightfully is getting shit on over this.
I like Fedor, it’s just his fans that are intolerable...and his management.
Lol UFC's bad side
I mean who knows, could be a reason. I’d say more likely its because Strikeforce is a smaller operation than UFC, and generally has less resources. Its one reason why they weren’t doing the licensing for the fighters in the undercard. If it were UFC, more likely that would all have been done in house. That’s just my guess anyways, and sometimes mistakes happen.
Precedent? :-D
When a true genius appears in the world, you may know him by this sign, that the dunces are in a confederacy against him. - Jonathan Swift
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by Derek Suboticki on Aug 14, 2010 5:37 PM EDT up reply actions
Pageview journalism?
Go look at the original story – they reported what they had and said more than once that it wasn’t clear exactly what happened and that it was one source thus far. That’s what we call a “story”. A story has a beginning, middle and end – generally. They started it, and things develop. Get that garbage out of here.
And then God created Saturn... and he liked it, so he put a ring on it.
Twitter me and what not.
I was anything but quick to do so.
I waited for HOURS without comment from them. They’ve blown me off in the past on similar requests for information (hoping that it blows over usually) so i published the earlier story with a note that I would update the story with Strikeforce’s comments. As soon as they provided them I didn’t bury them, I put up a new piece at the top of the page devoid of commentary from me and more information is coming.
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by Brent Brookhouse on Aug 15, 2010 12:34 PM EDT up reply actions
For the last time let me explain
Strikeforce is not the UFC. They don’t have the staff, the revenue, the roster to do anything close to what they UFC does. They work with others so that they can book fights for Showtime and get a license fee. That is really it.
- they team up with local promotions to set up a show. The local promotions helps with logistics and gets to run the prelims for a cut (often a big cut) of the gate.
- Strikeforce does not book the prelims. Those are (mostly) handled by the local promotion. That is why they are never aired, because those are not Strikeforce fighters. They are not under contract with Strikeforce they are under contract with whomever they teamed up with. Strikeforce does this because they only get paid for the aired portion of the fight so it makes no sense to book a lot of expensive talent on the prelims. In fact the Challengers are basically their prelims.
- Strikeforce does not handle the TV production, That is all Showtime. Strikeforce is paid to put together a card so that Showtime (or CBS) can air it. Showtime doesn’t book the fights but the fights have to be cleared by them. So when we sit and bitch about the broadcasts, thats a Showtime issue.
Strikeforce does all of this because Showtime pays them $700,000 for a normal card and $300,000 for a Challengers card. More than any other promotion not named the UFC makes outside of Japan (that includes the WEC). The reason they have to do all these cost cutting measures is also because they are working for license fees which add up to $8 million a year and not the estimated $250 million in ppv revenue the UFC makes.
Now I am not saying no one should complain about what Strikeforce is or is not doing, but if you are going to do so, at least be aware of why some of these actions are taken.
by John Nash on Aug 14, 2010 6:46 PM EDT reply actions 3 recs
I know how it works....
but it’s still not a good business plan unless you are willing and able to deal with the consequences. I am not saying they aren’t willing or able, and hopefully it all gets worked out. It’s still a problem in the PR aspect though.
Fighting is actually the best thing a man can have in his soul.
Right...
But the issue with all of that is it’s a zero growth business plan. They can never grow with the business model they are working with. They are capped at that 8 million a year. They can’t afford to sign big names outside of “freakshow” types, or UFC cast offs. They aren’t growing their own talent because as you said, they don’t really have their own prelims to do it on. To make it even worse, since Showtime is doing all the production that means that even if they did their own preliminaries like they have in the past, they often don’t get taped or taped with a single camera making highlight packages of henceforth hypothetical homegrown fighters non-existant.
It just seems like a zero-growth business model, and has for a long time now, with a lot of moves made to give the appearance of growth. Did Strikeforce really grow a lot by partnering with DREAM? Not really, but it sure looked like it was going to open the flood gates for some exciting fights. Now they are talking about doing the same kinda thing with Bellator. We had the whole Fedor thing, and we had the whole Dan Henderson thing. Fedor slapped the sleeping giant so to speak, and Dan Henderson has proven to be more of a trojan horse than a useful turn coat and draw.
If you aren’t growing you’re dying, and Strikeforce seems to do more to give the illusion of being a growing and thriving org than actually you know, growing.
Associate Writer - WindyCityGridiron.com - Artist formerly known as Sklz711
It's a growth business plan
SF has a 3 year 25mil. contract with Showtime.
When the contract is up and Showtime is satisfied with the Ratings, SF will lobby for a bigger contract (depending on how the Ratings have done).
In the End SF is still flirting with a PPV, but they don’t wanna rush it.
Nobodies asking strikeforce to be the UFC… people are asking strikeforce to make things right especially when the fighters did everything they were supposed to do. Who gives a fuck if they outsource part of the show… they are still responsible. Whether they have to force their outsource partner to make things right or do it themselves it’s their responsibility.
The fighter did what he was responsible for it’s only fair to ask the promoter to act in kind.
That’s not asking strikeforce to be the UFC because clearly they are not… that’s asking strikeforce to be a responsible organization. Simple.
I have no problem with Strikeforce farming out the prelims, but it is still their name on the banner. When a subcontractor fucks up, you can’t just wash your hands of it and say ‘not our problem’. The fact of the matter is, the problem occurred during a Strikeforce branded event. They are responsible for seeing that it gets fixed.
I like Coker and enjoy SF, but time and time again, there seems to misunderstandings and miscommunications. Fights not happening, be it for this or timing issues or whatever else.
A number of fighters (Kaufman and Riggs among them) have complained about a lack of communication and organization. Hughes talked about guys waiting for an hour plus to be stitched up. Now is this all in the hands of SF? No, but these things seem to keep happening at Strikeforce shows. Regardless of whether or not these things are under their control, they need to step up and make sure things go smoother.
There certainly are two sides of every story, but we have BOTH fighters telling the same story and Wood’s side is also saying they sent SF the paperwork. So if I am reading this right, SF is calling these two fighters liars. If the paperwork was not supposed to go to SF, shouldn’t the fighter have been made aware of this?
There are a lot of issues here
And somehow Strikeforce manages to be in the wrong on all of them. It doesn’t make any difference if they outsourced the undercard: Apple outsources production and Dell outsources support. When shot goes wrong on one of their products, who gets the blame? Who has to make it right?
Some people are saying that Strikeforce doesn’t have the resources to do the right thing. That doesn’t excuse these kind of screwups, it makes me wonder why they’re in a business they don’t have the resources to conduct properly. If you can’t afford go be a promoter, you shouldn’t be in the business.
Allthis talk about the casual fans is wrong as well. First of all, they’ll never hear about it. Most casual fans havent heard of the Strikeforce Callengers Series. Second, if they do, they’ll be right to blame Strikeforce. As above, if your name is on the marquee, you’re responsible.
Finally: doesn’t this make you wish the UFC would co-promote?
Don't believe a word I say, I don't train BJJ.
I blog at TangleBones - you should follow me on Twitter here.
If you like it, you should put a rec on it.
by jemaleddin on Aug 15, 2010 8:44 AM EDT via mobile reply actions
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