Should Strikeforce Fire Fedor Emelianenko and Let Him Go to the UFC?

Okay, yeah admittedly that was a close fight and I was pissed it was so freakin’ short because no clear victor had emerged by the time it was over. I still gave the nod to Tate, but I was a bit biased towards her (DAT ASS)

Agreed on Kajula.

Strikeforce clearly decided that they could use the spare parts from EliteXC, glued to the chassis of their own promotion, and put Vadim and Fedor in the driver’s seat, and that it would let them outrace the UFC. It hasn’t worked.

but you honestly can’t believe those comparisons are legitimate. A boxing champion vs. MMA legend co-headlining with a LW title fight is a legitimate PPV over a bodybuilder who has never competed in contact sports vs. a ninja turtle.

Huerta got shelved because he was trying to play games with the UFC, and the UFC won. don’t bite the hand that feeds you. Same with Fitch. If you don’t want to play ball, wait until your contract is up, and play somewhere else. There were plenty of people that wanted to play ball in his place under the UFC’s terms, and Fitch ended up coming back.

are weak save for the Fitch/Kos/Swick triad.

Up until recently, GSP, Silva, and Machida were champions of their respective divisions. Superfights are never expected in combat sports.

I’m not even sure why you included Jon Jones.

I’ve driven an hour and a half to eat at a White Castle before, you just can’t have your stomach abused like that by the standard fast food out there. Now they are a brand that intentionally limits their size and growth, they don’t even do franchising.

I’m with you on the WEC. The pound for pound most exciting promotion.

WEC is my favorite promotion just based on how much more exciting the fights are than anyone elses cards but I don’t see them having a long life due to them just being a placefiller promotion until the UFC frees up from being “exclusive” to SpikeTV.

The metaphor was pretty silly to start with but I just love me some Hardees (my wife hates Hardees so it’s a rare treat). Still all your points are right but it doesn’t really change the fact that they are in direct competition, particularly when it comes to Strikeforce wanting to expand into the PPV market (and Showtime is a PPV provider too, that is how they make their boxing money, I would have to bet they would love to tap that with MMA too. For them it’s not just about putting events on Showtime for free it’s about the real money being on PPV). You better believe that they are after market shares even if they aren’t on tv on the same nights currently.

In and Out burger is an almost exclusive California chain, I have never even seen one of their resturants more/less tried their food.

The cut to 205 comment has to do with the huge fucking tire around his waist. And like a lot of other fans, I enjoy shitting on Fedor because of the career path he chose post Pride. Enjoy swinging from the Fedors nuts. Sherdog my ass.

and a few heavyweights, I forget who though. It was well documented, I’m too lazy to google it since I’m posting in between cooking right now.

people get on Coker for signing Fedor and stepping up to the UFC in the first place but in his defense Showtime doesnt want to be in the MMA business unless they can compete with the UFC.

You know logic, you drive me absolutely nuts sometimes, but this is spot on. Coker and Strikeforce are in a complete Catch-22. Their biggest business partners have visions of them supplanting or at least equalling the UFC, but until Strikeforce DOES, those partners won’t fully commit, leaving Strikeforce perpetually twirling in the wind. In all honest, I don’t want Strikeforce to fail; shit, they have some good fights and a couple of people I know fight for them. That’s my friends’ livelihoods that are on the line, not just Coker’s reputation or Strikeforce’s brand. But they’ve backed themseves into a corner with a couple of dumb business decisions.

So basically, some people at Showtime must have looked at Dana White and said, “Oh my God, look at this crack-pot. If he can do it, we can too.”

But they couldn’t.

So now, Showtime/Strikeforce (who the heck actually owns Strikeforce?) is just trying a bunch of stuff since the original goal gets farther and farther out of reach. Of course, the problem is that in order for any of the stuff they’re trying to actually work, they’d need to really put everything they have into one major idea. And they can’t afford to do that.

I’ve seen this sort of thing before. With the benefit of hindsight, you are probably right—it would have been best to use Gina Carano to corner female mma. Then they would have been the legitimate premier organization for something, anyway.

So the options now are:

1. Hope Fedor “comes through” somehow.
2. Hope that some washed up former pro-wrestlers can sell a ppv.
3. Put together an awesome card (with who though?) for the next CBS show and convince CBS to stick around.
4. Try to build up their women’s division into something really valuable, since at least the UFC isn’t competition in this realm.

Well, I’m glad I don’t have to make these kinds of decisions.

Exactly. Fedor has never been a draw so now after he loses he will be? It doesn’t work that way.

There are a few smaller promotions doing a couple of shows a year with mainly Swedish fighters, and then there’s the larger Rumble of the Kings events
which usually have some high-level K-1 and Muay Thai bouts, but also a few MMA matches thrown in. Here’s a link if you want to check out how the upcoming November event is shaping up so far (I’ll be going to that one).

The numbered UFC events are shown live (at 4-7 in the night usually) on a cable sports channel, also replayed at various times, and the same channel also shows TUF with a weeks delay from when they air in the US. To my knowledge there is no way to see Strikeforce, DREAM, Sengoku etc, without the use of the internet (I download events from torrent sites after they’ve aired).
MMA is slowly becoming more and more popular among mostly young males, but it’s nowhere near the level of the US.

Right now we only have one fighter in one of the major orgs, which is Alexander Gustafsson who fights in the UFC LHW division. He’s a young guy with a bright future ahead of him I think (fun fact: we grew up in the same small town and have several common friends, never met him though). Before him you’d might remember lightweights David Bielkheden and Per Eklund who both had three fights each in the UFC, going 1-2 before being released. Other than those there are no big stars right now, but we have several pro-fighters on the European circuit, and the MMA scene is growing, so who knows what the future will hold.