Fightlinker is wringing his hands over the lack of outrage that a presumably Hepatitis infected Aleksander Emelianenko is still fighting and no one in the MMA media is complaining:

You know the dude’s got a serious issue when even Japan says “You’re not allowed to fight.” So why is a guy who’s basically the Tommy Morrison of MMA getting a free pass from the MMA media? Is it because he’s Fedor’s little brother? Or do we just care so little about the safety of his opponents?

There’s all sorts of signs pointing towards Aleks having hepatitis. If he’s still FIGHTING, that’s a health risk to everyone he fights. You’d think there should be some responsible journalistic outlet raising some questions about the whole situation instead of licking it’s chops in eager anticipation of Aleks’ next fight. Hey, I used to be down with the A to the E too, but this is fucking nuts. The guy might have a life threatening disease and he’s fighting in MMA!

And MMA Mania is reporting that Baby Fedor Kiril Sidelnikov's bad showing at the last Affliction show was even worse than we thought at the time. Hard to believe he needed drugs to look like that. Quote from Bill Douglas of the CSAC:

Kirill Sidelnikov, who last competed at Affliction’s Day of Reckoning event on January 24, has been suspended for testing positive for Stanozolol. The suspension period is retroactive to the conclusion of the bout on January 24 and runs through January 18, 2010. He has been fined $2,500. The mere presence of Stanozolol in the system constitutes a violation under the new testing procedures for CSAC.

Photo of Kiril by Esther Lin.

Dave Meltzer has buyrate updates on the UFC and Affliction in his latest newsletter(subscription only--it's worth it.)  First, UFC 94:

The trending information and some early information from a variety of sources gives an inconclusive picture nailing down how UFC 94 did, but it appears to have fallen short of early predictions regarding blowing away all previous company marks.

Based on the early trending data, it overall looks to be just over 1 million buys, with the major boost coming from Canada, where it was a record setter.

There are other reports from those with actual knowledge of PPV numbers themselves who have said at this point the confirmed number of buys was closer to 800,000, which, if true, would be a disappointment by today’s standards.

He also has an update on Affliction numbers:

For what it’s worth, Richard Schafer of Golden Boy claimed 150,000 to 200,000 buys for Day of Reckoning. Tom Atencio only said they were up 50% from the first show, which, depending on what the first show did (estimates ranging from 90,000 to 115,000), could be anywhere from 135,000 to 175,000. Independent sources continue to have the number at between 80,000 and 120,000, with most saying 100,000. It’s still too early to get what I’d consider a reliable number, but several trending patterns are in and they indicate a slight decline from the first show. 

Overall, it's still too early to tell on both, but it looks like both places had some relatively disappointing news.  Still, it's only disappointing compared to what they put out there.  A number between 800,000 and 1 million for GSP and BJ Penn is still tremendous, and anything over 100k for a promotion without television is very good.

Josh Barnett was on Tapout Radio today, and covered a number of different subjects.  One of the best parts was where he went nuts on Florian for criticizing his technique on MMA Live:

Kenny Florian is a punk-ass bitch.  He thinks he can put on a suit, shave his stubble off, and get in front of a camera, and it makes him some sort of expert on MMA.  I think it just makes him an expert on taking it up the ass, as far as I can tell...if he thinks his ability on the mat can match his mouth, and if he'd like to show me how to throw an armbar, then be my guest....I can fly out to "sit on a dong," grab him, and see what he's got to say now.

This was one of the most immature outbursts I've heard in a while.  No word on whether he will call out other men who weigh close to 90 pounds less than him.  Florian voiced a common opinion, that Barnett should have been able to finish Yvel sooner, and that he would have liked to have seen a better performance.  He said that if he couldn't finish Yvel from the top, a lot of people will have trouble seeing him beat Fedor.  I assume Barnett is mad about Florian's comment about Barnett messing up an armbar from the top.  Compared to sports analysis on ESPN all the time for other sports, it was a very tame comment.

Florian's job on MMA Live is to just give his opinions.  Going after him personally for it is ridiculous.  The whole point of being an analyst is to put a personal spin on things.

I've also seen people criticize Florian for being a shill on MMA Live, which is classic selection bias.  This week on the show, he said it was great news that Strikeforce got the deal and that all these fighters would have a place to fight.  He then followed up praising Joe Lauzon, who has gone after him publicly.  I also rewatched the entire post-Affliction show, where he completely discounted Roach's claim that Fedor got lucky.    

This may be as close as they ever come to fighting. One can dream I suppose. The rest of the photos for Affliction and WEC 38 at Combat Lifestyle.

There's an interesting (and annoying) article up over at ESPN about De la Hoya's involvement in MMA.

A number of boxing characters comment on the sport.  Let's start off with scumbag number one, Gary Shaw:

"Oscar is not into MMA," Shaw said. "He can't sit there and tell you anything about the moves or strategies that these guys are using. Oscar is not into MMA, and the people who are in MMA are haters. They will never accept him. Oscar won't be able to overcome that."

After quoting Gary, whose only experience with MMA is blowing a bunch of money and making a mockery of the sport, we turn to Bob Arum:

I really don't enjoy or like MMA," Arum said. "It's ludicrous. It's not skillful...actually, I find it offensive. The guys can't punch. They get on the floor and it looks like two guys humping each other.

Besides this idiotic statement, Arum points out it will be very hard to go in and compete with UFC, and he expects Oscar to lose a lot of money.  At the very least, he proved here that being ignorant doesn't necessarily mean you're an idiot.

Finally, we get to Oscar:

De La Hoya said he has been following MMA for about a year and finds it interesting.

"I respect any type of fighter," De La Hoya said. "Being in the ring is a tough gig."

I am only a casual fan of boxing.  I watch big fights and occasional HBO specials.  Given that, I still thought Oscar going nuts during the main event at Affliction was pretty cool.  

Gary Shaw is delusional if he thinks Oscar's main obstacle is being an outsider.  If anything, the man is very well-respected in MMA circles.  Gary can call MMA fans haters all he wants, but I have no doubt that boxing hardcores hate MMA a lot more than MMA hardcores hate boxing.  In fact, I'm aware of UFC research showing the boxing/MMA crossover is much stronger among hardcore MMA fans than casual fans.  

Gary Shaw wants Oscar to fail or quit because he needs an excuse for his own failure.  The real reason for his failure is a lot like the reason for most people's failures.  He did a god-awful job and paid the price for it.

A decent number, but not nearly enough especially if De La Hoya was paid $5 million to show:

"A celebrity who is here in bronze only, Oscar De La Hoya, [while] the live version is in nearby Anaheim, where his company got a $5 million fee from a T-shirt maker so that he would be personally involved the promotion of a mixed martial arts show," Merchant said.

That was big news in the MMA industry, since the entire announced payroll of Affliction’s card was $3.3 million. The paid attendance was 8,946 for a gate of $1,512,750.

If Affliction did indeed pay De La Hoya $5 million, that meant that not only did the boxer attending his first MMA show make $1.7 million more than all of the fighters on the card combined, but that Affliction was also in the hole nearly $7 million without figuring in expenses before adding the pay-per-view income.

Merchant said on Monday that Golden Boy Promotions CEO Richard Schaefer told him the figure. All sides, though, insisted there was no such payment.

Two weeks out from the event you could purchase ten tickets together in any section. Michael Rome and I both independently verified this, to say nothing of our sources who indicated just how slow ticket sales were at that time. There is also the possibility that Affliction paid substantial amounts of money to "purchase" tickets themselves, thereby raising the numbers on the totals. Clearly a last minute media push helped the show, but there was still considerable amounts of papering. Yes, the UFC has recently papered shows to this extent, but they also followed them up with extremely successful shows in closely timed proximity.

The overall point, though, is that what plagued Affliction before is what plagues them now: financial solvency. $1.5 million on the live gate is very respectable figure, but not when the payroll is more than twice that amount. Affliction is able to produce very good quality fights with quality fighters in a quality environment. But they are depleting their resources in an unsustainable way to do so. The choices here for Affliction going forward are fairly simply: find a way to cut costs or find a way to increase revenue or both, otherwise there will be no choice at all save shutting the doors on this MMA venture altogether.

UPDATE: Let me give Affliction Entertainment one small note of praise. The removal of a musical act from this show was a requisite but welcome change. Aside from the fact that such a muscial act has positively no business opening and middling a MMA show for "entertainment" sake, it's also on obvious financial burden that can be scrapped. By killing off that portion of the show, the overall experience is better and the bottomline is preserved.

I'll be on Fight Network Radio today at 3:10 pm EST to give a wrap-up and offer analysis regarding Affliction: Day of Reckoning and WEC 38. Click here for more information about the show and I'll be sure to post the mp3 of the appearance when it's up.

Thanks for the support.

UPDATE: And here's the audio.

"He's obviously got unbelievable potential, but he had some distractions getting ready for this fight. The movie. The commercials. If Fedor wants to keep winning, and winning well, he needs to train professionally. Right now he won with his old tricks.

"The fact that Fedor won, don't get me wrong, I'm very happy about. But he won this fight because of the training before this fight. The experience he had before this fight. The trainers did everything we could to get him ready. But for title fights, we can't train the way we trained for this one."

Vladimir Voronov talking to Sport's Illustrated's Josh Gross

After Vitor Belfort's flash KO win over Matt Lindland the usual round of breathless speculation has begun:

1. is the 'old' Vitor back?
2. did the move down to 185lbs unlock his potential at last?
   
3. will Vitor re-sign with the UFC and fight Anderson Silva?
4. Could Vitor be the man to finally dethrone Silva?

Quick answers: 1. yes, he never left. 2. maybe, too soon to tell. 3. possibly and 4. no.

Here's the deal. Vitor Belfort has always been extremely dangerous if you walk into his left hand early in the fight. Lindland cut off the ring, threw an unbelievably awkward left hook and charged right into Vitor's power punch. Further proof that Lindland is no Randy Couture. That was the definition of bad gameplanning.

Getting a flash KO win over Lindland isn't all that either. Dave Terrell did that in 2004 and no one remembers him.

Honestly, Belfort's win over Terry Martin impressed me more. Seeing Belfort gut out a tough fight against a game opponent in the later rounds is much more impressive than another flash quit KO win.

As far as his career prospects. I do agree with those who think Vitor might be headed back to the UFC. He's always been popular with the fans and doesn't need to be introduced to the UFC audience.

The risk factor with Belfort is do you dare give him a build up fight before his title shot? He's the kind of fighter who will let you down in that scenario almost half the time.

In my mind the ideal scenario would be to sign Belfort to the UFC, get Robbie Lawler free from EliteXC and put them into an immediate #1 contender fight. Either way the UFC wins and the resulting title fight could be the one that finally makes Anderson Silva a draw.

I'm not impressed by the return of the "old" Vitor -- the guy who gets quick wins over opponents who charge right into his wheelhouse.

I'm eager to see a "new" Vitor -- a fighter who can sprawl and evade takedowns, a fighter with a strong enough guard to not just survive but be a threat off his back, and most of all a fighter with the heart to go into the championship rounds hurt and still be a formidable offensive force.

Will we see that fighter in the UFC? Its too soon to tell.

UPDATE: Well one person at least isn't losing his head amidst the hype, and that's Vitor himself, from Tatame:

Vitor Belfort – "Next show it’ll be me and Fedor. We’ll see, that could be one of the options. I wouldn’t have to move up much in weight, I just won’t drop any. I’d just fight at my natural weight. I drop at least 10 pounds to fight. I wouldn’t have to drop anything and it would be a good opportunity."

HT Fightlinker