MMA Shakes Itself Up: UFC Emerges Beefcake
Posted by RB, 15 Dec 2006
Over the last few weeks in MMA there has been an avalanche of big announcements that could change the look of the sport quicker than Genki Sudo applying the submission. These announcements have mainly concerned the UFC and what is apparently their imminent rise into the status of 'mega-monopoly' as far as MMA in the US goes.
First the news broke that World Extreme Cagefighting had been bought by the UFC essentially for use as a 'farm' organisation where fighters will be groomed for the big stage. Word has it that the WEC will keep both their brand name and key employees for now, and so the integration of the WEC into the UFC scheme of things may be intended as a gradual one insofar as pronouncing the 'UFC farm' aspect of the deal in the short term future. Nevertheless, the immediate power boost the UFC receives from taking the reigns (and the profits) from what could have been a serious competitor at some point down the line is a significant one. Furthermore, if the UFC were to secure a separate TV deal for the WEC, their control over the US MMA market would be massively leveraged.
The dust of the WEC's financial independence had barely settled before the World Fighting Alliance became the second organisation to hit the headlines, completely vaporising as far as future WFA events are concerned and "immediately ceasing all operations." This news stung a little at first, indeed -- the WFA brought together a fantastic roster of fighters that the other organisations weren't making good use of, and they were willing to stack their cards full of these 'names' for the fans' enjoyment.
For the hardcore fan, their continued existence would have made for a great supplemental MMA fix in between the big cards. Unfortunately, they didn't cater to the wider MMA audience quite as well as they did to the hardcore fans, poor marketing being one of their major weaknesses, and the large payouts they made to fighters were matched with poor ticket and pay-per-view sales that made it financially impossible to… well, survive.
But hold back the tears, because it isn't necessarily a sad story -- the WFA collapsed in a pretty exciting way as far as organisations collapsing goes. Instead of dropping their roster of talented fighters onto the free market to be scattered amongst various places, bringing little excitement to any one place, they reached a deal with -- again -- the UFC, giving them first rights to purchase any of their existing fighter contracts.
Although we don't yet know exactly which WFA fighters have been taken under the UFC umbrella, Quinton Jackson appears to be a dead cert at this point, and Lyoto Machida also looks like a natural second choice. Aside from these two diamonds (who alone would add significantly to the UFC's talent roster), there are a host of quality fighters that the UFC may have chosen to pluck from the WFA's rough: Ricco Rodriguez, Heath Herring, Ivan Salaverry, Jason Miller, Bas Rutten, and 'Razor' Rob McCullough, among others. As well as boosting the ranks of the UFC divisions, these fighters could find themselves flung onto the top of the pile in the new UFC-controlled WEC, for which new fighters will be in demand. With the demise of the WFA, the UFC could have improved the depth of its talent pool enough for the quality of its pay-per-views to noticeably benefit. All in all, this is an exciting announcement which we can only hope lives up to its potential when we find out exactly what fighters the UFC has taken aboard.
With the UFC engulfing both the WFA and WEC, you would think news of their expansion couldn't possibly be any stronger. But no! … Earlier today a number of MMA sites published word of a signing that, if true, would be by far their largest and most momentous signing of an outside fighter to date: that is Mirko 'Cro Cop' Filipovic, this year's Open Weight Grand Prix winner in Pride. Of course the UFC heavyweight division has been dragging its heels in the mud for years now, but with the hypothetical signing of 'Cro Cop', along with Heath Herring, Bas Rutten, and Ricco Rodriguez from the WFA deal, the poorly division could be transmogrified overnight. Suddenly and without warning, the UFC could assemble a stellar 'top five' of heavyweights, and a more than respectable 'top ten': Filipovic, Sylvia, Arlovski, Vera, Monson, Rutten, Rodriguez, Herring, Silva, and Mir.
Clearly, 'times they are a-changing' in mixed martial arts right now, and this series of announcements coming hot on the heels of one another is proof positive of how explosively the sport continues to grow. Organisations reorganise around one another with frightening speed, and today's up-and-coming promotions are only ever a few shows away from breaking into serious contendership with the big guns; or, as in the case of the WFA, from fading away into obscurity and historical MMA trivia. The most promising smaller US organisations at the moment look to be the IFL, Strikeforce, Bodog, and the upcoming Elite Xtreme Combat to be shown on the Showtime network -- and even with the UFC's freshly expanded roster taking away more fighters who could have otherwise found their way to these shows, there is still great talent out there for the little guys to make use of.
Matt Lindland, after being cut from his UFC contract on questionable grounds over a year ago, has went on to become the sport's greatest freelancer -- he is currently number one in the world on mmaweekly.com's middleweight rankings and consistently takes fights against top level competition in various middling promotions. 'The Russian Experiment' himself, Fedor Emelianenko, has recently been signed to a one-off fight in Bodog next March. And Frank Shamrock is another major talent who may emerge to be the hero of the smaller MMA promotions -- he is already coach in the IFL, and has recently been announced for two early 2007 fights in Strikeforce and Elite Xtreme Combat. If both these matches go ahead, 2007 could be the year we see Frank make a return to regularly competing in the sport (and about time).
Ladies & gentlemen, as we go into the new year there is a whole bunch to look forward to in the world of mixed martial arts: let's cross our fingers and hope the sport lives up to its potential, and its popularity continues to grow exponentially over the next several months.
