UFC Quick Quote: The fans got screwed when the UFC bought Strikeforce
by Jesse Holland on Jun 7, 2011 11:04 AM EDT
in Strikeforce News
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"Great for the UFC and the Fertittas. Brilliant, brilliant move. For the fighters? Terrible move because they don't have another place to go and bargain. As a business man? I think it's brilliant on the part of the UFC. I'm not even sure that when Strikeforce's contract is up with Showtime they just don't fold it into the UFC at that point and make it all pay-per-view. For the fans it's bad, for the fighters it's bad, for the UFC it's terrific. Anytime you force fans to [buy] pay-per-view for every single card you put on, then you're screwing the fans. Not every card is a pay-per-view value. Some are just general good TV value and then the special ones are pay-per-view value so I feel the fans get screwed."
Former Elite XC boss Gary Shaw weighs in on Zuffa's purchase of Strikeforce, which he sees as "bad for the fans" because they might lose the free Showtime fights and get "screwed" into buying all pay-per-views. Unfortunately Shaw's argument excludes the events the UFC airs on Spike TV and Versus but does raise a good point about fighter bargaining power. Here more on this from the boxing community including Bob Arum and Oscar de La Hoya (via Fight Hub TV) after the jump.
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Umm...
So is Gary completely oblivious to the numerous free cards the UFC puts on? Prelims on Facebook and Spike TV?
by dredg_XIX on Jun 7, 2011 11:12 AM EDT reply actions 1 recs
And versus, he must only have basic cable
by ToeLock6 on Jun 7, 2011 11:16 AM EDT via mobile up reply actions
Yeah basic cable with a showtime option….
by Itsover on Jun 7, 2011 11:20 AM EDT via mobile up reply actions
lol
Soon as my flow starts, I compose art like the ghost of Mozart
Even though they all say that they're real, I know that most aren't
Boy you think you're clever don't you, girl you think you're so smart
Come with me to another side of the world... so cold and so dark
With a pirate version of Showtime
It ain’t free anywhere I’ve ever seen. Gary’s reasoning must be Strikeforce is free….once you pay for the Showtime option.
PPV price point is incorrect
There are too many pay per views and the problem is the price point. There are a lot of people who don’t have a bunch of UFC fan friends to share the cost with and they don’t want to go to the bar alone. The price needs to be where single viewers will still purchase it regularly.
Wouldn't disagree with that...
Unfortunately, “premium” fights on PPV have always run ~$50. So yeah, because of that, if I can’t get enough of the guys together to order the PPV, the bar is really the next best option, and you end up spending that $50 regardless…
Considering I just had to have surgery and haven’t been able to work in 6 weeks, I don’t feel so bad about watching them through online streams. Payed something like $400 on UFC PPVs over the last year and a bit, and have gone to 2 cards live.
If they were $25-$30 on UFC.tv or something, I’d be much happier with that option.
Gary knows nothing
Shouldn’t even be quoting him on MMA sites anymore.
I'm finishing Mac's pool. Check the fanposts.
Yes Gary is a moron, if he didn't run Elite X C into the ground with his moronic son SKALA, then perhaps there would be competition.
But they decided to put all his eggs in Kimbo’s beard and boom egg on his face, his face and especially SKALA’s retarded face. They are irrelevant to the MMA scene and should never be talked about, unless they get their ass kicked or are going to jail for fixing boxing matches.
I've got something to say; it better to burn out than to fade away!!!
Walking on the beach and cleaning my sandles of all that excess Bisping.
PS3 Network is OFF. Have you checked your Credit Card today?
I disagree
It is great for the fans as well but maybe not the fighters. The alphabet soup of titles and promotions in boxing is part of what killed it. We like the NFL and the NBA, all other major sports have one massive place to copmpete and because of that we get better fights/games and so on. Imagine if Hendo, Anderson Silva, Wanderlie, Rampage, Shogun and all the people from Pride that are now or were recently in the UFC never crossed over…..think how much weaker the cards in the ufc would be without those guys.
Adding strikeforce you not only get Diaz and a handfull of good fighters but a ton of heavyweights. Overeem, Fedor, Barnett, werdume, rogers it adds a lot of weight when you can pit those guys against Carwin, dos santos, cain, brock and mir…..
gary shaw is full of it. ufc will run it the way wwe did with raw and smack down. two leagues, strikeforce and ufc but fighters can cross over easy once showtime is up. if anything i see ufc throwing fighters to strikeforce esp the lw division where they have so many top guys thanks to the wec merger
I really hate comparing the UFC to other pro sports......
For one in the NFL if your contract sucks you just ride it out then create a bidding war for your services between the other 31 teams…..If the UFC was the only MMA company out there you could not do that.
this ^^^
If you spell Ndamukong Suh in Scrabble, you win. Forever...
***********************************************************************
I'm giving 48-1 odds if anyone wants to pick Deuce to win the money pool.
by DetroitDrew1980 on Jun 7, 2011 1:17 PM EDT up reply actions
There's a real problem with his logic
Though competition may be the best scenario in most cases, Shaw is not acknowledging some basic facts that blow up his argument. First, the Fertittas and Dana White are well aware that in order to attract talent to the sport, they have to pay their fighters well. You think that the goal of the UFC being as big as the NFL or soccer is going to happen screwing over the talent? Have salaries taken a nose dive since the Strikeforce acquisition? Ask Nick Diaz.
Coupled with the new insurance that the UFC offers their fighters, and Gary is not making a whole lot of sense here.
What the hell does this have to do with Football?
More cunty journalism
by John 'Balls Out' Daily on Jun 7, 2011 11:24 AM EDT reply actions
because in foot ball we do not have a bunch of leagues it is all the NFL and if we had two major leagues you might never see the colts vs the patriots etc….strikeforce and ufc togther makes for way better fights. look how deep the hw division is now with Cain, Overeem, Carwin, Fedor, Brock, Mir, Barnett, Rogers, Dos Santos, Werdume, Big Foot Silva……….that is an unreal HW division!
That's not the UFC HW division
Half those guys still fight for SF, and hopefully Rogers and some of their other HW’s don’t ever go to the UFC.
I'm finishing Mac's pool. Check the fanposts.
For now.
It’s only a matter of time before they’re all UFC fighters…If you think Strikeforce is gonna last beyond their Showtime contract – if they even get that far – you’re probably wrong.
The only guy I see them having an issue getting on board is Fedor, since they didn’t absorb his contract in the deal, and he’s likely to retire before he signs another one.
I somehow see the HW GP finishing up in the UFC…
lol Yup.
I was gonna simply put those 3 words…But wasn’t sure if he’d catch what I meant by it.
Under UFC law "Business As Usual"
It states that “Once we take over a company, we take their fighters within 365 days.”
There’s some fine print in there about sacrificing their first born child in there too…
Why not rogers
Imo he would beat A handful of ufc hw berry mitrone madsen beltran just to name a few
by 209stk on Jun 7, 2011 12:01 PM EDT via mobile up reply actions
The hell he would. He’s a street brawler who just didn’t think to cash in on it by putting them on Youtube. AA has been ruined, courtesy of Fedor’s one-hitter quitter, and he did capitalize on that. It does not make him a legit MMAist. The guys you listed, with the possible exception of Beltran, have good technique and would wreck Rogers.
Our lives change like the weather, but a legend never dies.
I find it hard to imagine any of those guys except maybe Barry wrecking Rogers. He’s certainly on par with numerous guys on the UFC roster.
"I don’t know about you but Frank Mir can play with my Dice anyday!"
by Diceman on Jun 7, 2011 1:54 PM EDT via mobile up reply actions
UFC would be foolish to not capitalize on Showtime's Strikeforce audience
The reason they bought Strikeforce is because it was valuable and had name value. Folding Strikeforce would be like shutting off a lucrative revenue stream.
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