MMAVu

So all the “co-promotion” talk that Fedor’s camp has been spewing lately, has been confirmed as more important than the big money. Fedor Emelianenko has signed a 3-fight deal with Strikeforce, and will likely make his debut for the promotion this fall.

The problem is, Strikeforce’s heavyweight division is about ankle-deep. There’s their heavyweight Champion, Alistair Overeen, (who by the way has not fought in Strikeforce since winning the belt in Nov 07) there’s former UFC fighter Paul Buentello, there’s Brett Rogers…and Bob Sapp listed. Oh yeah, and another UFC casualty, Fabricio Werdum. Fight fans can’t be happy about this move. This is almost like Michael Jordan, in his prime, playing in the NCAA.

Fedor can still fight the top heavyweights not under the UFC umbrella (I believe) but really, there’s not that much else out there. There’s Bobby Lashley, a 4-0 rookie, there’s some K-1 guys…but the bulk of the top heavyweights are locked up in the UFC.

Strikeforce has been a solid promotion thus far, are are unlikely to fold for the duration of the 3 fights. You can assume Fedor will fight every 6 months, starting this fall, so after he finishes this contract, he will be roughly 35 years of age. Well past the prime of the average MMA fighter.

…is apparently still not enough to sign “The Last Emperor” Fedor Emelianenko. Here are some of the highlights of the deal:

• 5-fight deal, worth $30,000,000.00
• Immediate Title Shot
• The freedom to display his manager’s opposing MMA promotion’s logos
• Freedom to fight in Sambo Tournaments
• A cut of the Pay-per-view revenue

Here’s UFC President Dana White’s thoughts on the matter:

It’s basically them coming in and saying, ‘Hey, we’ve got this guy and some people might say he’s the best heavyweight in the world. So for that, we want half of your business.’ Yeah, okay. That shit probably works in Russia — not here. We came to the table willing to give up just about anything, except the co-promotion. We offered him the most amazing deal. I guarantee you he will not be offered another deal like this in mixed martial arts. We gave on everything. He can go fight Sambo every Thursday night if he wants… But we’re not giving up half our business.

At the end of the day, that’s basically what it amounts to. The UFC did in fact build MMA in North America and took it mainstream. Now some rinky-dink company from Russia want’s to co-promote? Fedor’s management needs to realize they can likely only co-promote with other companies on their level. If not, we’ll never see Fedor (in his prime, anyways) in the UFC and that’s a shame.