ProphetFighting

Dana White’s conference call…PRIDE, Tito, HBO and other (f-bomb) topics

UFC President Dana “F-Bomb” White had a conference call last week to promote the [tag]UFC 73: Stacked[/tag]PPV to be held Saturday night from Sacto. The Orange County Fishwrap posted a full transcript of the call which you can read here. Below are my thoughts on several of the topics…er….several of the (f-bomb) topics that Dana (f-bomb) White addressed…and that’s no (BS).

On the war of words between [tag]Tito Ortiz[/tag] and [tag]Rashad Evans[/tag]:

“I mean, it’s typical Tito stuff. Tito always starts a fight before the fight. It started at … I don’t even remember what [tag]UFC[/tag] it was, but he came over and got in Rashad’s face and I’m sure it’s escalated from there.”

Yeah, typical Tito as is the “nappy headed ho” blast we reported on several days ago. Tito and White don’t get along, so don’t be fooled by his measured response here. He’ll blow up Tito later in the call.

On Tito Ortiz’s image and whether he is misunderstood sometimes:

“(Laughs) No. Tito is not misunderstood. I’ve had my dealings with Tito over the last six years. Tito is who he is. You know the history with me and Tito. He doesn’t call himself the ‘Huntington Beach Bad Boy’ for no reason.”

On whether Tito’s image is good for the UFC or not:

“I don’t ask anybody to not be who they are. You know, this isn’t the WWE. Different guys have different personalities. Tito is who he is. Tito comes in and Tito always gets in great shape. He comes in and fights. Do I like all of things he says and all of the things he does? No. I’m not crazy about it most of the time. But Tito is who he is. I’m not going to go ask Tito to not be Tito Ortiz.”

On whether Tito has changed over the years:

“He’s always been like that, but I think he’s matured a lot. I think Tito has matured as a person and as a fighter, definitely. I don’t always see eye-to-eye with him, but, yeah, I think he has.”

On Tito’s personality:

“How would I describe Tito’s personality? You are asking a guy that doesn’t get along with him 90 percent of the time. I don’t know. Tito is who Tito is, you know. I’m sure he feels the same way about me.”

No doubt Dana loved answering so many questions about Tito….he did say some interesting things about the status of PRIDE:

On the future of PRIDE and if it will be back:

“There are always rumors out there. I always say exactly what’s going on about this company and what we’re doing. If I don’t say it, it’s probably not happening. As far as [tag]PRIDE[/tag], we need to get these guys some fights, right now, so we can figure this thing out. They went out of business for a reason because that company is a mess. We’re trying to figure it out and fix it. We’ve got a lot going on, right now, with the UFC and opening our offices over in the U.K., getting over into Europe next year. So it’s going to take us some time to figure this thing out. It’s a lot more complicated and a lot more messed up than we thought it was. PRIDE is a very powerful brand and I loved the Super Bowl thing, so I don’t know. I honestly couldn’t answer that question, right now. We bought it with the intention of running it, but it is a seriously messed up company. So we’re trying to figure it out.”

From everything I’ve heard the contractual situation between [tag]Dreamstage[/tag] and their fighters was the real mess. [tag]Josh Barnett [/tag]said as much in his blog post announcing his return to pro wrestling. Of course the Fertitas should have known this going in, and I’d be very surprised if they didn’t–its called “due diligence” in the financial world. My personal take is that PRIDE is on the “back burner” now, and that’s due to management decision on the part of the Fertitas and the other relevant players. Right now the UFC is in a situation where “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”. As the hottest sports brand in the US, if not the world, they’re basically guaranteed of turning a profit anything they throw up an octagon and sell tickets. Their move into the European market has been successful as well. So not only are they spread pretty thin at the moment, business is going very well right now doing what they’re doing. In other words, in my estimation they’re going to wait and re-introduce the PRIDE brand when the business needs a “pop”.

While I’m sure the PRIDE situation is something of a mess, the UFC could be making a bet that the big name fighters associated with PRIDE don’t have any real competitive options. Sure, they could pay the bills taking Calvin Ayre’s BoDog money or do what Josh Barnett has done and get back into pro wrestling, but clearly the UFC is the pinnacle of MMA competition at the moment. This risk could easily backfire–particularly if Elite XC and their affiliated groups continue to gain traction. The [tag]Strikeforce/Elite XC[/tag] show held on 6/22 has been hailed as the best MMA card of the year so far, and gave them a couple of marketable stars in a resurgent Frank Shamrock and the Vietnamese-American technical wizardry of [tag]Cung Le[/tag]. They’ve already got the marquee name in women’s MMA, [tag]Gina Carano[/tag] plus have recently signed PRIDE’s most promising star of the future in the person of [tag]Rameau Thierry Sokoudjou[/tag]. Clearly the UFC is still the dominant brand in the sport by a wide margin, but Elite XC certainly has momentum. We’ll discuss the longterm prospects of the upstart group in a future post.

UFC’s biggest problem at the moment, at least in my opinion, is a glut of events that could result in some over saturation not only of their specific product but of MMA as a sport. One advantage of getting PRIDE back up and running ASAP is that it could be run (and should be run) as a unique entity–its held in a ring, plus has a uniquely Japanese identity. This would allow PRIDE to keep their fighters busy, while presenting a product that is markedly different than the UFC brand. Another organization with its own champions and challengers would allow them to keep more fighters under contract (and thus out of the hands of their competitors) while presenting a greater number of meaningful fights. This would be a win/win for both the Fertitas/UFC, the fighters and the sport as a whole.

On the rumor that the [tag]HBO[/tag] deal is dead and whether there are any new talks with [tag]Spike TV[/tag] or ESPN:

“You guys have some (bad) sources. The HBO deal is far from dead. No, we never said we were doing a PRIDE event in California in June. Yeah, we have a lot of television. Every year, I pride myself on … every year we’ve taken this thing to another level. This year is no different. Wait until you see what we’re working on, right now. We keep breaking records and we keep blowing people’s minds and we’re going to continue to. The things we’re working on, right now, are going to rock the entire industry again.”

The point of contention in the HBO deal is control of production–HBO wants to cover it “in house”, essentially the same way they do with boxing. The UFC, meanwhile, wants to control the production including hiring of announcers. This is a case where the UFC would be better served in the longterm giving up some control of their product. First of all, the HBO boxing production is first rate and having them present the UFC and MMA would help legitimize the sport in the eyes of skeptics. Furthermore, having the sport viewed through “fresh eyes” would present it from a new perspective and help minimize the “glut” that I spoke of above and the feel of “sameness” that the UFC wants to avoid. While I understand the UFC wanting to at least put their own announcers in the HBO broadcasts, IMO they’d be well served just insisting on some input in the hiring process. Given the high quality of HBO’s boxing announcing team–with top guys Jim Lampley and Larry Merchant considered the gold standard of the sport–their track record justifies giving them more control in the process then the UFC affords SPIKE TV. Which leads us to another White comment from the conference call:

On the rumors that production and announce team being the problems with the HBO deal:

“To be honest with you, I’m not fighting with them about any of that stuff. I think the deal is coming along. I think we are right about there.”

Everything I’ve heard indicates that the production of the show is entirely the source of the impasse between the two sides.

On the UFC terminating the final fight on Ken Shamrock’s contract:

“Yeah, and I know Ken Shamrock is flipping out saying, ‘Dana thinks he’s this,’ and, ‘Dana thinks he’s that.’ Listen, Ken Shamrock has lost every fight but one that he’s had in the UFC, OK. This has nothing to do with him personally. I like Ken Shamrock. If I saw Ken Shamrock tomorrow, I’d say hello to him and see how his family is doing. You know, Ken Shamrock needs to think about retiring. It’s one of those things where I don’t even know, actually, it would be stupid of me to say that. I was thinking about saying it would probably be hard for a commission to sanction him for a fight, but Kimbo Slice and what’s his name … Ray Mercer just fought, so I guess that’s probably not true. Ken has lost every fight he’s had in the UFC but one since he’s come back with us. He’s just not at that level anymore. He’s not at the level of a UFC fighter.”

I agree that Shamrock is no longer at the level of a UFC fighter, but Dana would do well to read my commentary on Kimbo Slice. He’s already a more credible fighter than many of the lower tier UFC guys. As for Mercer, even though he’s somewhat “long in the tooth” he’s a legit former world heavyweight boxing champion. I agree with the UFC’s decision to cut Shamrock loose (though I’d imagine that the real reason was the belief that they’ve gotten all of the revenue out of him that they can) but Kimbo/Mercer is a bad comparison.

On Frank Shamrock’s performance against Phil Baroni:

“He won the fight. I think [tag]Frank Shamrock[/tag]is going to fight a lot of guys that aren’t top contenders. That’s what you are going to see with Frank Shamrock. But, again, you are asking somebody that is very biased. I can’t stand that guy. He is an idiot.”

Part of Dana’s “charm” is his willingness to say what he thinks, and I pretty much agree with him on his assessment of Shamrock. I don’t agree with the bit about him fighting guys that “aren’t top contenders”. Baroni may not be the top guy at his weight, but he’s a dangerous striker and a tough matchup for anyone and Shamrock dominated him. Assuming that his injured knee heals up, Shamrock is certainly capable of providing a credible challenge to anyone. Of course he won’t be fighting the “top contenders” in the UFC simply because Dana thinks he’s an “idiot” but there will still be plenty of good fights for Shamrock elsewhere.

Full story here

[tags]Dana White, MMA, mixed martial arts, Ken Shamrock, Calvin Ayre, BoDog Fight[/tags]

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