ProphetFighting

Mark Cuban trying to sign Fedor?

The “free agent Fedor” soap opera keeps getting stranger and stranger. Sherdog is reporting that Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban has been in negotiations with Fedor’s camp with the intention of making a significant MMA investment in the near future:

Mark Cuban, the energetic and controversial owner of the National Basketball Association’s Dallas Mavericks, is negotiating for the services of Russian mixed martial arts star Fedor Emelianenko , Sherdog.com confirmed Sunday.

“I am in ongoing discussions with some of his people,” Cuban revealed in an e-mail interview that will be published on Sherdog.com later this week.

Cuban’s interest in Emelianenko has everything to do with HDNet, currently available in 6 million homes, nearing a major uptick in the amount of MMA programming on the HD network.

“I plan on making a significant investment in MMA with the goal of promoting it as a professional sport with professional athletes,” said the 49-year-old Cuban, whose net worth was listed by Forbes in 2007 to be $2.3 billion. Cuban purchased the Mavericks in 2000 after selling Broadcast.com to Yahoo! for $5.7 billion in stock. “There is no reason that a fighter in an undercard match should be treated any differently than how I treat our players on the Mavs.”

I’ll have more thoughts on this after….well, after I think about it some. My initial reaction is that the involvement of Cuban in MMA would likely be a net positive for the sport.

Mark Cuban after Fedor Emelianenko @ Sherdog

[tags]Fedor Emelianenko, UFC, MMA, mixed martial arts, Mark Cuban[/tags]

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