One thing I've found most curious since this weekend's shocking announcement that the UFC's parent company has purchased Strikeforce is a little nugget Dana White keeps dropping:
He mentioned it during the original breaking news interview with Ariel Helwani and he mentioned it during yesterday's official conference call discussing the acquisition. It's a rather curious statement considering the UFC brass has been attacking its roster with a scythe following numerous recent events. One uninspiring performance ( Gerald Harris ) or one untimely misstep (the very first UFC appearances for Willamy Freire and Antonio McKee ) can see you exiled from the Octagon. It's the weeding out of the roster, something every sports franchise must do from time-to-time.
The UFC can, however, sustain these cuts because it possesses a deep roster of over 200 fighters. But still: "We need more fighters." This brought to mind a Jonathan Snowden piece from a short while back:
The UFC's top stars are old. There's no getting around it. Randy Couture is 47. Chuck Liddell just hit the big four oh. Anderson Silva is 35. Brock Lesnar is 33. [ Quinton Jackson ] is 32. BJ Penn is an ancient 31. Forrest Griffin is as well. Even Georges St. Pierre sees 30 creeping up on him.
These are the UFC's biggest stars, the guys who draw the big money on PPV. All but Forrest get a percentage of the pay per views they appear on. These men are the difference between a show drawing a basement level number and drawing a million or more buys. They are also men in desperate need of replacements.
Couture and Liddell have one foot out the door already. Rampage seems disinterested and distracted. Silva and Penn may have peaked athletically and a steep decline seems possible. Lesnar has quit million dollar a year jobs before, and on a whim. New blood is needed, fighters in the position to pick up the slack for the guys who built the company into a powerhouse.
But when I look to see who is waiting in the wings, the cupboard seems awfully barren.
Could one of the more subtle motives behind Zuffa's acquisition be that the UFC is concerned about the development of true "name" fighters at the top of its roster? In the near future, Junior dos Santos looks to benefit from a season coaching The Ultimate Fighter opposite megastar Brock Lesnar, but we still don't know what freshman champ Cain Velasquez can do without Lesnar across from him. Jon Jones is fighting Mauricio Rua for the title next week at UFC 128 , but he hasn't drawn one lick for himself yet and doesn't have much of a personality to sell. Shogun himself is Brazilian, which as a trend hasn't helped one's draw or starpower, and we still don't know how popular he is in North America. Chael Sonnen burst on the scene last year, but he's old (33), already lost his title shot, and is effectively suspended for a while. The lower weight classes aren't pretty either, as a grand total of about seven people watched Frankie Edgar draw Gray Maynard . Perhaps the lone hope among the lower weight classes is Anthony Pettis , and he's being shuffled down the divisional ladder following his much-buzzed about win over Ben Henderson , which featured the "Showtime Kick".
With that in mind, Joe Silva looks to benefit from a healthy influx of "names" that can be slotted into high profile bouts, chief among them:
And while none of them are exactly crossover superstars yet, they are each eminently more marketable than Maynard, Jake Shields , or Jon Fitch , all of whom have or will soon headline cards for the UFC in the span of four months. If Diaz's contract gets moved to the UFC, he immediately becomes the second-biggest star in the welterweight division behind GSP (although a case can be made for BJ Penn, despite UFC 127 's poor numbers...). Alistair Overeem is essentially a pre-packaged superstar, who would likely explode into mainstream popularity with one performance echoing his Brett Rogers and Todd Duffee bouts on a UFC card. "Jacare" could very well take over the middleweight division when Anderson Silva abdicates his throne.
So while it's a bit disingenuous for Dana White to claim "The UFC needs fighters" as they continually prune an already swollen roster, the promotion definitely needs fresh, compelling faces on its fight posters. Consequently, as soon as any legal issues are cleared to permit these fighters into the UFC, expect their highlight reels to be shown on loop on Spike TV.
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