By Sean Farrell

UFC President Dana White has reneged on yet another “Guaranteed” title shot. Yushin “Thunder” Okami is going to be snubbed yet again and all Dana White has to say is “Okami is gonna be pissed, but he’s not getting the next title shot.”

With Okami earning this “guaranteed” title shot after defeating Nate Marquardt, he will now be snubbed by a second opponent, the first was Vitor Belfort, the second is none other than “to be determined.” Yes, Dana White is up to his old tricks snubbing Japanese fighters of what they have earned and letting them stay inactive and springing a big fight out of nowhere on them then if not victorious stating Japanese MMA is no good or it sucks.

With Silva clearing out the middleweight division there isn’t any fight left that makes sense, so might as well make the Okami fight. Okami is the last man to get a victory against Anderson Silva although it was by DQ from an illegal upkick. Okami is also a much stronger and improved wrestler since then and is now better than Chael Sonnen, the last man to give Anderson major problems inside the Octagon.

Okami being snubbed again is leading to the belief that Dana White doesn’t like Japanese fighters. White has repeatedly brought in Japanese fighters well past their prime and let them get beaten on in the UFC to further his statement of the “UFC having the best fighters in the world.” Although this isn’t true in every case with a Japanese fighter, it seems like the formula Zuffa LLC is going with and it’s working.

I know for a fact this statement is not true at all, the UFC is a giant marketing machine and there are plenty of fighters who can beat the UFC’s best but many if not all are true martial artist and do not fight for sport since they have a different respect for the martial arts. The UFC does have the best mixed martial artist in the world, but not the best fighters by a long shot.

The mainstream media and casual fan is unaware of this as many do not know the history of the UFC, the fallout after the Pride FC purchase by Zuffa, or the origin and history of many martial arts in general. This leaves the UFC with their marketing strategy to capitalize on the uneducated fans and draw them into new icons and sports heroes outside of the conventional big four: Football, Basketball, Baseball, Hockey in the 18-40 year old male demographic.

Even if Okami lost to Silva it wouldn’t make a difference to Silva being the pound for pound king that has already been justified on numerous occasions. The only thing I can see coming from this is the UFC doesn’t want Anderson Silva to lose or have any high probability of losing any fight and are relying on Georges St. Pierre’s victory over Jake Shields to set up the biggest fight in all of combat sports history.

Until then, expect Anderson Silva to be inactive or have no real challengers get in the Octagon with him and just pad his record every once in a while until this GSP debate is settled. This leads to the old saying “Money Talks and BS Walks.” and in the UFC, it doesn’t matter what you’ve done or how good you are, if you can’t draw the buys you won’t get what you’ve actually earned.

If I am wrong what about the cases of many challengers left without title shots who rightfully earn them? Jim Miller is one that comes to mind since he only has one loss in the UFC in nine bouts and that lone loss is to Gray Maynard, who should be the UFC lightweight champion seeing how the current champion Frankie Edgar is 0-1-1 against him and getting a rubber match somehow.

Dana White is turning into a Don King/Vince McMahon hybrid which is great for business and the sport but terrible for purist of martial arts in general. Not saying Dana White hasn’t done any good he has done many great things but so has Don King and Vince McMahon, it doesn’t necessarily make you a good hearted person as much as someone who is just increasing their popularity in the public image.

At the end of the day, the only color that matters to the UFC and Zuffa LLC is green and Dana White knows this and has all the smoke and mirrors imaginable to keep the UFC under his iron fist, where he is the true champion and pound for pound king and everyone else is just a roster space in “HIS” sport.

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