UFC President Dana White Buys Strikeforce: Breaking News & Inside Scoop
By Sean Farrell
As reported earlier, Strikeforce is no longer the UFC’s biggest competitor. A video interview surfaced online with UFC President Dana White, and he announced that Zuffa has purchased the San Jose, Calif.-based fight promotion Strikeforce. “It’s literally official right now. We literally just purchased Strikeforce,” said White. “I don’t want to disclose any of the details on how the deal was done, but the reality is that we now own Strikeforce.” White explained the reasons behind the purchase in the interview, stating that expanding Zuffa’s talent was a necessary step as the promotion ventures into more international endeavors. “As we go out and [continue to expand], we need more fights. Let’s face facts. Strikeforce is a brand that fans have come to like and [the fans] enjoy the fights that they’re putting on. So it made sense to us,” said White. “Our job is to put on the big fights that fans want to see, and as we continue to travel [abroad], we have to put on the right fights in these other countries.”
White also revealed that while Strikeforce is now property of Zuffa, Scott Coker’s promotion would not be dissolved by any means. Instead, Strikeforce will continue to operate independently under the supervision of its new parent company Zuffa LLC. “Strikeforce is going to continue to run — business as usual. There are contracts in place, and we honor contracts. These guys pull good ratings on Showtime, and all of those contracts are going to be honored. These guys are going to remain Strikeforce fighters.”
White then elaborated on that concept, asserting that Coker would continue his role as Strikeforce head, maintaining the promotion’s operations and managing the talent. But, according to White, Coker will have license to re-sign fighters at his discretion, including talents with whom White takes issue, such as the already UFC banned Paul Daley and multiple steroid offender Josh Barnett. “We’ve signed a deal with Scott Coker. He’s staying on. You’ve seen me battle with guys over the years, but I’ve never had a bad thing to say about Scott Coker. I’ve known Scott since the K-1 days. Scott is a good guy.”
First it was PRIDE FC then WEC, add Strikeforce to the list and in my opinion the same result I see the UFC using up Strikeforce, stealing the top draws, having unification bouts, and eliminating everyone else they don’t want just like they did to Pride FC.White said under the terms of the purchase, Strikeforce talent will remain on the promotion’s roster for the time being, though UFC fighters could potentially make their way into the organization. As White said “Could guys from the UFC leave and end up over in Strikeforce? Yeah.” This obviously won’t happen until Strikeforce’s current contracts run out. “That’s a separate business that has their own income,” White said. “They have their own budgets and everything else that they do. They have their own television deals. If they’re that interested in acquiring (a fighter), it’s no different than it was before.” White went on to say “The beauty in a business like this is that there’s three partners in the UFC. It’s me, Frank, Lorenzo, and actually Abu Dhabi. So these guys, Lorenzo can go deal with Showtime. I think the last thing Showtime wants to see is me show up at the door and start having conversations. And that’s no big deal. Lorenzo can go deal with Showtime.”
Showtime has failed to comment on the sale of Strikeforce which makes sense, and in addition to the Showtime heads, White is also still at war with several fighters in Strikeforce, including the before mentioned UFC castoff Paul Daley, who had his contract with the UFC negated after firing off a late sucker punch on Josh Koscheck at UFC 113.
Daley as everyone knew he would voiced his displeasure over the purchase, saying he is considering pulling out of his upcoming April 9th, 2011 title fight against Nick Diaz because of the sale. “Business as usual, what if I dont wanna fight for DANA WHITE/ZUFFA?……Dana White bans me for life from the UFC, then buys Strikeforce, and thinks I’m still gonna be EASY and fight on one of the most anticipated fights of the year (vs. Diaz)? Which will no doubt make ZUFFA/Dana White money,” said Daley. “Daley vs. Diaz still on?…..Someone better holla at my manager real quick.”
In addition to his participation in Diaz vs. Daley, “Semtex” expressed conflict at even staying connected with the Strikeforce promotion at all when he said “Not sure what I’m gonna do right now, honestly…fight for the Strikeforce and be Strikeforce champ, put money in ZUFFA/Dana Whites pockets? Or fight here in the UK for BAMMA, who appreciate my brand, and have my loyal fans, family and media support me. For real,” he said. It seems as if this sale is affecting everyone involved.
In addition to Daley, Dana White also has had a tense relationship with newly crowned Strikeforce light heavyweight champ and MMA legend Dan Henderson in the past, but “Hendo” says he has no problem working with Dana White or Zuffa and would even consider a re-up with the UFC at the end of his Strikeforce contract, which he only signed because they offered more money than the UFC at the time. “I’ve never said anything bad about them,” said Henderson. “I always appreciated everything they’ve done for me and for the sport. It’s just I was paid more money to go elsewhere, and that’s what I did. Dana’s the type that needs to talk a little smack if he doesn’t get his way, but I’ve got no hard feelings about anything.”
Good or bad for the sport, Zuffa’s purchase of Strikeforce is certainly creating a wealth of intrigue and everyone has taken notice even ESPN. Rising UFC heavyweight prospect and former Atlanta Falcon, Brendan Schaub spoke on a number of subjects yesterday, including the well being of Strikeforce’s heavyweight division as compared to that of the UFC’s. Schaub didn’t bash Strikeforce’s stable of heavyweight fighters in any way, and he even asserted that several of them would do very well in the UFC, but he did say until they actually compete in the UFC, it’s hard to consider the two divisions in the same ballpark. “The only thing they’ve done in the past five years, six years, is come up with this tournament. …I don’t think there’s any comparison,” Schaub said. “The UFC heavyweights, we’re a pretty stacked division with some tough guys – we have a number of guys that could win their tournament. …It’s two different leagues and (Strikeforce) is playing catch up to the UFC. They definitely have some tough guys and there’s a number of their guys who could do very well in the UFC but until they’re in the UFC it doesn’t really matter.”
With the announcement that Zuffa, LLC has purchased Strikeforce, the possibility of Strikeforce fighters competing in the UFC is much greater than it once was, even if Dana White was adamant that Strikeforce and the UFC will remain separate entities. The pathway for fighter negotiation’s have been drastically widened and it is highly likely that the purchase increases the odds that Strikeforce fighters will enter into the UFC upon the conclusion of their Strikeforce contracts regardless of what Dana White says. White has said many many negative things about Strikeforce, starting around 2008 with a rising interest in Strikeforce, he began a long media battle with Strikeforce and their main media partner, Showtime. Dana White has made numerous negative claims and statements towards Strikeforce, including calling Strikeforce, “Strikefarce”, calling Strikeforce the “minor leagues”, fans are only interested in the results of Strikeforce events, without actually watching them, Strikeforce fails to get their own fighters to fight each other, Strikeforce is unorganized, Strikeforce’s weight divisions are not very competitive, which leads to mismatches and a lack of interesting fights, Strikeforce fails to draw in a relevant number of TV viewers, Strikeforce is a small local San Jose based show, and is not on the same national and international level as the UFC, Strikeforce is not heavy competition for the UFC, Strikeforce fails to make much of any profit, Strikeforce has no distribution, and the most comical, Strikeforce fails to hold consistent title defenses for their champions.
Since the end of 2010, there have been more than two dozen occasions where a Zuffa based organization has held an event within one week before or after a Strikeforce event. One of the best examples of this, was Strikeforce’s Carano v.s Cyborg, when Zuffa held UFC 101 the prior Saturday. It was followed almost immediately by WEC 42, just six days before the Strikeforce event.
To White’s credit though, Dana has expressed he has “no beef with Strikeforce”, however has expressed a greater dislike for Showtime and Ken Hershman in particular. Claiming that Showtime is second rate at everything they do including sports broadcasting. During one interview, White expressed that he has a mutual relationship with Strikeforce president Scott Coker, explaining that Coker is caught in-between his battle with Showtime and is not at fault.
That then flipped again when Dana White was noted on a number of occasions for criticizing Strikeforce on how they handled a title fight between Dan Henderson and Jake Shields for Shield’s Strikeforce middleweight title.
White claimed that the way Strikeforce advertised the event as “feeding” Jake Shields to Dan Henderson, expecting him to lose. White repeatedly cites the primary Showtime advertising for the event that heavily favors Henderson over Shields, which White feels indicated a high level of disrespect towards Shields. The title fight between Henderson and Shields took place on April 17, 2010 where Shields defeating the heavily favored Henderson by a unanimous decision. His win was immediately followed by the infamous “Nashville Brawl” and the fight would become Shield’s last fight with Strikeforce, before he signed a multi-fight deal with the UFC. Here we are now and on March 12, 2011, White announced that Zuffa had purchased Strikeforce.
The words of Dana White should faze nobody and no one should believe anything he says, chances are if he’s bad mouthing it and has no part of it, he has a desire to have it for himself as has been the case for numerous years now. Dana White has become the sick twisted mixture of Don King/Bob Arum/ and Vince McMahon and in all actuality it has been great for the sport. This purchase and every other major Zuffa purchase has backed that up, and Dana White can never be considered a fool by any means, as he surely knows what he is doing and it’s only a matter of time before the UFC is a legit sporting league like the NFL, NBA, MLB, and NHL.