The article below is the whole reason for writing this little blog. Read it if you want but its long and I note any points that I want to talk about in the blog, and I think my IQ took a dip from reading Jerry Millen douche up the place. He's like Dana White but without anything to back his words up (not even logic).
M-1 Official: UFC Is WWE of MMA
http://mma.fanhouse.com/2009/07/31/m-1-official-ufc-is-wwe-of-mma/
(pretty much some bull where M-1 VP Jerry Millen blames Dana White for the Fedor deal falling through and call the UFC greedy, Typical posturing with a lot of fallacious logic)
The Backstory:
Affliction's folding has left the worlds top heavyweight, Fedor Emelianenko, jobless. So for the past week the UFC, the worlds top MMA promotion, has been trying to sign the fighter. The signing fell through.
Why M-1 and Millen suck:
Why has the deal with Fedor fallen through? One person. One person (well one organization) whom every MMA fan should hate: Jerry Millen. You know the guy that took Pride and ran it straight into the ground. Because M-1, the company that owns Fedor's current contract and the company that Millen represents, is making exorbitant demands for a single fighter.
Basically they want to “co-promote.” Both parties, UFC and M-1, add up the fighters purses the rent on the arena guard and all the other costs of running an event then split the costs down the middle. Then the two parties “[are] willing to take half the profit or half the loss” (Millen).
The profit splitting sounds harmless right? Except that the UFC hasn't lost money on a card since 2004. Its like going up to McDonald's and saying I want to do business with you. I've got this great idea for a new McBurger. You pay for half of your company's operating costs I'll pay the other half. Then in return we'll split the profit. No one would agree to that. McDonald's took a risk just to start a business and now that the cash is coming in in dump trucks I want to take a piece.
For example, if it costs McDonald's $100 to stay in business, and they make a gross profit of $1000 with out the new McBurger. Then the company makes $1000. With me some new guy off the street the starting cost is $50 each. Now say with the new McBurger they rake in $1500. Then McDonald's has to have to split $1500 with me. So $750 each. In other words by splitting McDonald's lost $250.
The UFC – M-1 co-promotion is the same idea as the new burger. M-1 is offering the new fighter but because the UFC is already an established brand the card regardless of whose on it will make huge amounts of money regardless of whether the new expensive fighter is on it or not. So the UFC makes more money without the co-promotion. Bottom line the UFC is a business and it or any business for that matter are not willing to let some upstart ride their coattails, steal their money and damage their reputation. If M-1 wants to join up with the UFC then they should pay at least half of the hundreds of millions in losses that the UFC ate for a decade. Actually more because there is no risk involved and they eventually would make all of that money back.
The real situation is even worse than the McDonald's example. Brock Lesnar's fight against Randy Couture brought in roughly 700k-900k PPV buys, and after his shit talking and antics is worth even more so figure 1million buys (to make the math easy). Fedor's Affliction shows on the other hand only brought in about 100k buys each. So if each buy is $50, then Lesnar is worth $50 million dollars, and Fedor only $5 million. Its like a rival company wanting to split the profits but only make 10 percent of the cash. This of course discount the UFC's marketing ability. With the UFC behind him Fedor could be made into a money making force, especially with his background, but without the UFC Fedor isn't worth shit. In other words Fedor, Millen, and M-1 give almost nothing and take half.
M-1 still wants to co-promote in spite of the fact that they're basically getting free advertising for Fedor, introduction into the largest MMA fan base in the world, and would probably be able to get massive advertising deals from every company promoting the UFC from Budweiser to Tapout. Now throw $2 million dollars a fight on top of that, more money than the UFC pays the entire rest of the card combined. The fact that Dana White even was willing to let Fedor compete in combat sambo (basically MMA in pads and headgear) whenever he wanted just shows how greedy the M-1 is. They say they want to do whats best for the sport but really they just want to huge piles of UFC gold.
Millen also says that they would split any losses. But M-1 has been attached to two company's that have gone under, Bodog and Affliction. Affliction paid Fedor 300k and M-1 the other million when every other big name on the card made a million dollars by themselves. Thats not co promoting thats the some thing boxing promoters do to their fighter: Do none of the work and take most of the money. Its part of what killed boxing and M-1 is trying to do the same in MMA. In other words M-1 used Bodog and Affliction to make some quick cash then bailed when If they are truly willing to split the losses why is M-1 still around? Because there nothing but a group of leeches. When the money's flowing they take it like the greedy bastards they are but when the ship starts sinking they're the first to jump off.
UFC is the WWE of MMA:
Sure UFC is the leading, basically the only, MMA organization around effectively making them the force in the sport like WWE, but honestly who cares. All the best fighters would stay competing and fighting against each other at a high tier of combat. As an added plus, with one MMA organization, MMA wont turn into boxing with 4 world boxing authorities that refuse to unify the heavyweight championship (or any championship) meaning only the best champ and no alienated disenfranchised fans.
To summarize, Millen and M-1 simply want to take money from an established enterprise and in doing so are detrimental to the sport. Without Fedor the UFC can still continue to grow with him they will simply lose money unless M-1 gets much less greedy (which almost certainly ain't happening).
Jerry Millen says that competing organizations is good for MMA, that co-promoting is good for MMA. He's wrong (he's like 0-5 in this paper). A single elite organization was necessary so that MMA doesn't stagnate and end up like boxing.
One final thought:
throughout the article Millen, continually states that the UFC's determination not to accept the deal is a hindrance to the sport and that they should accept the deal. He repeatedly says that the UFC is holding back the sport. But why should the premier power in MMA bend to the will of a tiny organization with only a single chip. The UFC shouldn't. The only people holding up the sport up are M-1 and Millen. If any thing they should let Fedor take his million bucks per fight and then take 10% managers fees like the leeches they are.
Personally I think M-1 will fold in a year or two and Fedor will be forced into the UFC but he's already 32 years old and not getting any younger. Lets just hope that when Fedor finally ends up in the Octogon he still has some juice in the tank.
This has all been my opinion, hope you liked it
- Joe
