Strikeforce kicked off this last critical week with a successful Fan Experience event held in New York City and closed it with HDNet’s coverage of their weigh-ins today, all leading up to Saturday night’s opening round of their first ever Heavyweight World Grand Prix.
Strikeforce: Fedor vs Silva Weigh-In Photo:
Strikeforce: Fedor vs Silva Weigh-In Video:
QUICK NOTES:
Strikeforce and CEO Scott Coker featured on Bloomberg – Scott Coker, chief executive officer of Strikeforce, talks about the mixed martial arts promoter’s revenue and profitability outlook. Coker speaks with Michele Steele on Bloomberg Television’s “InsideTrack.”
HWGP Opening Ceremony – Here’s The Demolition Man @alistairovereem practicing his portion of the HW tourney entrance… http://yfrog.us/j6ws0wz … MMAPayout: The rumor is out, Strikeforce will have a PRIDE like opening ceremony for the event Saturday night. MMAPayout has learned that Lenne Hardt was also in talks to participate on the show, but due to schedule conflicts, she was not able to participate on Saturday night. She is hopeful to join the next round of the Grand Prix though, which may take place in Japan. Picture below courtesy of MiddleEasy:
Freddy Madball – Freddy Madball & Jaysaun cut a new theme song for Andrei Arlovski, titled “The Real Deal”. It will debut on Saturday nights broadcast of Strikeforces opening round of the Heavyweight Grand Prix.
Attendance and Gate– Coming into the week, the word was that around 10,000 tickets had been sold. At the HW GP Fan Experience event, Scott Coker mentioned that he was expecting around 12,000-13,000 fans for the event at the Izod Center in New Jersey, which is configured for 14,500 fans. If they hit those marks, expect Strikeforce to hit the 1 million dollar gate number once again, the last coming from the Fedor vs Werdum event in San Jose last year.
International Strikeforce Fans – UK Fans: The Strikeforce Heavyweight Tournament starts Saturday night on SKY Primetime PPV, £9.95 – for first event or £24.95 for the entire HW tournament… other selected European countries can catch it on Eurosport 2. Brazil and Latin American Fans: HBO Plus will be televising the event. Canadian Fans: Super Channel will televise the event. Japanese MMA Fans: It will air on SkyPerfecTV PPV. Most other countries can catch the the SF HW GP events on PPV.
Strikeforce still gunning for April event in Japan (LA Times) – Strikeforce CEO Scott Coker has given himself one more week to secure a venue in Japan for a planned April event...Should the event be held stateside, Coker said he is considering Georgia, Missouri, Oklahoma, and Texas, states whose athletic commissions have apparently agreed to license Josh Barnett… MMAPayout: Loretta Hunt reveals that Strikeforce was trying to book the Saitama Super Arena in Tokyo, which seats about 35,000, but the venue was not available on that date or surrounding dates, which filling up would have been quite the challenge with the recent decline of popularity for MMA in Japan.
From Russia — with no love lost (ESPN) – “He’s not Russian, he’s Belarusian,” Emelianenko said of Arlovski via a translator. “This is just a different country. It’s a Slavic country.” … Asked for a reaction, Arlovski blurted out “f— Russia” before he and Khorolinsky quickly said it was a joke… “I don’t think Fedor nor Sergei are qualified to judge Andrei,” Khorolinsky said.
HDNet/HDNet Fights – Will televise the weigh-ins on Friday at 5:00 PM ET and the prelims on Saturday as well before the Showtime portion of the event kicks off. Prelim fights will air on HDNet at 8:00 PM ET.
WEIGH-IN RESULTS:
SHOWTIME BOUTS:
-Fedor Emelianenko (230) vs. Antonio “Bigfoot” Silva (264)
-Andrei Arlovski (242) vs. Sergei Kharitonov (250)
-Shane Del Rosario (248) vs. Lavar Johnson (243)
-Chad Griggs (229) vs. Gian Villante (227)
-Valentijn Overeem (239) vs. Ray Sefo (249)
HDNET BOUTS:
-John Cholish (155.75) vs. Marc Stevens (156.5)*
-Igor Gracie (170.75) vs. John Salgado (170)
-Sam Oropeza (169.75) vs. Don Carlo-Clauss (170.5)
-Anthony Leone (146.2) vs. Josh Laberge (145.75)**
-Kevin Roddy (145.75) vs. Jason McLean (145.5)
*Cholish agreed to accept Stevens’ weight of 156.5 pounds even though it was slightly over the limit.
**Leone was given one hour to make the 146-pound limit for his fight.
Source: MMAWeekly
Shame on NY/NJ if this show doesn’t sell out.
UPDATE:
Added stories from LATimes (Loretta Hunt) and ESPN (Josh Gross) to the Quick Notes section.
Madball still making music….Nice. We don’t Fake it, We Just Take IT!
Tough sell out, tix were a bit steep for StirkeForce and UFC is just around the corner. People are probably saving there $ for 128.
What a crap card. 2 fights with known fighters and 16 fighters who will fight for peanuts. They may put the GP label on it and fool the gullible but they wont fool me. I will stream the fights.
You would think SF would stack the cards to gvie the consumer added value since they are working with lessor talent and want to make a name for themselves. How about a little less $500 fighters and more real prospects. I have seen much better cards on much smaller shows. To be honest 75% of this card is filler not worthy of an Amateur card. This is a poor card even by SF standards. They could have done better and not effected the bottom line.
Wow, a Strikeforce card that Brain doesn’t like. Shocker.
I guess I’m one of the gullible because I bought tickets and I can’t wait. And the tickets were less than half of what I paid for UFC 111. I think it’s a great value, and I’m DVRing both the prelims and the card so I can watch them at home on Sunday.
Hey Brain, don’t bother streaming it. If the card is that bad just skip it. Good thing that SF didn’t fool you.
Brain Smasher, Diego:
People can have their opinions, but there is one fact, when Fedor walks out, the 10K plus fans all stand and the places goes nuts. I’ve been privileged to watch 2 of his fights live, and it is a great experience every MMA fans should have.
Diego:
Enjoy the show, should be fantastic. Come back to payout and let us know what you saw and what you liked.
I was thinking of doing a Fan Feedback post after the event, so if anyone want’s to contribute, that would be great.
If by 10K you mean 3K i agree. SF rarely gets 10K and not everyone is cheering for Fedor. Fedor is more popular now that SF has falsely hyped him up. But he has a track record a mile long to show he isnt as popular as you make him out to be.
The card didnt turn out that bad. There should have been a much better card to leave a good impression with what should be higher than normal viewers. Unfortunately SF choose to use filler. I was a little disappointed in the performances. Grigsby or whatever his name. That foot like like two unskilled brawlers. I expected one fo these guys to come out and prove to be a legit contender but they looked very bad. exciting fight but neither showed much potential. Very sloppy.
Fedor has been looking like he is hiding a poor gas tank for soem time now. I dont know why but he didnt used to fight liek that. Now he is stumbling around the ring in round 1 looking like he is in round 3. Staggering, hands way down further than normal, bouncing off the fense, attacking like he has to end it early. He was fortunate vs Rogers he ended it early but he has looked very sloppy and tired early in fights. On a side note. He cleaerly has decline physically tot he point he dont get away with his sloppy technique like he used to. Now he cant slip punches like before and now he pays for not keeping his hands up. Also he dont have the speed to catch people like before. Not good when you arent exactly taking on the young bucks of the sport.
Very sad for Arlovski. He is very talented. Probably more so than anyone in SF. BUt i really believe a 12 year old could KO him. He should be forced to sit out a year and really should just retire. The win was almost meaningless for Sergei and the GP really got ugly. Already hearing a lot of negative comments regarding the GP. The interest really took a hit tonight.
11k+ in attendance and Fedor was hugely popular. Of big events I’ve only been to UFC 111 and this one, but Fedor got a huge pop when he was introduced at the beginning and the place went ballistic when he got in the cage. He got a louder reaction, by far, than any other fighter (out of the two cards I’ve seen live).
A lot of Fedor shirts were being worn, and a lot of Russian being spoken. (It was hilarious that when Silva was in half-guard and looking to pass about 20 Russian guys behind me were chanting “stand them up”.) I think you underestimate his popularity Brain, it seemed like half of Brighton beach showed up to watch him. I speak enough barroom Russian to know the ringside doctor who stopped the fight should avoid any Russian restaurants for the near future.
I agree about Arlovsky, three very nasty knockouts in his last four fights, plus dropping a decision where he just didn’t seem willing to engage. I’ve enjoyed watching him through out his career, but enough is enough.
I’ll post more later. I like the Fan Feedback idea – or I’ll just post on the write up.