Invicta FC President Shannon Knapp. Photo credit: Esther Lin/Invicta FC

By Joshua Molina

Just days before staging its fifth Internet Pay Per View this Friday, Invicta FC President Shannon Knapp said her all-female mixed martial arts organization is in negotiations with a broadcast partner to bring the year-old company to television by the end of 2013.

“There are a lot of possibilities,” Knapp told fcfighter.com. “The demand for the promotion and the product is fairly high. We have a lot of issues on the Internet. It’s a priority for me to find a good home.”

January’s Invicta show was plagued by Internet connection problems. Knapp eventually gave the show away for free because of so many complaints that viewers couldn’t get a consistent video feed from her Internet broadcast partner Ustream. Friday’s $9.95 show, Knapp said, will feature a satellite feed, which will bring more clarity to the stream.

Going forward, however, Knapp said she is “in dialogue with three or four” television broadcast outlets to move from the web to television.

“I love Showtime,” she said, as an example. “I have worked with them for years. They get it. I think they do a good job of promoting the events, whether boxing or MMA.”

Knapp said the company’s focus was to build an audience during its first year and now it’s time to move to the next level.

“The plan was to give the content away and build a brand and do it quickly and effectively,” Knapp said. “As we roll into 2013, we look at a year of monetizing.”

Michelle "The Karate Hottie" Waterson (left) will challenge reigning champ Jessica Penne for the Invicta FC world atomweight (105 pounds) title on Friday

Friday’s Internet Pay Per View event from Ameristar Casino in Kansas City, Missouri is very well the biggest all-female MMA card in U.S. history.

Along with established stars such as Sarah Kaufman, Julia Budd, Zoila Frausto and Jessica Penne, the 13-fight card features the Invicta FC debut of Cris Cyborg, the former Strikeforce 145-pound featherweight Champion who is widely regarded as the best female fighter in the world not named Ronda Rousey.

Cyborg,10-1, never lost her championship, but was stripped of it after she tested positive for performance enhancing drugs. Strikeforce eventually folded in 2012.

“Everyone knows who Cyborg is,” Knapp said. “When you find an athlete who has that kind of exposure it’s great for the promotion.”

Cyborg will step into the cage against Australian Fiona Muxlow. Knapp said she is looking forward to Cyborg’s redemption.

“Everyone deserves a second chance,” Knapp said. “There’s always a bunch of critics out there. I feel confident. I believe in her. I have worked with her for a long time.”

Knapp, a former executive for Strikeforce as well as the UFC, said she knows the “real” Cyborg.

“Cris is a very, very kind-hearted person outside of the cage,” Knapp said. “She’s a caring person. She’s caring about animals, children. She is just your all-around nice female.”

The Invicta show comes two months after the UFC promoted the first and biggest women’s MMA match in history between UFC Bantamweight (135 pounds) Champion Ronda Rousey and challenger Liz Carmouche. Rousey won by first-round armbar, surviving an early submission attempt.

At a time when Knapp is spending every waking hour trying to promote the concept of big-time women’s MMA in Invicta, Rousey in a different, more popular promotion, is the face of women’s MMA.

“Who cares?” Knapp said. “It doesn’t bother me at all. My thing is, UFC has been around for a long time. They are certainly the biggest and the baddest on the playground. I understand the business side. It motivates me to make sure that fans see not just one athlete out there.”

Knapp, who worked for the UFC before working for Strikeforce, said she learned a lot from both companies, but credits the UFC with being the more professional organization.

“I think the UFC is a well-oiled machine,” Knapp said. “It’s very professional in terms of the way the business runs. I always like the atmosphere of how they treat the athletes like athletes. Of course I learned a lot of things working for them and as a rival promotion. Strikeforce was run on a completely smaller staff. It didn’t feel as structured, whether it was making sure the athletes had bottled water behind the scenes as opposed to having to fill a cup.”

If Knapp lands the television deal, one of her goals is to start a reality show that puts the spotlight on the female fighters. It won’t, however, be a copy of the UFC’s The Ultimate Fighter.

“For us, there is more of a story to tell and that is not the format I would be looking to sell,” Knapp said.

Knapp hopes the interest in women’s MMA continues and that it is not a fad, like has been seen with other women’s sports such as basketball via the WNBA, where there was a big buzz to start before interest faded.

“This past year, the numbers that we have pulled, and the performance of the athletes, have been a whirlwhind,” Knapp said. “Our ticket sales are good. Our prebuys are good. Hopefully we will be blessed with continuous success. There is an appetite for women’s MMA.”

Email reporter Joshua Molina at jmolina@fcfighter.com
Read Joshua Molina’s interview with Cris Cyborg’s opponent Fiona Muxlow by clicking HERE.

Mark Hunt

By Joshua Molina

Around the world in MMA . . .

With the incredible shrinking man Alistair Overeem out with an injury, Mark Hunt has stepped up to fight Junior Dos Santos.

Junior Dos Santos appears on the fast track back to a title shot against Cain Velasquez, whose only challenge against Antonio “Bigfoot” Silva will be to see if he can extract even more blood from Silva’s head in less time than the first fight.

Dos Santos’ manager has suggested that Overeem didn’t want to fight the former UFC champ. He’s probably right. Overeem folded faster than a lawn chair once he got hit against the slow Bigfoot. Against Dos Santos, the guy who walked into the cage against Bigfoot, wouldn’t stand a chance against Cigano.

. . . Jon Fitch has signed a four-year deal with the World Series of Fighting. Fitch, an incredibly skilled, but notoriously boring defensive fighter, was fired by the UFC after a loss to Demian Maia.

The UFC’s firing of Fitch must be personal because if the UFC is the best MMA company in the world, Fitch deserves to be fighting on that stage. He did afterall, take out rising star Erick Silva to school for a night last October, in a UFC Fight of the Night.

Fitch derailed the rapid fire Silva, shades of a young Roberto Duran, and showed that he can still scrap with the best.

Oddly, Silva is still in the UFC, but Fitch isn’t.

. . . Lots of talk in MMA about transgendered fighter Fallon Fox, born as a man, but is now legally a woman.

Fox’s battle is a big step for the transgendered community. If the International Olympic Committee allows transgendered fighters to compete under strict rules, certainly MMA should.

Besides, if you are a woman it’s probably better to fight a woman, born as a man, who is drug free, than fight a woman, who is doping, who has the muscle mass of a man.

. . . In a battle of ex-Strikeforce stars, Jake Shields will fight Tyron Woodley at UFC 161 on June 15. Shields sure has fallen from his high point of fighting Georges St-Pierre in front of the largest MMA audience in North American history in Canada.

Shields lost in a boring fight to GSP, was then knocked out by Jake Ellenberger and has looked lackluster and drained in his UFC victories over Martin Kampmann and Yoshihiro Akiyama. His decision victory over Ed Herman was overturned because he tested positive for a banned substance.

Woodley was destroyed by Nate Marquardt, but then bounced back with a knockout victory over Jay Hieron.

Shields is a masterful grappler and Woodley is a good wrestler. George W. Bush was still president the last time Jake Shields knocked anyone out, so expect this fight to be fought on the mat, with Shields smothering Woodley.

Woodley best chance is to knock Shields out, but Shields has been hit by Dan Henderson and Ellenberger and knows what it feels like by now to get hit hard. Expect Shields to be on his knees shooting for the takedown as early as he can.

Dan Henderson (left) Photo credit: Esther Lin/Strikeforce

By Joshua Molina

Lost in the Ronda Rousey vs. Liz Carmouche hype is the fact that on the undercard of UFC 157, Dan Henderson will face his toughest fight since Anderson Silva five years ago.

Henderson was days away from one last UFC title shot against Jon Jones last year, but like a victory over Jake Shields, saw it slip from his grasp when he injured his knee.

Now he may never get it.

To get a shot at the gold, he must first go through Lyoto Machida on Feb. 23.

And that’s a fight that won’t be easy.

By fight standards, Henderson is old. He’s 42 years old. That’s FORTY-TWO years old. Machida is 34 years old.

Henderson is on an incredible tear. He’s won four straight, crushing Feijao, Renato Sobral and the great Fedor Emelianenko. He last won in a epic fight against Shogun Rua. But that fight was more than a year ago, Nov. 19, 2011.

We don’t know what that fight took out of Henderson. We do know that long, yearlong layoffs are never good, especially at his age.

The last thing to go for a fighter is his power. And that’s really all Henderson has left. He’s slower, tires easily and his once-great wrestling skills have weakened.

Time isn’t on his side.

Machida’s just needs to avoid Henderson’s bomb to win the fight. That’s not easy, but at leasy he knows what he is up against. Henderson must worry about Machida’s kicks, punches and speed.

Speed kills. And Henderson could be headed toward a wicked end.

If he can get by Machida, he will get his title shot against Jones or Chael Sonnen (Jones, let’s be real).

It would cap what would be an amazing 5-fight run.

As big as Rousey’s big moment in the Octagon will be, marking the arrival of women’s MMA, when Henderson steps into the cage, it could mark the end of a legend’s last, incredible run.

Ovince St. Preux aka "OSP"(pictured) says he's ready to fight anyone in the UFC, beginning with Forrest Griffin

By Joshua Molina

In the sport of mixed martial arts, there are fighters and there are fighters.  And then there is ex-Strikeforce star Ovince St. Preux.

The Haitian-American fighter known as “OSP,” in a span of 321 days – from Feb. 20, 2010 to Jan. 7, 2011 — fought seven times. More impressively, he was undefeated during that stretch, knocking off quality fighters such as Abongo Humphrey, Antwain Britt and Benji Radach. He beat those fighters in a span of seven weeks.

So when Strikeforce folded in January, it seemed likely that the 29-year-old former defensive end for the Tennessee Volunteers would be among the top guys headed for the UFC.  But his name didn’t appear anywhere on any official lists. Yet that doesn’t matter to OSP.

“I am confident I will be in the UFC,” said St. Preux, 17-5. “I know what I am capable of. I am 100 percent sure I will make the transition to UFC.”

In fact, St. Preux is ready to fight right now. Besides working as a counselor for teens, he trains every day and remains in shape in case he’s called in at a moment’s notice as a replacement fighter in the UFC. Long term, he expects to fight in the organization later this year.

“With the UFC you never know,” St. Preux said. “MMA is a sport you have to stay in shape year-round. With the UFC you never know what’s going to happen.”

When he finally arrives, expect him to make a big impact. A college football and high school wrestling star, OSP pulled off eight straight wins between February 2010 and December 2011 before he stepped into the Hexagon for the biggest fight of his career – against the great Gegard Mousasi.

“I went into that fight not feeling 100 percent,” St. Preux said. He called it a learning experience. St. Preux said he let the fact that he was fighting a Top 5 light heavyweight get inside his head.

“You are either going to rise to the occasion or it is going to get to you,” St. Preux said. “It got to me.”

In his last start on Aug. 18, 2012, OSP (left) leveled T.J. Cook (right) in Strikeforce action

He said the loss was his own fault.

“It was more about my performance,” St. Preux said. “I didn’t meet my own expectations. It’s just unfortunate that it happened to be during my biggest fight.”

The night before the weigh-in, St. Preux recalls, he was eating pizza – something that a top-level fighter knows he shouldn’t do before a fight. Mousasi used his cage experience and superior Muay Thai, striking and ground-and-pound, in the fight to silence St. Preux.  St. Preux felt like he was able to figure Mousasi out in the third round, but by that time it was too late and he lost the decision.

He learned from the fight. He KO’d  T.J. Cook in the third round on Aug. 12, on the undercard of the Ronda Rousey vs. Sarah Kaufman fight. He said it was the first time he had ever “ate right” before a fight.  Coming off that big win, St. Preux said he’s ready to fight anyone in the UFC.

“It’s going to get a lot crazier when I get in there,” St. Preux said. “Forrest Griffin is a guy I’d really love to fight.”

Five years since his debut, St. Preux said he’s thrilled with his place in the sport. He feels like he is still a newcomer.

“I was the same guy in college who watched MMA and thought, ‘How could they do that?’  Now I am doing it,” he said.

He’s still hungry.

“I see myself as one of the top fighters at 205 in the world,” St. Preux said. “I love what I am doing.”

Undefeated rising star Cat Zingano

By Joshua Molina

It’s not that Cat Zingano doesn’t think a lot of Ronda Rousey. It’s that Cat Zingano doesn’t think of Ronda Rousey at all.

“I don’t consider her anything superhuman,” Zingano told Full Contact Fighter. “I don’t consider her. She’s entitled to the way she acts. That’s not the way I act. That’s not the way I would ever act. She has what I want. I have not called out Ronda Rousey. I am calling out the winner of that fight (against Liz Carmouche). It’s the belt that means something to me.”

Instead, the undefeated Zingano (7-0) is calling out Miesha Tate, in hopes of taking part in the second women’s match in UFC history. Unlike, Rousey, Zingano has good things to say about Tate.

“She’s the former champion,” Zingano said. “I want to get that fight against her. She is a tough opponent. I think I have what it takes to go out and beat her and then move to facing whoever will hold the belt after the next UFC women’s fight.”

Zingano said she wants to step up her level of competition.

“Miesha is talented,” Zingano said. “She is real scrappy. She can back up what she says she can do. She is classy and she carries herself well.”

Zingano said she and Tate represent something positive in women’s MMA.

“We’re athletes,” Zingano said. “We both represent something different in MMA other than going out there and talking shit. We are women. It’s not about bullying. It’s not about being an asshole. It’s about going out there and fighting.”

Born in Colorado, Zingano wrestled in high school, becoming a four-time All-American and National Champion. The 30-year-old at one time had dreams of trying out for the U.S. Olympic team.  She wrestled and beat guys in high school.

“The majority of my wrestling career I was the only girl on the team,” she said.

Along the way, she pissed off a lot of people. She didn’t care.

“Many coaches wouldn’t shake my hands after I beat their boys,” Zingano said. “Many boys wanted to see me quit, but I didn’t have quit in me.”

But after that she said that she lost her passion. Right after high school a close friend of hers died, and she said she felt “pretty screwed up about that.”

In her last effort, Zingano (right) choked out Raquel Pennington at Invicta FC 3 on Oct. 6, 2012. Photo credit: Esther Lin/Invicta FC

Later she developed two bad staph knee infections, which led to multiple surgeries. She said she was laid out and depressed.

“There was just something about the sport,” she said. “When I needed the passion it wasn’t there.”

Her last wrestling match was in 2004 in the Dave Schultz Memorial  International.

She remembers watching Sara McMann in the 2004 Olympics.

“She and I wrestled before and I did feel sad that I missed out on something that I potentially could have done well in,” Zingano said.

She struggled for three years looking for an outlet.

In 2006, she found Jiu-Jitsu. The art rekindled her passion and she believes she became a better Jiu-Jitsu fighter than wrestler.

She brings all her abilities into the MMA cage, combined with aggression and heavy strikes, Zingano has looked unstoppable.  She has three wins by KO and three wins by submission. She said she’s never been hurt in a fight.

“I am not satisfied with decisions,” Zingano said. “I would really be upset with someone being able to dispute whether I won. I am all about finishing. I am not a point-getter. I like to go out and finish and be in control of that person.”

And she wants the UFC strap. She also draws inspiration from her mother, who died young from cancer, and her happy, healthy 6-year-old son.

“I just really want to fight the best,” Zingano said. “I have no problem proving myself. I have done it my whole life.”

By Joshua Molina

Nearly seven years ago, 18,265 people packed San Jose’s Shark Tank, not to watch hockey, figure skating or a live concert.

They came to watch “cage fighting.” The legendary Frank Shamrock, a San Jose resident, battled Cesar Gracie in the main event. On the undercard, a young Vietnamese-American fighter Cung Le made his MMA debut.

The show launched a group of Bay Area fighters into the mainstream, under the banner of Strikeforce mixed martial arts, which was owned by Scott Coker and his primary investors, Silicon Valley Sports & Entertainment.

What followed were TV deals with Showtime, primetime on CBS, early-morning on NBC and national recognition of San Jose, California as “the hotbed of MMA.”

To this day, the Shamrock vs. Gracie fight owns the record for the largest paid live attendance for an MMA show in California.

Over the next 5 years, Strikeforce would hold 19 shows at what became the HP Pavilion, along with dozens of other shows around the country.

But tonight, Jan. 12, Strikeforce will hold its final show, 1,600 miles away from San Jose, in Oklahoma City, probably in front of less than 5,000 people.

The show will mark the official end to Strikeforce, which became the No. 2 MMA company in the world.
How did the company rise and fall so fast?

Silicon Valley Sports & Entertainment, now Sharks Sports & Entertainment,  wanted to return its focus to hockey and its other brand, the San Jose Sharks.

Strikeforce, despite its success had also backed itself into a financial corner with a co-promotional partnership with M-1 Global, to promote Fedor Emelianenko.

So at the height of its popularity, Coker and his hockey-centric investors sold Strikeforce to its competitor, the UFC in 2011.

As everyone expected, after the sale, Strikeforce died a death by a thousand cuts at the hands of its owner, the UFC.

On Jan. 12, Strikeforce and San Jose’s once sizzling MMA force dies for good, with a card rich with mostly unrecognizable names.

Nick Diaz, gone. Cung Le, gone. Jake Shields gone.

Even the current titleholders, Luke Rockhold and Gilbert Melendez won’t be fighting. They were too injured to fight on the final show.

A card that was once called “Champions” will feature one championship fight – Nate Marquardt, a former UFC star, defending against Tarec Saffiedine, for the Welterweight Championship.

As we say goodbye to Strikeforce, let’s remember that the organization changed MMA for the better.

It gave birth to stars such as Ronda Rousey, Nick Diaz, Luke Rockhold, Jake Shields, Josh Thomson, Cris Cyborg Santos, Gilbert Melendez, Gegard Mousasi, King Mo, Cung Le, KJ Noons, Rafael “Feijao” Cavalcante, Daniel Cormier, Alistair Overeem and several other former world champions.

It also was the place that allowed Frank Shamrock to build on his legacy and reintroduce himself to a new generation of MMA fans.

He finished the Shamrock vs. Gracie rivalry when he KO’d Cesar Gracie, before eventually becoming the voice Strikeforce, as a Showtime analyst, along with broadcast partners Mauro Ranallo, Pat Militech, and at times Gus Johnson and Stephen Quadros.

It’s where, after a decade, Fedor finally lost.

The current popularity of women’s MMA can be directly traced back to Strikeforce, which staged Gina Carano vs. Cyborg Santos in 2009, another HP Pavilion event with nearly 15,000 people in attendance.

Careers were made – and killed – in Strikeforce. Expect Luke Rockhold, Daniel Cormier and, of course, Rousey, to have big UFC careers.

What Strikeforce ultimately proved was that the UFC is not the NFL of MMA.

Another company can survive, and beat the UFC, as Strikeforce did in California, if it knows what it is doing.

The right combination of talent, financial capital and knowledgeable business people can create a successful MMA company that can compete with, and even outperform, the UFC.

The people behind Strikeforce had that, but then lost it, and, worse, lost faith in the product, just as it was on the verge of major mainstream success.

For the sake of the fans, fighters, even the UFC — because competition will make them better — let’s hope the next group of MMA investors are a lot smarter and more business savvy than the Silicon Valley Sports & Entertainment investors who let Strikeforce slip from their hands.

UFC President Dana White

By Joshua Molina

If you turn down fights in the UFC, you are gonna pay for it.

UFC president Dana White has made that clear – once again. Now the brash boss of the UFC has declared that Lyota Machida is no longer in line to fight for the Light Heavyweight Championship.

Machida is one of the many fighters on his s#&t list after he declined to fight Jon Jones on Sept. 22. After Henderson pulled out of the Jones fight with an injury, White declared to the media that Machida was the next in line for a title shot.
But White actually hadn’t spoken with Machida about that yet. Machida nixed it, saying he needed more time to prepare for the cat-like Jones. It looks like Machida may have a lot more time to prepare for Jones.

Now, Jones is fighting Vitor Belfort on Sept. 22 and Machida is on the outside looking in. If (when) Jones gets past Belfort, the likely next opponent will be Chael Sonnen, who even thought he has never fought in the light heavyweight division, earned major points with White when he said he would fight Jones on eight days notice on Sept. 1.

Jones, of course, didn’t want to fight Chael, the only man to beat Anderson Silva five out of seven rounds and have nothing to show for it.

The other big possibility is Daniel Cormier as Jones next opponent. If (when) Cormier gets past an aging Frank Mir, Cormier may move down to light heavyweight and probably give Jones the beating Dana White would like him to get.
In the meantime, all eyes are on Belfort and whether he can pull off what would be one of the greatest upsets in mixed martial arts history.

It’s entertaining to see how quickly guys get title shots in the middleweight division in the new, Zuffa-owned Strikeforce. On one hand you have Luke Rockhold, one of the best fighters in the world, but he doesn’t really have any top challengers in his division.

Strikeforce announced that the Santa Cruz surfer Rockhold will take on Lorenz Larkin. Larkin looked fantastic in his last fight – a three round unanimous decision over the one-dimensional Robbie Lawler. But in the fight before that he was KO’d by Muhammad “King Mo” Lawal. Technically Larkin is undefeated because his loss to King Mo was declared a no contest after Mo failed a drug test.

Because of the dearth of talent left in Strikeforce, Larkin will get a title shot, and a chance to derail Rockhold, one of the sport’s brightest young stars. Rockhold should feel lucky that he doesn’t have to stop immediately back into the cage against Jacare Souza, who was rumored to get a rematch against the man who beat him for the gold.

Souza has more weapons than Larkin, so Rockhold, who punished Tim Kennedy in a five-round unanimous decision victory in his last fight, should be the favorite against Larkin who is still growing as a fighter.

The other news out of Strikeforce this week is the signing of Sara McMann, an Olympic silver medalist in wrestling. McMann also competes for Invicta FC. The writing on the wall here is clear. McMann will likely get fed to Ronda Rousey, an Olympic bronze medalist in Judo, as her next challenger for the Strikeforce bantamweight championship, in a fight that would showcase to Olympic medalists fighting inside the Strikeforce cage.

Daniel Cormier (right) will face Frank Mir in Strikeforce action on Nov. 3.

By Joshua Molina

Strikeforce Grand Prix Champion Daniel Cormier has a date with former UFC heavyweight champ Frank Mir on Nov. 4 in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.

Although the two knew they were fighting each other, the date was just announced over the long weekend.

Cormier is 10-0 in his MMA career and is regarded as one of the sport’s brightest stars. He is a former Olympic wrestler who in recent fights has displayed knockout power in his hands. His biggest wins have come over Antonio “Bigfoot” Silva and former UFC champion Josh Barnett.

Cormier is expected to move to the UFC, which also owns Strikeforce, after his fight with Mir, win or lose.

Mir needs a victory to stay in the conversation of top heavyweights in MMA. The man who made Brock Lesnar tap out by ankle lock was destroyed in his light fight against UFC heavyweight champion Junior Dos Santos.

Mir was a last-minute replacement for Alistair Overeem, who failed a pre-fight drug test.
Mir, 16-6, has a history of pulling off big wins when no one expects him to. He is the only man to submit Lesnar. He also knocked out and submitted Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira. He broke Nogueira’s arm.

When he steps into the Strikeforce cage he will make history as the first fighter to fight simultaneously for the UFC and Strikeforce. Like Cormier, Mir is expected to return to the Octagon after the fight.

Twice-fired Miguel Torres has pulled out of his fight for Titan Fighting Championships on Nov. 4 to fight for upstart promotion World Series of Fighting on Nov. 3.

World Series of Fighting is expected to broadcast its show live on the NBC sports network and kickboxing legend Ray Sefo is expected to serve as president of the new promotion. Not much else is known about World Series of Fighting, but the company will hold a press conference on Thursday in Las Vegas to reveal more details.

Torres was the WEC Bantamweight champion, but hasn’t been able to repeat his success in the UFC. He was fired by UFC boss Dana White for making a ridiculous and offensive rape joke in a Sports Illustrated interview.

White let Torres come back, but then dropped him after his recent knockout loss to Michael McDonald at UFC 145.

The MMA and pro wrestling world is morning the sudden loss of Michael Clarke Duncan, the star of “The Green Mile.” Clarke also famously hung around MMA athletes and pro wrestlers, frequently appearing at Las Vegas UFC shows and WWE shows at the Staples Center.

Speaking of pro wrestling, Dave Meltzer, pro wrestling’s pioneer of news, has started writing a column for mmafighting.com. Meltzer created his own genre of pro wrestling journalism and covered the sport as journalist, not a fanboy, for long before it was ever popular.

The former Oakland Tribune reporter in the 1980s broke the stories regarding sex and steroid scandals in the WWE. Meltzer previously wrote a column for Yahoo! and he recently came under attack from Dana White who on camera blasted Meltzer for one of his reports on the declining TV ratings of the UFC.

Contact reporter Joshua Molina at jmolina@fcfighter.com. Or follow me on Twitter at https://twitter.com/JoshuaMolinaMMA

MMA is hurting for a larger-than-life superstar like Brock Lesnar, who has said goodbye to the sport

By Joshua Molina

Mixed martial arts needs a new star, and Nike deal or not, Jon Jones is not it, thanks to Dana White.

It doesn’t matter if the sport has great fighters, smart promoters or, hundreds of MMA gyms across the country opening its doors to young athletes.

It needs a charismatic star who can communicate on a large platform.

It’s hard to believe that just four years ago the sport’s brightest star was a guy named Kimbo Slice. Somehow, after several backyard brawls, Slice talked his way into a major contract with Elite XC and found himself fighting on national television.

Slice, in the professional sense, couldn’t fight. It didn’t matter. His mystique, aura, and Mike Tyson-like ferocity forced traditional sports media to pay attention to MMA.

The media stories about Slice around this time four years ago are laughable. From the Orlando Sun Sentinel in October 2008 was this gem: “To family, MMA star Kimbo Slice is a hulk with heart.” That same year he also appeared on “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” And dozens of other mainstream articles.

It didn’t matter that Slice was one of the worst MMA fighters in the world. The mainstream world didn’t know that. He was a star and people wanted to watch him. He made more money for the fighters around him.

There are, arguably, no mainstream stars in MMA, anymore. In a hilarious twist of irony, the biggest MMA star in the world right now is probably Ronda Rousey. That’s funny because UFC president Dana White has made a career downplaying and dumping on women’s MMA.

It’s no coincidence that Chael Sonnen, the most charismatic, flamboyant and best trash talker in the sport headlined UFC 148, which received one million buys on pay per view. UFC 147, the card prior, raked in a disastrous 200,000 buys.

How many MMA fighters can the average person on the street name? I bet they name Kimbo Slice before they name Anderson Silva, who is regarded as the best pound for pound fighter in the world.

MMA took off, with the UFC in the driver’s seat, after an epic fight between Stephan Bonnar and Forrest Griffin on the Ultimate Fighter. At the time, the UFC was on the USA network, with the best time slot in the world – after WWE’s wildly successful Monday Night Raw. A lot of eyes were on that fight.

Griffin and Bonnar, not the best MMA fighters, were the finalists on the first season of the reality show The Ultimate Fighter. There were overnight stars. The show was an excellent build for the pay per view show a week later between Randy Couture and Chuck Liddell, when quickly become major mainstream stars.

Tito Ortiz was also a huge name at the time. His bleach blond hair and no fear fighting style made him someone people wanted to watch. There have been other great fighters and personalities in MMA over the years, including Quentin “Rampage” Jackson, Dan Henderson and Ken Shamrock. Even Tank Abbot was a star who helped popularize MMA.

But for every one of those kinds of personalities, there’s a dozen really good fighters that no one in the mainstream really cares about. Benson Henderson? Anderson Silva? Junior Dos Santos? Nobody in American knows who these people are, outside of the hardcore MMA world.

Dana White pulled off a masterstroke when he signed former WWE wrestler Brock Lesnar to a contract. Even though White rushed him into the main event slot, burning him out before he was ever great, Lesnar was a perfect addition to the UFC. He was a monster with a personality that everyone was already familiar with from his years as a pay per view headliner for the WWE.

The signing of Lesnar fueled the popularity of the promotion and MMA. Lesnar is the biggest pay per view draw in the history of the UFC, even though he was never a Top 10, much less Top 50 fighter in the world. It didn’t matter. He was a star and people wanted to watch him.

In team sports, the company can live off the brand. For example, even though Tim Tebow is the biggest star in the NFL, it doesn’t matter if he crashes and burns. The NFL is the strongest brand and is bigger than its stars.

But that doesn’t work in individual sports. Everybody knows the name Don King in boxing, but that doesn’t make people want to watch. Instead, they want to watch stars like Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Manny Pacquiao. Muhammad Ali, Sugar Ray Leonard, Oscar de la Hoya, Evander Holyfield, Mike Tyson, Lennox Lewis, etc. were all stars who helped bridge the sport over the years.

Pro wrestlers have always had big stars emerge to bridge the mainstream gap. Hulk Hogan, Randy “Macho Man” Savage, Stone Cold Steve Austin, The Rock and now John Cena and CM Punk are huge stars who keep the product hot.

Boxing is not as popular as MMA right now in the television ratings sense, but boxing’s stars, Pacquiao and Mayweather are far bigger mainstream stars than anyone in MMA has ever been. And the mainstream pays money to watch stars.

Mixed martial arts needs a star.

Dana White should be trying to lure someone like WWE wrestler and athletic phenom John Cena or Jake Hager, Jr, otherwise known as Jack Swagger, a 31-year-old All-American wrestler from the University of Oklahoma.

The reality is that, in America, mainstream fans aren’t going to get behind a Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu black belt who submits his opponent with an armbar, who doesn’t speak English, or isn’t interesting on the microphone, if they can.

American fans in droves are never going to appreciate seeing a fighter get out of trouble by executing a brilliant Muay Thai clinch, then kneeing an opponent in the face.
They are definitely never going to care about skilled lay-and-pray fighter who controls his opponent on the ground for five rounds.

While hardcore, intelligent MMA fans appreciate these styles, the mainstream fans are what MMA needs to survive in the long run.

MMA needs a talker, with a charisma. It needs someone who can tell a story on the microphone. It needs someone who Dana White won’t verbally destroy because he won’t save a weak card. It needs someone who can capture the attention of the middle-America, and not be held back or restrained by White or any promoter.

Who will be MMA’s next big thing?

The sport has potential stars within it. Luke Rockhold, King Mo, Sonnen and Nick Diaz all have the kinds of personalities necessary to crossover and pique the interest of the mainstream – if they are given the platform to do so.

From a business and marketing perspective, it doesn’t matter if you are a great athlete, or the best in the world at what you do, if no one knows you who are. Kimbo Slice proved that.

Contact reporter Joshua Molina at jmolina@fcfighter.com. Or follow him on Twitter at https://twitter.com/JoshuaMolinaMMA

Chael Sonnen

By Joshua Molina

Chael Sonnen needs to shut up.

He’s been running his mouth almost non-stop for most of the year. After trashing Anderson Silva, his country and his training partners, he walked into the cage and got TKO’d by Silva in July.

Now, he’s trying to bait Jon Jones into agreeing to fight him. He was willing to replace an injured Dan Henderson and fight Jones on eight days notice on Sept. 1, but when Jones refused, Sonnen attacked him. He’s called him a chicken, a coward and a mental midget. Now he told ESPN radio that he will end up fighting Jones on Sept. 22 because Jones’ opponent, Vitor Belfort, is going to pull out of the fight.

Sonnen has been praised for his willingness to fight Jones on such short notice, but Jones and others have speculated that Sonnen has been quietly training for the fight because he knew Henderson was too injured to fight more than three weeks prior. Was Sonnen courageous or cunning?

Regardless of what Sonnen knew and when he knew it, he needs to stop talking before he ends up making a fool of himself.

Here’s why the Sonnen trash talk worked with Silva. People believed he could win. He hammered the unbeatable Silva for four rounds, then made a mistake, and paid for it, tapping out to a triangle choke.

The insults worked against Silva in the rematch because fans believed that he could actually beat him. It doesn’t matter that Sonnen was TKO’d in the second fight. Once again, Sonnen won the first round, and then made a mistake in the second (why on earth is he trying spinning backfists)?

Fight fans know that Sonnen is competitive with Silva, so listening to his trash talk is worth their time.

That’s not the case with Jones.

We don’t know that he’s competitive with Jones. In fact, the most logical assumption is that he’s not.

Jones is bigger, younger, faster, and just about more skilled in everything except wrestling and trash talking. To use pro wrestling vernacular that Sonnen would appreciate, barring some outside interference from Dan Henderson in the match, when the referee isn’t looking, Jones would likely clobber Sonnen and do it worse than Silva did.

Sonnen needs to calm down and stop diluting his effectiveness as a UFC character. There’s a fine line between brilliant self promoter and bizarre, delusional self promoter.

What if Sonnen talks his way into a fight with Jones and then gets tapped out in the first round? He’s going to have a hard time selling his next fight based on trash talk. He also needs to show some modicum of respect for Jones as a fighter. He’s not a coward for not wanting to fight a new opponent on eight days notice.

Professional fighters aren’t chickens or cowards. Jones may have his priorities out of whack; he might be getting bad advice from those around him; he might be playing it too safe and trying his career, but he’s not a chicken.

Besides, Jones is so hated in MMA right now that it really doesn’t matter if he fights Belfort, Sonnen or Elton John; people will pay to see him fight anybody, hoping that he will lose. At least for one more pay per view.

Lack of competition alert: Everyone in MMA is still reeling over Dana White’s verbal destruction of Jones last week during a media call. White wouldn’t be acting that way if there were another MMA competitor that he could lose Jones to. It’s easy for White to abuse Jones because he knows Jones probably won’t fight anywhere out of the UFC.

Theoretically Jones could move to Bellator once his UFC contract is up, but White doesn’t appear to be too worried about Bellator as competition yet. The UFC is not MMA.

Contact reporter Joshua Molina at jmolina@fcfighter.com. Or follow him on Twitter at https://twitter.com/JoshuaMolinaMMA

Ronda Rousey (left) has made her opinion on the Jon Jones-UFC situation clear. Photo Credit: Esther Lin/Showtime

By Joshua Molina

Not too surprisingly, Ronda Rousey agrees with UFC president Dana White.

She also believes Jon Jones should have fought Chael Sonnen on eight days notice.

Rousey, who smashed Sarah Kaufman two weeks ago in 54 seconds, told ESPN this:

“I don’t know what Jon Jones’ reasoning is, but I’d have made a different decision,” Rousey told espn.com.

UFC President Dana White

By Joshua Molina

Sometimes you can be your worst enemy. That was the case this week with UFC boss Dana White.

At a time when he should have been protecting the business that he claims to have created, he was actually destroying it.

In recent years the UFC has raked in hundreds of millions of dollars in pay per view buys and live gates, but it’s never a good thing when network sports writers are saying that you have no class.

CBS Sports.com National Columnist Gregg Doyel wrote this after Thursday’s debacle involving UFC Light Heavyweight Champion Jon Jones and his trainer Greg Jackson:

“Jones and Jackson don’t deserve crucifixion. They deserve what everyone in the UFC deserves on a hard day like Thursday: They deserve a company president with class. But they got Dana White.”

As everyone knows now, Dan Henderson injured his knee and pulled out of his fight with Jones. Chael Sonnen agreed to fight Jones on eight days notice. Jones refused to fight Sonnen.  White canceled UFC 151 scheduled for Sept. 1 – and blamed the cancelation on Jones for refusing to fight Sonnen.

King Mo Muhammad Lawal and Rampage Jackson appear in a video seemingly putting their differences behind them.  Not too long ago, Jackson called King Mo “Queen Ho” because he wore nipple rings. King Mo felt that the Jackson ignored him when he met him at a King of the Cage event.

The most interesting part of the video, however, is Jackson saying he wants to leave UFC and MMA to go box or kickbox because too many fighters are not fighting, and instead rolling around “humping” each other, creating boring fights.

Jackson trashed Sonnen for his style of fighting, but King Mo defended him, saying that he knows how to promote fights and you are fighting him, he’s going to “put money in your pocket.”

King Mo, by the way, is in full pro wrestling mode.

He’s about to make his pro wrestling debut with TNA on Spike TV, before debuting with Bellator at the beginning of the year, where he hopes to compete as a full-time MMA and pro wrestler. At the end of the interview, he shakes Rampage’s hand and tells him that the two should reform the famous 1990s tag team of “Harlem Heat,” where King Mo would play Booker T and Jackson would be Stevie Ray. Booker T, by the way, was the far more successful, and better-conditioned of the two athletes.

Fortunately for Dana White, the UFC has Chael Sonnen to keep the interest in the company alive.

Sonnen continues his verbal beat down of Jon Jones, this time in the form of a clever pizza special at the pizza restaurant he owns Oregon.

People can buy the “The Jon Jones” pizza special, loaded with chicken and cheese. The pizza comes with a six-pack of beer with special delivery (Jones of course was arrested and convicted of drunken driving earlier this year).

The best line is at the bottom of the advertisement, “Hurry Up! Get this deal now before our chicken runs out and we have to cancel.”

Sonnen is doing everything he can to angle himself into a fight with Jones. Even if it never happens, he keeps his name relevant and he is still the best in the sport and promoting fights.

Contact reporter Joshua Molina at jmolina@fcfighter.com. Or follow me on Twitter at https://twitter.com/JoshuaMolinaMMA