Week in MMA & Boxing - 2/10/17
2018 UFC Show Schedule
Ariel Helwani reported there will be 13 PPV shows this year, with 11 from the U.S. and one each from Canada and Brazil. There will be four shows on FOX, down from five live and one taped last year. There will be 18 shows on FS 1 and six Fight Pass shows. The schedule will include 23 live events in the U.S., five in Europe, three in Canada, Latin America, Brazil and Asia, and two in Australia.
The 41 total events scheduled is the same number as in 2016. The next FOX show will be 4/15 from the Sprint Center in Kansas City, the first time UFC has ever run that market. There will be a 6/3 PPV show from Brazil and a 7/8 PPV show from Las Vegas. International Fight Week will once again take place in Las Vegas with a Fight Pass exclusive show on 7/6, an FS 1 show on 7/7 which will be the TUF finales for the upcoming season, and the PPV on 7/8.
The 41 total events scheduled is the same number as in 2016. The next FOX show will be 4/15 from the Sprint Center in Kansas City, the first time UFC has ever run that market. There will be a 6/3 PPV show from Brazil and a 7/8 PPV show from Las Vegas. International Fight Week will once again take place in Las Vegas with a Fight Pass exclusive show on 7/6, an FS 1 show on 7/7 which will be the TUF finales for the upcoming season, and the PPV on 7/8.
UFC 211: Stipe Miocic vs. Junior Dos Santos 2
The talked about Stipe Miocic vs. Junior Dos Santos heavyweight title fight will headline UFC 211 on 5/13 in Dallas. Miocic had a tremendous 2016, with first round knockout wins over Andrei Arlovski, Fabricio Werdum (winning the title) and Alistair Overeem (defending it). He’s won four straight via knockout, with his last loss coming on December 13, 2014, a close decision loss to Dos Santos in what was a great fight.
To me, Dos Santos, even though he won, was never the same after that fight, as the damage of that fight plus the really bad damage of the two losses to Cain Velasquez took their toll. Dos Santos has only fought twice in those two year, a knockout loss to Overeem and a decision win over Ben Rothwell. Originally the idea was he’d face the winner of Velasquez vs. Werdum. They tried to match Werdum with Dos Santos this month, but Werdum turned down that fight, and based on that, decided on Dos Santos as the title contender which really shows the lack of depth in that division.
To me, Dos Santos, even though he won, was never the same after that fight, as the damage of that fight plus the really bad damage of the two losses to Cain Velasquez took their toll. Dos Santos has only fought twice in those two year, a knockout loss to Overeem and a decision win over Ben Rothwell. Originally the idea was he’d face the winner of Velasquez vs. Werdum. They tried to match Werdum with Dos Santos this month, but Werdum turned down that fight, and based on that, decided on Dos Santos as the title contender which really shows the lack of depth in that division.
UFC on FS1 does Better than Expected
The UFC on FS1 show from 2/4 in Houston was headlined by Chan Sung Jung, "Korean Zombie" vs Dennis Bermudez. This was far from the type of fight or card FOX was looking for the night before the Superbowl, in Houston. FOX had the rights to the Super Bowl, and they thought it would be cool to have a UFC show in the Super Bowl city, with all the tourists and bigwigs in town.
UFC had historically arranged a show the night before the Super Bowl in Las Vegas, under the guise that the city fills up with tourists who want to gamble that weekend like no other weekend of the year.
The thing with special shows is, to garner the attention of the non-fans in town, you can’t just have a fight card. It needs to be a special event with big names. But after overloading November and December, UFC had nothing left.
UFC had historically arranged a show the night before the Super Bowl in Las Vegas, under the guise that the city fills up with tourists who want to gamble that weekend like no other weekend of the year.
The thing with special shows is, to garner the attention of the non-fans in town, you can’t just have a fight card. It needs to be a special event with big names. But after overloading November and December, UFC had nothing left.
Zombie, back after three-and-a-half years, cracked Bermudez with an uppercut to the jaw, and in 2:49, the fight was over, earning him his sixth performance bonus in seven fights. The other surprise was this show, with limited star power, did the best numbers for a Fight Night in one year, and ninth best ever on FS 1. The show did 1,158,000 viewers, peaking at 1,286,000 during the Ovince Saint Preux loss to Volkan Oezdemir. The viewership was heavily skewed to the 35-49 age group. The last Fight Night to beat it was last year’s night before the Super Bowl show, but that was a much stronger card.
Live, even with Houston filled with sports fans for the Super Bowl, it wasn’t a big draw. The show drew 8,119 fans paying $611,133 to the Toyota Center.
Live, even with Houston filled with sports fans for the Super Bowl, it wasn’t a big draw. The show drew 8,119 fans paying $611,133 to the Toyota Center.
Instant Replay Rules
The Association of Boxing Commissions is proposing a new addition to the unified rules where referees can use instant replays to review whether they’ve made the correct call if it involves the finishing sequence of the fight. Nevada already has this rule in place, but it would expand the rule to more states (not all states use the ABC rules, so right now we’ve got a situation in MMA where some states use the old rules and some use the new rules and the fighters have to find out which set of rules they are fighting under).
The way the rule being proposed (which will be voted at the convention in July in Uncasville, CT and would likely pass) is that a referee can only use instant replays to see if a fight ending was possibly caused by an illegal move, whether intentional or unintentional. Only the referee can call for the replay being used and it would be up to the referee to make his call based on what he sees.
The way the rule being proposed (which will be voted at the convention in July in Uncasville, CT and would likely pass) is that a referee can only use instant replays to see if a fight ending was possibly caused by an illegal move, whether intentional or unintentional. Only the referee can call for the replay being used and it would be up to the referee to make his call based on what he sees.
Ryan Bader Leaves UFC for Bellator
Dana White also said this past week that the UFC has turned down matching Bellator’s offer for Ryan Bader, so Bader will be headed there. Bader was ranked as the No. 4 contender at light heavyweight behind Anthony Johnson, Alexander Gustafsson and Glover Teixeira, but it’s really No. 5 since Jon Jones is going to be No. 1 contender and getting the title shot as soon as his suspension ends in July.
It depends on the size of the Bellator offer, but given the gigantic difference in revenues between the two sides, you can see UFC is strong on keeping talent costs down unless Bellator way overspent. And he’s not a guy you would want to overspend for. Losing Bader, 33, is nothing close to a game changer, and he’s not major marquee fighter, but if you look at Bader’s career and Michael Bisping’s career as far as what they’ve actually done and quality names that they’ve beaten, until Bisping won the title in a bout nobody expected him to.
It depends on the size of the Bellator offer, but given the gigantic difference in revenues between the two sides, you can see UFC is strong on keeping talent costs down unless Bellator way overspent. And he’s not a guy you would want to overspend for. Losing Bader, 33, is nothing close to a game changer, and he’s not major marquee fighter, but if you look at Bader’s career and Michael Bisping’s career as far as what they’ve actually done and quality names that they’ve beaten, until Bisping won the title in a bout nobody expected him to.
Other Headlines:
- The entire roster will be brought to Las Vegas for two days in May to be talked with by owner Ari Emanuel and Dana White. It’s said that other athletes, musicians, actors, actresses and other celebrities under the WME IMG banner will also be brought in.
- They will also tell fighters about the new UFC Performance Institute, a gym available free of charge to all fighters and coaches with state-of-the-art rehab setups.
- The new season of The Ultimate Fighter, with Cody Garbrandt and T.J. Dillashaw as coaches, will start filming next week.
- The UFC removed three fighters from their rankings, Misha Cirkunov, who was ranked No. 8 at light heavyweight, Rick Story, ranked No. 9 at welterweight, and Lorenz Larkin, ranked No. 6 at welterweight.
This Weekends Show
This week’s show is the 2/11 UFC 208 show from the Barclays Center in Brooklyn. The PPV has Jim Miller (28-8) vs. Dustin Poirier (20-5), Jared Connonier (9-1) vs. Glover Teixeira (25-5), Tim Boetsch (20-1) vs. Ronaldo Jacare Souza (23-4), Derek Brunson (16-4) vs. Anderson Silva (33-8) and the main event to create a UFC women’s featherweight title with Holly Holm (10-2) vs. Germaine de Randamie (6-3).
The main event being a title match is the strongest case for title devaluation to date. De Randamie wasn’t even a top ranked 135 pounder and Holm, who was, has lost her last two fights. After Cyborg was out of the picture, the idea was to rehab Holm and give her a title for a Rousey vs. Holm double title fight, but Amanda Nunes spoiled that record setting event. That said, Poirier vs. Miller looks good and Silva is a legend and Souza by all rights should be in line for a middleweight title shot if he wins. How this show does, and I don’t expect it to do well, is based on how much Holm means on her own (and she did mean a ton in her last fight on FOX) and what just seeing Anderson Silva fight means.
The main event being a title match is the strongest case for title devaluation to date. De Randamie wasn’t even a top ranked 135 pounder and Holm, who was, has lost her last two fights. After Cyborg was out of the picture, the idea was to rehab Holm and give her a title for a Rousey vs. Holm double title fight, but Amanda Nunes spoiled that record setting event. That said, Poirier vs. Miller looks good and Silva is a legend and Souza by all rights should be in line for a middleweight title shot if he wins. How this show does, and I don’t expect it to do well, is based on how much Holm means on her own (and she did mean a ton in her last fight on FOX) and what just seeing Anderson Silva fight means.