Alistair Overeem thinks it's a little fishy that Fedor Emelianenko is suddenly clamoring for a fight with him.
Emelianenko's reps at M-1 Global made headlines this week by announcing the Russian heavyweight wants a year-end meeting with Overeem - and not Fabricio Werdum, who submitted him Emelianenko back in June.
But Overeem, Strikeforce's current heavyweight champion, contends M-1 is playing "tricks" with the public to cut in line for a crack at his belt.
Fabricio Werdum shocked the mixed martial arts world when he defeated heavyweight legend Fedor Emelianenko, and Sherdog recently posted a video of him breaking down the fight and how the submission went down. No word on when either fighter will return to the ring, but expect plenty of interest in a re-match between the two.
M-1 Global’s Vadim Finkelstein is pulling no punches in telling both Strikeforce and the MMA world that his number one fighter, Fedor Emelianenko is ready and will fight in either October or November, regardless of what Scott Coker(CEO of Strikeforce) wants. Finkelstein certainly took a very direct approach when talking to LowKick about a potential Fedor Vs. Werdum fight as opposed to Fedor Vs. Overeem:
“We are ready to fight against anyone, but everyone agrees that the most interesting fight right now is the rematch against Fabricio Werdum. We have one fight left on our contract, so if Strikeforce want to extend it – they should listen to our opinion. Fedor will fight again sometime between October and November. I’ll repeat that again: the only thing fans want to see is Fedor vs Werdum II. Fabricio himself said that he would like to rematch Fedor in Russia. It’s great, but this fight will not happen in Russia…. I can really feel that the rating makers on the US websites really wanted Fedor Emelianenko to suffer from his first “real” defeat. They now have Fedor on the Third Place, and the first is Brock Lesnar. Question: Who’s Brock Lesnar? He has only five professional fights, and one defeat. He is a marketable fighter because of his WWE past. They sell-out 60,000 stadiums for that crap, which no one would even consider watching in Russia. That’s why Brock Lesnar is popular. As for Fedor, he is not a marketable fighter – he’s just the best. He destroyed everyone during 10 years. He has 31 victories.”
Very direct words indeed, and you gotta love the he’s just the best line. Seems like M-1 is turning up the heat for a rematch and an attempt to clear the blemish from Fedor’s record.
Despite his recent loss to Fabricio Werdum, heavyweight fighter Fedor Emelianenko is still considered one of the greatest mixed martial artists of all time. It makes it hard for casual MMA fans to understand why he isn’t in the UFC, considered to be the highest level of the sport we love. There’s been talk from both UFC president Dana White and Fedor’s management M-1 Global as to why the two sides have not met but Fedor addressed the situation directly in a recent spread with Tatame:
If Dana White really wanted me in UFC, I would have been in UFC by now. Dana is the guy who speaks more than he actually does
There’s an entire interview in July’s issue of Tatame, and it sounds like an interesting piece as Fedor discusses Junior Dos Santos, Shogun, and the UFC.
Despite his recent loss to Fabricio Werdum, heavyweight fighter Fedor Emelianenko is still considered one of the greatest mixed martial artists of all time. It makes it hard for casual MMA fans to understand why he isn’t in the UFC, considered to be the highest level of the sport we love. There’s been talk from both UFC president Dana White and Fedor’s management M-1 Global as to why the two sides have not met but Fedor addressed the situation directly in a recent spread with Tatame:
If Dana White really wanted me in UFC, I would have been in UFC by now. Dana is the guy who speaks more than he actually does
There’s an entire interview in July’s issue of Tatame, and it sounds like an interesting piece as Fedor discusses Junior Dos Santos, Shogun, and the UFC.
It was a foregone conclusion that at some point highly outspoken UFC president Dana White would really say some nasty stuff about Fedor Emelianenko and it seems that he saved it for ESPN, calling Fedor a phony and a farce. Agree or disagree?
UFC president Dana White talked to reporters after Thursday’s “UFC 116: Lesnar vs. Carwin” pre-fight press conference and touched on a wide range of subjects from his unwillingness to sign Fedor Emelianenko after his loss, TapouT backing out of their sponsorship deal with the Russian fighter, Chuck Liddell being done in the UFC as a fighter, this weekends UFC 116 event, and much more.
UFC commentator Joe Rogan recently commented on Fedor Emelianenko’s recent loss to Fabricio Werdum amongst other things during a UStream podcast. Rogan is set to resume his normal color role at UFC 116: Lesnar vs. Carwin this Saturday and expect the popular comic to continue to think that every fight is the “Biggest, best, or most important” in UFC history and he might be right when it comes to Brock Lesnar taking on Shane Carwin.
While Showtime executives do not traditionally release ratings figures,
early estimates for this past weekend's historic "Strikeforce and M-1
Global: Fedor vs. Werdum" co-promoted event put the average Showtime
viewership at approximately 550,000 viewers when including DVR and on-demand figures.
MMAjunkie.com has learned from industry sources that
Showtime experienced a ratings jump of 56 percent for the show against
May's "Strikeforce: St. Louis" event.
As is typical for mixed martial arts broadcasts, the viewership increased throughout the broadcast, and the ratings peaked during the main event between Fedor Emelianenko and Fabricio Werdum with a 2.1 household rating and more than 700,000 viewers when factoring in DVR and on-demand data.
Fedor Emelianenko ($400,000), Fabricio Werdum ($100,000) and Cung Le
($100,000) were the top earners at this past weekend's "Strikeforce and
M-1 Global: Fedor vs. Werdum" event.
MMAjunkie.com recently requested and today received the list of total disclosed paydays from the California State Athletic Commission.
The total payroll for the June 26 event was $788,800.
Alistair Overeem thinks it's a little fishy that Fedor Emelianenko is suddenly clamoring for a fight with him.
While Showtime executives do not traditionally release ratings figures,