News and notes from around the MMA, pro wrestling, and boxing world …
– Travis Tomko is done with TNA and Big Sexy The Giant Killer is also upset with the company.
– Doug DeLuca and Gary Shaw have both resigned from EliteXC (EXC).
– Dave Meltzer’s latest Yahoo! column looks at where the MMA industry currently stands.
– He also has a story on Jamie Varner, who defends his WEC light weight championship against Marcus Hicks. Carlos Condit and Brian Stann also have title defenses.
– Lance Storm says thank you to ROH.
– Josh Gross looks inside the mind of Rampage Jackson.
– James Toney’s victory over Hasim Rahman was changed to a no decision.
– Roger Huerta has interesting things to say about UFC.
– There will be a second Strikeforce Playboy Mansion Show.
– Is there more than meets the eye when it comes to Ricky Hatton and his trainer breaking up?
– It looks like Oscar De La Hoya vs. Manny Pacquiao is where we are heading in De La Hoya’s last fight.
Talking Points
Roger Huerta’s comments are only surprising because of how public they are. I’m sure that most fighters who aren’t main eventers or top earning fighters feel the same way. The UFC can most definitely pay their fighters better than they are now. But when you’re the standard bearer, you’re setting the rates in which you pay your fighters. When Affliction throws major dollars at people who aren’t money drawers, it hurts the overall pay scale because they can’t keep them it up. It just shows the UFC that they are spending within the limits of what is smart. If the UFC is going to start raising fighter pay, they are doing so because they think that’s the market value for fighter pay. Remember when Rich Franklin had what everyone thought was one of the more unfair contracts? He was making something like $14,000 to show. And yet he was the middleweight champion. But did he draw all that much money? Probably not, but he was a poster boy for the UFC at the time. Eventually he made more money, which was both a product of the UFC pushing him, and him delivering. It’s a hard thing to gauge.
The name if the game is money drawing. They are trying to position Huerta as a major draw in the lightweight division, and as a Mexican fighter, and if he continues to win, he’ll definitely step into more money. But what does it mean to fight for another company? Did he look at what EXC was paying fighters for their last fight? And there’s no way that Affliction can keep up with what they’re paying. He’s done far too much good for his name in the UFC to even think about going elsewhere. UFC is the one company that is making money. I’m sure the XFL was attractive to certain lower level NFL players too.
We will probably have play by play of the WEC event this weekend.
And two of our writers are scheduled to be on a new Internet radio show early next week. We’ll have more details soon.
