Strikeforce CEO Scott Coker talks about UFC 139 and the future of Strikeforce.

Strikeforce CEO Scott Coker looks back at the Strikeforce: Diaz vs. Daley event and discusses the results and what’s next for Gina Carano.

Strikeforce CEO Scott Coker looks back at the first event of the Strikeforce World Grand Prix Heavyweight Tournament.

Strikeforce CEO Scott Coker looks back on the Strikeforce: Diaz vs. Cyborg event and talks about what’s next for the fighters.

Put the two together, and you get a lot of things. Chaos? Sure. Unpredictable results? Of course. Entertainment? Definitely.

The Strikeforce Heavyweight Grand Prix provides fans, fighters, and Strikeforce itself with a lot to be excited about. Fans get to see some great matchups, and fighters get to distinguish themselves among a top-heavy division that has a lot of question marks. Meanwhile, Strikeforce gets to settle a number of nagging issues in the division (including having a champion who’s never faced Fedor Emelianenko or the only man to beat him in the last ten years) while attracting plenty of viewers for the spectacle.

I poked fun at the bracket itself in my last column, but it really is rather smartly constructed. By putting the heavy hitters in one side, Strikeforce CEO Scott Coker ensures that none of his most marketable fighters drops a fight against an underachieving opponent. He also ensures that at least one of those four will be in the tournament final, injuries aside.

Most of all, though, it provides flexibility. Look at Fedor, for example. If Fedor loses to Antonio Silva, Strikeforce can sleep easy knowing that Silva is a legitimate talent who they have locked up for the forseeable future. If he wins only to lose to Fabricio Werdum again, the same statement holds true. And if he loses to Alistair Overeem in the second round, they just have to hold their breath in the final, as Overeem would then be possibly the most hyped (and possibly most talented) heavyweight in the world.

If Fedor is able to run the gauntlet, then he will have redeemed himself and provided some wins against quality opponents to act as a rebuttal to the annoying and ridiculous claim by his detractors that he “hasn’t fought anybody”.

If there’s a problem in all of this it’s either a) the possibility of someone like Josh Barnett coming out relatively unscathed from the other end of the bracket and beating whoever emerges from the “big four” side of things and b) the fate of the heavyweight title itself.

Coker says now that the heavyweight title will not be on the line in any of Alistair Overeem’s fights, for reasons that make sense. For one, it wouldn’t be fair for Overeem (and his opponents) to be fighting five round bouts while other competitors only have to be ready for three round contests. Another situation is that the title could conceivably change hands three times in one tournament, which wouldn’t do anybody any favors.

Ideally, the champion wouldn’t even compete in such a tournament, but seeing Overeem against Werdum and possibly the winner of Fedor and Silva is well worth any title lineage headaches. Plus, it’s not as if the promotion’s heavyweight title has an illustrious history at this point, anyway. Thanks to this tournament, there’s a good chance to change that, so if non-title bouts for Overeem are a necessary evil, so be it.

Strikeforce is doing their best to handle the tournament professionally, even going so far as to have three separate reserve bouts and a committee to decide the best possible replacement should there be an injury to a victorious fighter. There’s also a system in place to prevent a draw, as a fourth judge will be on hand for each fight to name a winner based on “overall performance” if the other three judges are deadlocked. Of course, you could do the same thing by having any judge who scores the bout even based upon rounds name an overall winner, but we’ll take what we can get.

Strikeforce needs to take care of a couple of issues in their heavyweight division, namely finding out who stands where in terms of rankings and legitimizing the title itself. If everything pans out, this tournament could help them do both (and wouldn’t it be great if Strikeforce became a spiritual successor to Pride in terms of running yearly tournaments?). Even if it doesn’t work out as Strikeforce would like, the tournament will provide for a fun 2011 for fans.

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Strikeforce CEO Scott Coker reflects over the Strikeforce: Henderson vs. Babalu 2 event which took place on Saturday, Dec. 4 2010 in St. Louis, Missouri.

While the success of Pride Fighting Championships mixed things up quite a bit, the ultimate failure of that promotion led to rankings that are stacked with a vast majority of UFC and WEC fighters. A situation where there is real debate about whether a Zuffa-employed fighter is better than a counterpart elsewhere is pretty rare these days. However, a quick look at the lightweight division reveals that there is quite a bit of debate about who should be the top fighter in the weight class.

To me and many others, the top fighter at 155 pounds is Frankie Edgar. Detractors will point out that he lost to Gray Maynard, but that was about two and a half years ago. Furthermore, in my mind, he did the most important thing a fighter can do to assume the mantle- he beat the number one guy in the division. Not only that, but he did it twice.

The fact that BJ Penn was a clear-cut, consensus number one before the two Edgar losses makes it even easier for me to rank Edgar as the top lightweight in the world. However, there are others who feel differently. No one that isn’t present at Maynard family reunions is seriously campaigning for Gray Maynard at the top spot, though he does have an unblemished record of ten wins and no losses, as well as a win over the champ himself. No, what makes this particular situation so interesting is that the other two fighters who have started to garner some attention as potential successors to BJ Penn are currently fighting outside of the UFC.

Those fighters are Gilbert Melendez of Strikeforce and Eddie Alvarez of Bellator Fighting Championships. Recently, both have had performances that have led many within their respective organizations-from announcers to executives and other fighters- to say that they should hold the top spot in the world.

It smacks more than a little bit of bias to hear Strikeforce or Bellator’s commentary teams claim that their own promotion’s lightweight champion is the best in the world, but it says a lot that you can’t really dismiss it outright. There is at least some merit to the claims, which aren’t completely ridiculous, at least.

Melendez earned a certain number of votes when he pummeled and dismantled Shinya Aoki during their fight in Strikeforce awhile back. For those who already had Melendez in the top five and who vaulted Aoki to the top spot when Penn first lost to Edgar, it makes sense to rank Melendez first. For me, Aoki proved to be too one-dimensional to have ever been the best lightweight out there, and Melendez lacks enough signature wins against top competition, but that’s just me.

Then there’s Alvarez, who garners significantly less consideration among media members for the top spot, though it’s hard not to be impressed by his utter destruction of Roger Huerta. Sure, Huerta has been on a rough streak lately, but he provides that all-important opportunity to compare Alvarez against UFC fighters that Huerta had faced during his time in the Octagon. Huerta may not have been a champion in the UFC, but he fared well and beat some tough opponents, and never looked as bad as he did against Alvarez, even in losing efforts. Alvarez also took the tough Josh Neer apart, who managed to hold his own against tough competition in the UFC for some time, as well.

What Alvarez and Melendez really need is the opportunity to fight another truly elite lightweight, which both are angling to do in the form of a cross-promotional match against one another. With Edgar facing a challenging bout against the only fighter to have beaten him in his career so far, this fight could really open the door for Melendez or Alvarez to be considered the legitimate best lightweight in the world.

Will the fight happen? It’s hard to say, though it seems like a no-brainer at first glance. Then again, Strikeforce has a much higher profile than that of Bellator, even if both promotions pale in comparison to the UFC in terms of mainstream awareness.

Then, there’s the business side of things. Scott Coker, the CEO of Strikeforce initially said that a co-promotion would be hard to do because of all of the details, which go down to what network to air it on. Bjorn Rebney, the CEO of Bellator went on to say that a co-promotion isn’t that hard to work out at all, and that they could do the fight on Showtime, CBS or wherever else Strikeforce preferred to do it.

The whole thing quickly become a bit of a debacle, though. Rebney claimed that he was trying to get a hold of Coker to talk business, but that his messages were going unanswered, to which Coker said he had never received any messages at all. This prompted Rebney to post images of the texts themselves, although Coker dismissed that particular tactic as “childish” and said that the number Rebney was trying to contact was an old number that he no longer used.

Sigh.

Then, in the middle of all that, there was speculation from Alvarez himself that Coker was being evasive about a co-promotion in order to “protect” Melendez. So, who knows whether this thing can actually get done. It doesn’t even make a whole lot of business sense for Strikeforce, honestly, though it’s a great opportunity for Bellator and would be wonderful for the fans.

If Alvarez does continue to fight only the opponents that Bellator can provide for him, while Melendez continues to fight friend and quality lightweight Josh Thomson over and over for the rest of eternity, this debate over which organization has the best lightweight will not last very long. As they say, steel sharpens steel, and it’s hard to be considered the best fighter in the world when you barely have any top ten opponents to prove your worth against.

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Of course, it should be noted that Ryan will be fighting on the Strikeforce Challengers 10 card, not on a “regular” Strikeforce card, or even better, a CBS-aired Strikeforce event. So, at least we know that Sarah Kaufman won’t be too angry. In that respect Couture begins a bit below the curve when compared to fellow Strikeforce rookie Herschel Walker, whose possession of an ages-old Heisman trophy allowed him to skip the Challengers series altogether.

Like Walker, though, Couture will face an opponent who is no doubt not intended to give him more than a mild challenge. Couture will face Lucas Stark, who is 2-4 as a professional and got one of his two wins by split decision, no less. However, Couture himself was just a competent 4-1-1 as an amateur, with the one draw coming in a fight where Sean Bollinger knocked him out with a triangle choke, only to have the referee rule that Couture went out after the bell sounded to end the second round.

Nonetheless, predicting the outcome of two relatively inexperienced fighters is not as interesting as taking a look at this and other seemingly strange moves on the behalf of Strikeforce. Whether you look at the signings of fighters like former WWE wrestler Bobby Lashley (or rumored future Strikeforce signee Dave Batista), Herschel Walker, and now the very green Couture, it’s clear that many of these names are attached to a higher-level promotion because of…well, their names.

Lashley is an exception, as he had plenty of collegiate wrestling experience prior to his “sports entertainment” days, but Walker and Batista had no real experience (please, don’t write me to debate that Walker’s years of tae kwon do equal valuable MMA experience) to bring with them. For crying out loud, even Jose Canseco has been attached to Strikeforce through rumors. Sure, he may never fight for the promotion, but the fact that we all kind of believe he could end up there says a lot, doesn’t it? (By the way, I’m not so elitist that I would deny having interest in a Walker-Canseco bout. Make it happen, Coker!)

Even the two women’s divisions that Strikeforce currently hosts are examples of Strikeforce doing things differently than the other big name promotions do. That’s not to say that having fighters like Kaufman and Cristiane “Cyborg” Santos compete under the Strikeforce banner is akin to bringing in 40-something year old ex-wrestlers, football players and baseball stars, but like I said, it shows that Strikeforce understands that they can’t beat the UFC at their own game.

In other words, even though it may appear to be pretty bush league to sign a guy and probably put him on television for his first professional fight, I think it’s actually a pretty crafty move. Couture has name recognition thanks to his pa, but won’t command the kind of price tag that someone like a former WWE wrestler or well-known athlete from another sport would. Putting him on the Strikeforce Challengers 10 card will interest at least a few people to get them to watch the show when they otherwise would not. That in turn will allow other fighters that are being showcased on said card to be seen by more fans. All in all, it’s not a bad move.

In fact, I would argue that this has to continue to be Strikeforce’s game plan…at least for the foreseeable future. They may snag a Dan Henderson every now and then, but their biggest opportunity is going to be to provide what the UFC can’t- or more accurately, won’t. At this point, that includes women’s divisions and “freak show” fights, along with signing the occasional prospect like Couture, who is more noteworthy for his name than potential at this early point in his career. At the same time, they must continue to snap up any talented fighters that they can and promote the talent that they do have.

Coker has said in the past that he doesn’t want Strikeforce to be perceived as a company that takes the UFC’s cast-offs. I say, “why not?” Why not sign Paul Daley? People are going to want to see what the crazy bastard who swung at Josh Koscheck after the bell will do next, right? And are you going to tell me that Keith Jardine isn’t good enough to be on a light heavyweight roster that currently lists Mike Kyle as one of the better title contenders?

Coker has done a good job, but one thing he may want to remember is that he can’t beat the UFC at their own game- at least not yet, and not anytime soon. Don’t worry about whether you have to sell the occasional novelty fight or bring in the occasional UFC cast-off, as long as people are actually watching.

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Scott Coker Says “Psssssssh” to Fedor-Werdum 2

Scott Coker is growing on me. Part of this is because he doesn’t engage in public flame wars with fans (or YouTube tirades directed at journalists), and part is because he’s finally sticking up for himself a little bit. In the past, Coker has turned the other cheek when UFC president Dana White has tried to bait him into a war of words, and has had to tiptoe around the “crazy Russians” themselves that make up Fedor Emelianenko’s management team.

Then, something happened. Fabricio Werdum tapped Fedor in sixty-nine seconds. Suddenly, Coker was a new man. He stopped paying for late pizza deliveries, went to White’s house just to knock on the door and then flip him off, and told Fedor’s management team that the immediate rematch with Werdum that they wanted wasn’t gonna happen.

Well, he did one of those things, anyway.

Taking the words right out of my mouth, Coker was reported by Sherdog.com as having said, “To me, it’s only been a month. We saw the Werdum fight already.” He went on to list Alistair Overeem, Antonio Silva or Sergei Kharitonov as possible opponents for Fedor’s last fight on his current contract. When asked what he would do if Fedor’s notoriously-stubborn management team tried to play hardball, Coker was uncharacteristically assertive, saying, “I just don’t think they’ll have a choice.”

This is a great move for Strikeforce. If I was them, I wouldn’t put him in there with Overeem either…that is, unless it was a title match and Fedor was locked up in the event that he won the title. That way, if Fedor fights Silva or Kharitonov, then splits to fight somewhere else, Strikeforce still has an untarnished champion and Werdum, who already beat Fedor. There’s no reason for Strikeforce to let Fedor avenge his loss to Werdum or beat their champion in a non-title match if he’s just going to bolt when his contract’s up, anyway.

Rampage Likely to Face Machida Next

According to MMAWeekly.com, Quinton “Rampage” Jackson’s next fight will be no easy test, as he will face former light heavyweight champion Lyoto Machida. Though there is no reported date for the bout, it would obviously take place in the fall, with most believing that November’s event in Germany would be the most likely choice. For his part, Rampage just about confirmed the rumor on his Twitter, saying that he was going to be fighting someone whose name he couldn’t spell. That doesn’t exactly limit the possible options, but let’s just go ahead and believe the Machida rumor for now.

I don’t think this is a particularly good matchup for Rampage, though Machida having been knocked out by Mauricio “Shogun” Rua adds a certain amount of intrigue, since Rampage has heavy hands and all. Still, it would be a great fight to see, and would help to shorten the line for a title shot in 2011.

Mir-Nogueira 2 Tops List of Upcoming UFC Fights

UFC 119 is looking to be awesome. UFC 120? Not so much. The UFC officially announced a rematch between Frank Mir and Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira, which will headline UFC 119 on September 25th. Meanwhile, Nogueira’s brother, Antonio Rogerio Nogueira, will take on Ryan Bader in what should be an outstanding fight, as well. Finally, Chris Lytle will get to avenge the controversial decision loss to Matt Serra that kept him from getting a title shot at Georges St. Pierre when those two hook it up again that night.

UFC 120, however, is looking Ultimate Fight Night-tastic. Michael Bisping will headline the London-based event on October 16th against Yoshihiro Akiyama, who has not been as impressive as fans would have hoped in his first two UFC bouts. Meanwhile, Dan Hardy will make his first appearance since getting dominated by St. Pierre as he takes on Carlos Condit in what should be a good fight, if also one that isn’t really worthy of being the co-main event on a UFC card. John Hathaway vs. Mike Pyle is the only other offically announced fight on the card, though Cheick Kongo and Spencer Fisher are among the high-profile fighters rumored to be taking part in other fights that night. Hey, it’s going to be on Spike TV though, so I shouldn’t complain! In fact, just go ahead and forget that I did.

Finally, UFC 121 will take place just one week after UFC 120, and the card finally has another officially announced fight to join the title bout between Brock Lesnar and Cain Velasquez. In the newly-announced bout, Paulo Thiago will fight Diego Sanchez in another fight to help sort out the middle of the ultra-competitive welterweight division.

Quick Shots

–Randy Couture is fighting James Toney in the surefire winner of 2010′s “WTF Award for Head-Scratching Matchmaking” in just over a month, but that hasn’t kept him from commenting on some other fights that interest him in the light heavyweight division. The UFC Hall of Famer told SBNation.com that he would love to fight both Anderson Silva (at 205 lbs., of course) and Lyoto Machida. Shortly after, I told no one in particular that I would be interested in watching either one of those hypothetical fights, as well.

–Josh Koscheck may have pulled a no-no, announcing on his Twitter that his fight with Georges St. Pierre will take place on December 11th. Actually, he said that he will become the welterweight champion on that particular day, but I reserve the right to edit comments for excessive craziness. Actually, forget that. I haven’t been editing any of Chael Sonnen’s pre-fight smack talk, after all.

–In WEC news, Jamie Varner confirmed on his official website that he will be facing Donald Cerrone for the second time at WEC 51, which will be going down on September 30th. This will be a rematch of their controversial 2009 bout, where Varner took an illegal knee to the head in the fifth round, which took the fight to the scorecards early and earned Varner a split decision win.

–If you’re not into any of the above fights, perhaps Houston Alexander vs. Rameau Thierry Sokoudjou is more your speed? That barn-burner will take place at Shark Fights 13 (no, I haven’t heard of it, either), which takes place on September 11th. And…are you ready for this? It’s not even the main event! THAT designation rests with the highly-anticipated bout between recent UFC castoff Keith Jardine and Trevor Prangley. Prangley is apparently the Shark Fights champion, but won’t be putting his strap on the line against Jardine. Booooooooooooooo!!!

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Shields Will Fight in the UFC at 170

It’s funny- out of all of the ways I could have found out that the much-anticipated signing of Jake Shields to the UFC had taken place, I saw it on ESPN. That’s right, an otherwise dull day of channel surfing resulted in a raised eyebrow as I saw the news on the ticker on the bottom of my screen. Good for you, ESPN. Of course, Sports Illustrated’s Josh Gross has since reported that the deal is not done, so maybe ESPN doesn’t deserve props on this, after all. Gross says the terms have been agreed to, but the contract hasn’t been officially signed yet.

Regardless, Shields will be fighting in the UFC, and at welterweight, to boot. He will be likely to face a top welterweight not named “Georges St. Pierre” in his first fight, which many are assuming will be the winner of the Thiago Alves-Jon Fitch bout on August 7th. That sounds good enough to me, and whether he fought at welterweight or middleweight, he would be providing a much-needed shake-up to either division.

Sonnen Continues Crazy Behavior

We’re all aware that Chael Sonnen basically talked his way out of relative obscurity and into a high-profile title fight with Anderson Silva. Sure, he had a few quality wins along the way, but nothing that would exactly blow anyone away. However, Sonnen has long since kept talking until he ended up on the wrong side of the crazy border, comparing a black belt in jiu-jitsu from the Nogueira brothers to a Happy Meal toy, reducing Rich Franklin to being just “a math teacher from Ohio” and taking every possible opportunity to slam the mercurial Silva.

His latest digs include a funny-for-all-the-wrong-reasons comment about Silva’s “fifteen minutes of fame are up”, which would seem to be a much more apt description of what is to come for Sonnen himself. It’s not as if anyone was talking about Sonnen before he beat Nate Marquardt and started putting Silva on blast. Meanwhile, Silva has been number one in his weight class for years. He’s debatably the best pound-for-pound fighter in the sport and sure-fire future Hall of Famer…well, unless he keeps pissing Dana White off. Oh, and Sonnen has said that every other 185 and 205 pound fighter in the UFC is a coward, too.

Amusingly enough, when Silva tracked Sonnen down at a recent UFC Fan Expo (after Sonnen walked by and said Silva wouldn’t have to worry about signing autographs in a couple of months, because no one would want them), he apparently didn’t have much to say to Silva’s face. Silva told Sonnen to “relax”, and Sonnen told an interviewer afterward that he couldn’t remember what else had taken place. Riiiiiight.

James Toney Joins Apparent Competition with Sonnen

You may wonder who can challenge Sonnen in the realm of ridiculous, over the top trash talking. I would counter that by saying that Sonnen may not even be the champ anymore. Why not? Because of James Toney.

“After I knock out Randy Couture, I’m coming for Brock’s bitch ass next,” Toney said, calling out a man that would take him down in .2 seconds and proceed to grind him into burger with very little effort at all. He did earn some points by aptly pointing out that his new rival Dana White is “too scared to get in the cage.” Still, it wouldn’t appear that looking past a multiple-time UFC champion and trying to start an Austin vs. McMahon rivalry with the UFC president is a great way for Toney to get started. Perhaps Toney should, I don’t know, win an MMA fight before crowning himself as UFC heavyweight champ?

Dream “Declares War” on UFC…No, Really

Hey, you know Dream? The lovable but mostly-underwhelming Japanese MMA organization that does a pretty good Pride impression, other than having about a third of the talent that Pride had in its heyday? Well, they just scored a nice sum of money, raising an investment of over 200 million US dollars. So now, FEG (parent company of Dream and K-1) got a nice little bit of cash flow and is acting like a high school kid who just got his first paycheck from McDonald’s and has gone to the mall to spend it all.

K-1 prez Sadaharu Tanikawa not only issued a “declaration of war” against the UFC, but puzzlingly enough, against the pro-wrestling organization WWE, as well. This was said despite an admission that Dream “won’t stand a chance in the American market”, so they plan on taking on the rest of the world instead. A noble goal, right?

Unfortunately, so much of Dream’s production is focused on traditional Japanese MMA presentation (right down to the roster of fighters) that the organization will have a hard time gaining ground on the UFC in many other countries, too. I doubt that fans in England, Germany, Brazil or many other locations will be following Dream more avidly than the UFC in the future.

Quick Shots

–Mark Hunt has confirmed that he will be fighting at UFC 119 against fellow UFC newcomer Sean McCorkle. Hunt comes in without a win in the last few years, but UFC president Dana White insists that he is being brought in because of a stipulation with Hunt’s contract that was triggered during the Pride acquisition. Hmmm. For his part, Hunt has been (wisely) mum on any contract details or why he finds himself in the UFC at this point in his career. He also openly regrets not having trained harder earlier in his career, but maintains that he is taking fighting seriously for the first time now.

I’m excited to see Hunt in the Octagon, as I was always a fan. He’s 36 years old and will be unlikely to threaten the elite wrestlers that make the top of the UFC heavyweight division, but if he can beat the 6’7″ McCorkle, he could take part in some fun fights against the UFC’s better strikers. A Cro Cop rematch would be great, for instance.

–Strikeforce’s Scott Coker won’t say that he has signed former WWE wrestler Dave Batista, but he will openly speculate on how entertaining a Batista fight against fellow WWE alum Bobby Lashley could be. He even says that such a bout “absolutely” be a pay-per-view level fight.

I generally like how Coker does things, but I strongly disagree on this one. Any “fun” regarding such a matchup ends the moment the bell rings and Lashley double-legs Batista through the cage and onto the arena floor. Batista is a 41-year old rookie with no amateur wrestling or traditional martial arts background. If he fights, it should be on a Showtime undercard against a fellow newbie, such as with Herschel Walker. In fact, Batista-Walker could be a fun fight eventually. See, a “fun fight” would ideally have some element of doubt as to the outcome. Pairing two former WWE wrestlers just because they were “sports entertainers” is just clown shoes.

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