Strikeforce

(Photo courtesy of ajc.com. Tie courtesy of Elton John.)

Heisman Trophy winner, two-time NFL Pro Bowl selection, Olympic bobsledder, Dissociative Identity Disorder sufferer, Celebrity Apprentice contestant, Tae Kwon Do black belt, and American Kickboxing Academy student Herschel Walker will make his MMA debut on January 30th at a Strikeforce event to be held at the BankAtlantic Center in Sunrise, Florida. The news was announced yesterday via press release, though Walker's opponent has yet to be named. The only other match tied to the card at this point is Cristiane "Cris Cyborg" Santos's 145-pound title defense against Marloes Coenen.

As Dana White pondered when Walker's Strikeforce signing was first announced: "Which athletic commission is going to let this guy fight? Who the fuck are they going to find to fight Herschel Walker? A guy in a wheelchair?” We now know the answer to the first question is "Florida," the state that previously signed off on Kimbo Slice vs. Ken Shamrock at the same venue last October. As for Dana's other hypotheticals, we hope that Herschel Walker's opponent has some kind of disability, considering that Walker has only been training in MMA since last month, and it wouldn't really be fair to make him fight a guy who has both fighting experience and the use of all of his limbs. I mean, if Strikeforce really wants to put Walker against Fedor Emelianenko in the spring, they'd better give him a beatable first opponent.

(Photo by Esther Lin, for Strikeforce.)

Kerry Vera and Kim Couture are set to go at it tonight in the Strikeforce Challengers event in Kansas City.  Since they both share the names of famous UFC fighters who just faced one another, it probably seemed like a genius idea to Strikeforce.  But "Sugar Free" is a Couture in the same way that Ivana is a Trump.  When a name helps that much you hang on to it, even if you didn't hang on to the husband. 

So what do you think, is your interest in this bout harmed by the somewhat disappointing display put on by their male counterparts at UFC 105?  Or does Kim's shiny weigh-in bikini erase all those memories from your mind?  Not trying to juge or anything, but when these girls show up wearing more than you...

(I think we all know what the young male audience was tuning in to see: Randy Couture's brilliant and intoxicating smile. Props: MMA TKO)

Spike TV is a lot like those jerks who you play in a fantasy football league with.  There’s always one sure way to know when they did better than you, and it’s by checking your email inbox.  Spike sent out another email today touting the triumph of UFC 105 over Strikeforce on CBS, at least among a few key demographics.  According to Spike, UFC 105 drew an average of 2.9 million viewers on Saturday, which is considerably less than the 4.04 million that Strikeforce averaged.  UFC 105 peaked with 3.7 million viewers during the main event, whereas Strikeforce had 5.46 million watching Brett Rogers get his head knocked off. 

But just because they technically lost the overall ratings battle to a network TV event (which is expected), doesn’t mean they can’t hype their own numbers in the young male demographic that the UFC and Spike TV collectively own.  Just check out this handy breakdown they provided:

(Props: ArkhamAsylum via TheGarv)

Brilliant. Speaking of ugly defeats, Spike's "Main Events" counter-programming special that aired opposite "Fedor vs. Rogers" on Saturday night drew 2.14 million average viewers — over back-to-back airings. According to MMA Junkie, "The 9 p.m. ET/PT airing of the special drew 1.2 million viewers, and the 11 p.m. replay drew an additional 939,000 viewers." If you'll recall, Strikeforce's live show brought in a very respectable 4.04 million average viewers on CBS. (Doesn't feel good getting outgunned by a larger network, does it Dana?) With their asses chapped by the ratings drubbing, Spike sent out some data implying that Fedor is still no Kimbo-on-TUF when it comes to putting asses on couches. Our advice to Fedor? Learn English, grow a bushy beard, and knock some fools out in a boatyard. And would it kill you to start a Twitter page?

(Mark Miller knocks Josh Neer out cold at an IFL event in 2007)

I spoke with Mark Miller this week for an SI.com article about his Strikeforce cancelation and the ensuing financial difficulties that resulted from losing his sponsorship money while he sat around backstage waiting to fight on Saturday night.  He was excited to hear that Strikeforce would be paying him his win bonus as extra compensation for the mishap, and he seemed generally way more understanding about the whole thing than a lot of guys who had just trained for six weeks might have been:

I was supposed to be the fifth of six fights on the undercard, and then they were going to go to the main card which was going to be aired on CBS.  I was warming up backstage, getting ready to go on, and they told me that they were going to skip us to make sure the women got their fight in, and then after the Fedor-Rogers fight they were going to let us fight after that.  I said, ‘Whatever, that’s fine.’  I unwrapped, chilled out for a little bit, then as it got closer to the main even I got warmed up again.  When the Fedor-Rogers fight ended I heard them call back on the walkie-talke to the athletic commission that the last fight was going to be a no-go.  I was kind of confused at first.  I wasn’t sure what was going on so I stayed wrapped and stayed warm, just in case, but they came back and told us for sure that it wasn’t happening.  They told me the reason was that in the beginning of the fights there was some problem with production.  I don’t know, I was kind of surprised by it all so I wasn’t paying too much attention to what they said.