Bjorn Rebney: Bellator will not follow the Strikeforce example
Posted on March 13, 2011, 08:41 AM by Anton Gurevich"No. My answer to that is based on our entire philosophy. It's one where fighters control their own destiny. The organization that puts the cage down and puts up the lights, and puts all the cameras together and puts on the show on MTV, has the same exact philosophy of the fighters who step into the cage. I am a big fan of controlling one's own destiny. It's what got me to this point. It's that type of control of controlling your destiny that is everything our organization is about. It's our very, very core.
I think time will tell whether it's good or bad overall for the industry. Competition is good for the industry. Competition ultimately breeds the best. ... It's always good to have alternatives and competition, especially in a space growing as quickly as the mixed-martial-arts space is. Ultimately, only time will tell if it was a good thing for the industry." - MMAJunkie.com
Bellator CEO Bjorn Rebney declared that the idea of selling out conflicts with the ideology of his promotion, which is all about giving an equal opportunity to everyone. With Strikeforce being under the ZUFFA banner Bellator are now the biggest "alternative" promotion in North America, mostly thanks to what seems like an extremely successful deal with MTV2. Next Bellator event will take place on March 19th (6PM on MTV2), and will be headlined by a Featherweight Quarter-Final bout between the top-ranked Georgi Karakhanyan and Patricio Freire.
Comments
Coker was saying he had big plans for Strikeforce too. Money makes the world go round and and everyone has a price. I like Bellator's tourney format though and I wish them all the success possible on MTV2.
Well Coker doesn't own Strikeforce so he has no real say in the sale, what I am curious about is if Bjorn Rebney owns Bellator or not. Also its a question of short term profit or long term gain. In another 5 years Strikeforce would have been worth at least twice as much as it was when they sold now.
Yeah that's what I was thinking. Zuffa saw how much buzz was being generated around Strikeforce recently (what with the GP and the awesome cards) and they decided it'd be better to eliminate them as a competitor sooner rather than later. I'd say the deal they offered them was somewhat superfluous in price but it worked out cheaper in the long run than waiting for them to get bigger and more valuable.
At this stage Bellator aren't even competition for the UFC, when you see Dana White starting to trash them, then you'll know he sees them as competition.
Remember StrikeFarce? they were supposedly the UFC's ''feeder'' show/org.
If or when Bellator expands, and gets popular you will see them garner interest from Dana et al. And if Dana sees them as a legit threat to his org, he will either:
a) Snatch their talent
or
b) Buy them out
or
c) all of the above
ZUFFA purchases Bellator
:P