MMA Recap

While the "Fedor vs. Rogers" event can be deemed a success, there is one major problem that happened at the event.  Preliminary card fighters, Mark Miller and Deray Davis were both scheduled to fight each other but didn't.  This wasn't due to some mysterious injury or anything like that; it was in fact due to time.  But the unfortunate part is that there was plenty of time for the fight to happen.

Before we begin, we need to do some math.  There were six fights in total scheduled for the undercard.  Each fight could have the potential to go the distance.  Given extra time for walk-ins/walk-outs and announcing the winner, total time for each fight in a perfect setting would be about twenty minutes.  Yes I know this is fast, but if you need to keep pace you can have fighters walking out and getting prepped while the announcer is reading the results.  So six fights, twenty minutes each equals two hours for the undercard.

The undercard was scheduled to begin at 6pm and in fact started at 5:50pm.  Of the five fights that DID happen, two went the distance.  The other three had a total in cage time of six minutes and 15 seconds give or take.  Now allowing for extra time for walk ins and walk outs and announcing the winner, that still leaves us with about forty minutes or so of extra time.

But back to the events of the night, after the Curran-Neace fight, someone flipped out over time and said lets get the women's fight up next so that we can air it if at all possible on the CBS broadcast.  Not a big deal, just push the Miller-Davis fight to the end after Fedor-Rogers much like Hieron-High fight at "Affliction: Day of Reckoning".  Of course the women's fight ended in just over a minute.  At this time, the clock read 7:25pm and many fans were wondering if the Miller-Davis fight would be happening next.

Unfortunately it didn't happen next.  And the fans were treated to a very long intermission.

After the main event, several fans were still wondering if in fact Miller and Davis would fight.  But after several minutes, the answer was clear as the clean up crew started to do their job.

At the post-fight press conference, myself, along with several other members of the media asked what happened to the fight.  At the time, the answer we were given was that they (Strikeforce) weren't sure exactly what happened and that it might have had something to do with the commission.  By the end of the press conference we were given a slightly different answer, in that it wasn't anything with the commission pulling the fight, but that due to time constraints the fight got canceled.

Again, several members of the media asked the question if both fighters got paid, and we were informed that they would be paid.  This was at least some good news as many members of the media remembered what the UFC did when Nover and Stout couldn't fight; they both got their to-show pay and both got their win bonus.  Unfortunately for Davis and Miller, neither got a win bonus.

Both fighters have had sponsors who ended up not paying for their sponsorship due to the fight not taking place.  Both fighters had sponsors from several local businesses who were counting on their logo being shown in front of several thousand fans.  While it would be nice if the fighters still got paid by their sponsor, it is understandable that a sponsor would be upset about a fighter not being able to uphold his agreement.

Even more upsetting is the fact that both fighters are local and sold several tickets to their friends, family, and training partners.  While exact numbers are not known, MMA Recap has estimated that somewhere between 120-150 tickets were sold between the two fighters.  In a 12,000 capacity venue, that's roughly 1% of all the fans showed up to watch that specific fight.  MMA Recap has also confirmed that several of these fans tried to get a refund as the only fight they came to see live did not happen.  These fans were told, "Card is subject to change" and were denied their refund.

Finally both fighters took this fight because it was a chance to fight FOR Strikeforce.  Miller hadn't fought since his time on "The Ultimate Fighter" and Davis had been planning on taking a full year off after his loss at Bellator.  But when given an opportunity to fight for arguably the second largest promotion in the US, they jumped at the chance.  Now they are left with a bad taste in their mouth.

It is unknown at this time if either fighter will take another fight.  Both fighters left the Sears Centre disappointed that they didn't get a chance to showcase their abilities.

I am still awaiting a response, if any, from Strikeforce with comments on the situation.  The most pressing question I had was if Strikeforce was going to try to work with either fighter again.

It is unfortunate that such a major event had a blunder of this proportion.  Hopefully Strikeforce will do what ever they can to help right this situation.

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