Translation Services – Free of Charge
Published by Charles Jay on August 25th, 2008 in Operation Cleanup

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Commentary on MMA history….as it’s happening

TRANSLATION SERVICES – FREE OF CHARGE

In case you didn’t catch it, here are some of the highlights of a release that was issued earlier this week by the good folks at Pro Elite:

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PRO ELITE POSTPONES SEPTEMBER 20 EVENT IN NEW MEXICO
Company cites need to effectively focus resources and promotion on remaining year-end events

LOS ANGELES–(BUSINESS WIRE) – Citing a desire to efficiently focus its promotional resources and ensure top talent for a series of televised yea-rend events, ProElite, Inc. (OTB:PELE.PK) today officially postponed the September 20 staging of its planned EliteXC mixed martial arts (MMA) event in Albuquerque, NM. The Albuquerque fight card was to have featured New Mexico native Joey Villasenor.

“We are in the next steps of the evolution of our company,” said Jeremy Lappen, head of ProElite’s fight operations, “and we need to be smart about how we use our resources to produce the best possible events for our fans and our broadcast partners. This move lets us direct our energies toward building momentum for our ShoXC and EliteXC fights on Showtime and CBS in the Fall.”

ProElite is undergoing a strategic transformation. With new management in place, the company is working to develop product and operating efficiencies that will ensure the highest quality events.

ProElite’s Fall schedule now includes the following televised events:

* ShoXC on Showtime on September 26th
* EliteXC on CBS on October 4th featuring Kimbo Slice & Gina Carano
* ShoXC on Showtime on October 10th
* EliteXC season finale on Showtime on November 8th

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I hope you would allow me the opportunity to come into your home today and translate this press release for you. My translation services are free, in case you were worried about it.

And remember that this comes from someone who has been involved with promotions and not only has written a few hundred press releases in his time, and continue to produce them through his company.

OK, here we go:

RELEASE: “Citing a desire to efficiently focus its promotional resources and ensure top talent for a series of televised year-end events, ProElite, Inc. (OTB:PELE.PK) today officially postponed the September 20 staging of its planned EliteXC mixed martial arts (MMA) event in Albuquerque, NM.”

TRANSLATION: “We really don’t have the money, or at least not enough to spend on this without running out of money somewhere else.

RELEASE: ” The Albuquerque fight card was to have featured New Mexico native Joey Villasenor.”

TRANSLATION: “We didn’t have enough ability or resourcefulness to sell this card, even with a hometown fighter.”

Let me explain here that shows do not get cancelled unless (A) no tickets are sold, (B) They have no money to pay the expenses, (C) the star attraction on the show pulls out, or (D) any combination of the above. There is no “mixed signal” here. No aggressive and ambitious promotional organization cancels a show, not as part of a positive strategy for the future.

RELEASE: “We are in the next steps of the evolution of our company,” said Jeremy Lappen, head of ProElite’s fight operations, “and we need to be smart about how we use our resources to produce the best possible events for our fans and our broadcast partners. This move lets us direct our energies toward building momentum for our ShoXC and EliteXC fights on Showtime and CBS in the Fall.”

TRANSLATION: “We really couldn’t assure ourselves, much less others, that we were good for the purse money. We don’t mind proceeding with these shows that carry with it a television subsidy, but when it comes to an event that is largely reliant on ticket sales, we can take that show or leave it. Here, we’re leaving it.”

RELEASE: “ProElite is undergoing a strategic transformation. With new management in place, the company is working to develop product and operating efficiencies that will ensure the highest quality events.”

TRANSLATION: “We really don’t know what’s going on or what we’re doing. We’re just hoping we get lucky with one of these upcoming shows so we can stay in business.”

I see the stock symbol in this release, and as we’ve discussed, and as was chronicled in a story in Barron’s, Pro Elite was started as a stock play that might be charitably classified as a scam. It scammed the individual who originally presented the idea, and scammed the shareholders who saw the company overspend by funneling money, through shadow companies, into the pockets of opportunists who started the thing, then pumped, and subsequently dumped, the stock. This announcement sounds a lot like a few we’ve heard from IFL, which is on the rockpile. And it’s a bad signal to those shareholders, as if the departure of Gary Shaw, the only one in the group who knew how to promote a show, hasn’t sent it already.

I understand the bullshit that comes from Lappen, who is trying to put a smiley face on a sinking ship, He ran the World Fighting Alliance into the ground previous to this, and I don’t know how much responsibility he bears for the demise of Elite XC, but there’s only so far you can insult the public’s intelligence. The clock is ticking, and the joke may be on them when, someday, the UFC decides they are going to make some big offer, just for shits and giggles, to sign Kimbo Slice, simply to put Pro Elite down and out for good.

Wait – I hear a whistle. Perhaps that was the “two-minute warning”?