Despite what Zuffa management says, WEC is at a crossroads
Published by Zach Arnold on November 17th, 2009 in Current Events

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The talent hits that UFC has taken on its roster lately has impacted not just the mindset of UFC, but also the mindset of everyone outside of WEC management. Don’t believe me? The story of interest in the media heading into an awesome fight between Mike Brown and Jose Aldo on Wednesday is… when are the two companies going to merge?

WEC management can issue denials to reporters and swat down false reports about mergers, but the truth is that as WEC plans to expand their schedule for 2010, there is more of a need for Zuffa to roll up WEC fighters under the UFC banner more than ever. The speculation will intensify instead of fading away — and for good reason. Brock Lesnar is in the hospital, Anderson Silva had surgery on his elbow and is flaky, Rampage Jackson is on the sidelines doing a movie, Dan Henderson is still a free agent, and the depth that UFC once had in all of their divisions is suddenly starting to dry up.

Enter the WEC guys.

They want to get paid for all the hard work they’ve done. They see the limitations of WEC’s current business structure. They want to get paid! They want the exposure. They know that fighting in the UFC will get them that exposure. Just ask WEC Featherweight champion Mike Brown. In a recent r a w v e g a s . t v interview, Brown talked about his upcoming fight and what he would think of a merger between UFC and WEC.

First, his big fight on Wednesday against Aldo.

“I mean he’s a great fighter and he hasn’t really had any struggles in the WEC yet, he’s kind of blazing through guys. It’s interesting whether he will be able to blaze through me or is he going to you know get caught up with some roadblocks, it’s interesting match-up.

I mean that’s why I’m here fighting and I think that it’s a good match-up for me. He’s quick, he’s good of course, you know but I think if I fight like I can that I’ll be the winner.”

Brown has unfairly taken a lot of heat from Urijah Faber fans who still can’t accept him as the better fighter. Brown proved what Tyson Griffin proved, which is that if you are a 155-pounder and you make the cut to 145, you have the size and power advantage on Faber and can physically beat him in the cage. Despite two impressive wins over Faber, Brown still has to answer critics.

“No, I don’t have to prove anything to anybody, it’s like uh I was like that as a kid I used to be a Knicks fan, I used to think oh Patrick Ewing can dunk on anybody you know even if he had a horrible game but I still always believed in Patrick so you know Urijah Faber has his fans and I could beat him 10 times and they’re still going to say that he’s better.”

Brown not only beat Faber twice, but he also dismantled Leonard Garcia. The label used against Brown is that he’s boring, but that’s mainly because of his plain name. When you listen to Mike Brown speak, he’s fun to listen to and very human. There’s a lot of pressure on him to not only win, but to do so in dominating fashion. Balancing entertainment vs. winning is harder than it looks.

“That’s a tough call. They’re both very very important you know I don’t know, do I want to put on a great fight and lose or do I want to have a boring fight but I won? That’s uh, I try to do both, I try to get a nice balance you know because I mean you could go out there and just be you know an idiot and go crazy and fans would love it and you’re going to get knocked out you know in a minute so you got to find a balance I think somewhere of entertainment and making sure you’re getting the wins.”

Brown is content with staying within the WEC framework as long as the company continues to grow in stature and gain more exposure. It’s when the WEC stays in a limited structure that has him frustrated.

“It’s a lot of it is exposure in TV fights, you know, and I’m now starting to get more fights on television and that’s what it’s all about, getting exposure and getting that recognition, people start knowing who you are. If you never fight on TV, people have no idea, you could be the best fighter in the world but they don’t know you.

Now it’s I think it’s starting to be everyone now, I mean I go into a Wal-Mart and I’ll get you know three or four people who know who I am which was weird before. Used to be just go to an MMA show and they go oh you’re Mike Brown, what’s up man, good fight, but now I’ll go to like you know Jiffy Lube and the guy will be like, oh shit, Mike Brown! What’s up! He’s like, you’re driving a Ford Focus man, what’s up with that?

I think it at this point [a merger] would be good but it… it doesn’t matter as long as they promote WEC. If they put into the WEC and put it on PPV and give it more exposure then that’s fine, you just need to get it out there so people know who we are. If it’s stuck on you know non-PPV television and it just keeps everything smaller and the money is not as big, just as long as it grows is all that matters.

You know everybody in the world feels they’re underpaid right, so? I feel I am, too.”

Reed Harris, who has been busy issuing denials to various media outlets about UFC and WEC merging, made this thoughts clear about where WEC is heading in a recent interview on the V e r s u s . c o m web site.

“Dana [White] just made that comment the other day that we’re in it for the long haul, got a new deal with Versus, we’re committed to Comcast and Versus, we’re doing more shows next year, we’re going to probably Canada and Mexico, we want to try to go to Europe, I think that people are going to see WEC grow a lot in the next couple of years as they saw UFC grow. We’re now established as the best place for Lightweight fighters in the world, my 35 and 45 pound divisions there’s no one in this sport that will argue that I don’t have the best guys in the world and the great thing about what happens is that when that balls start rolling, you know, we’re now getting calls from Japan, we’re getting I got a call from France the other day, these guys got fighters in France that want to come over and fight in the WEC, they’re Lightweight guys and they want to fight the best guys in the world so that’s where they call.”

Harris feels that a recent acquisition, Chris Horodecki, is a key piece of the roster puzzle.

“I’ll tell you what, it’s huge for me because what people don’t know is when the IFL went out of business I tried to sign him back then and Affliction got him and you know they offered him more money and Chris is a great fighter, he’s very exciting, that’s the thing. What we look at in WEC is a guy could be 20 and 0 and if he just goes out there and lays on guys, I’m not that interested in them. Guys like Chris bring it, you know, they’re exciting fighters, they always let it all hang out in the cage, when the fight’s over a guy like Cerrone and Henderson, when those fights are done you know they gave it everything they had and that’s really what we look for.”

One of the interesting tactics WEC is considering doing is what they are doing this month with their show in the same town a few days before a big UFC event (headlined by Forrest Griffin vs. Tito Ortiz).

“I like doing it that way you know we’ve got obviously it kind of reminds me of the old days, remember in Vegas when they used to have these big fight weeks where they’d have a couple of boxing matches, a couple of big promotions would come in and they would team up and you could come to Vegas for 3 or 4 days and kind of be a fight-based vacation and that’s what we’re looking to do in November.”

Brown mentioned in his Rawvegas interview that he wants to be on PPV and WEC management, for the last several months, has indicated a move to PPV would happen and that the promotion would average one show per month.

“Yeah, every month and I think there may be is a month or two in that cycle that we’ll skip, we maybe have months where we do two shows. We’re scheduled I think for 10 with Versus and then maybe plugging in a couple of PPVs so we’re up to a show month.

We’re going to have the Flyweight division come in. We’re working on it now. In talking to Sean Shelby (matchmaker), see what Sean’s plan was and it’s very scientific and technical, he is wanting to make sure that he gets all the fights he needs to get in the 35, 45, and 55 pound division before we add another division, we want to make sure all of our guys are fighting on a regular basis, that we’re building our divisions, that all of our fights are meaningful, OK? We also know that if we go to a PPV we have to have meaningful fights or we have to have compelling fights that people will pay for and that’s obviously got to shape up in the next six to eight months but we are looking to do a PPV probably maybe even in the first quarter of ‘010, so…”

As for the great fight on Wednesday night between Mike Brown and Jose Aldo that more people should be talking about?

“Well you know what? I can’t, I couldn’t make a prediction, I truly don’t know who’s going to win this fight. And those are the best kind of fights as a promoter that’s what you always hope for. Mike Brown has not been stopped. I mean, Mike Brown has heavy heavy hands, great wrestling, super super strong, Jose Aldo on the other hand, how good is he? I don’t know. I’ve never seen him go the distance with anybody, I’ve never seen anybody be close to him in a fight. I mean obviously Cub Swanson is a great fighter, that’s what I think people took away from that that maybe Cub wasn’t you know wasn’t ready or whatever, Cub Swanson said that guy hit me I didn’t even know what happened you know? 8 seconds, you know he finished him, Jose Aldo this is going to be test though, he’s never fought anybody like Mike Brown.”