If you do not know, the UFC and K-1 have been working together.
Today I picked up the paper and there was an interview with Mr. Tanikawa who is the producer for K-1. In the interview Tanikawa said that FEG(basically sports agent branch of K-1) negotiated to loan Royce Gracie to the UFC. They negotiated who the opponent would be and the fight purse. Tanikawa said that that show(UFC 60) did 800,000 ppv buys, and he feels it was because of Royce. Tanikawa said that FEG would receive half of the ppv buy profits. Tanikawa said 3.2 billion yen was made(around 32 million dollars, 800,000 buys), so FEG gets 16 million dollars.
I was pretty surprised to read this news, as half is alot. I never thought much of the Gracie/Hughes fight, it didn’t make sense to me as a fight(I thought Royce would lose easily), but it made alot of business sense. Especially for K-1.
No it didn’t mention any specific fights. It was a very long interview, alot related to Bob Sapp, and their mma production Hero’s.
I thought the part related to the UFC would be of interest members here, since the UFC is the major mma show in America.
[quote]Donut62 wrote:
Hopefully they send Herring over so we can get out of this Sylvia vs Arlovski funk that has made the heavy’s boring as hell for the past year.[/quote]
It is kind of complicated. Tanikawa is the President of FEG and the Producer for K-1. Obviously conflict of interest.
I do not know how exactly it works. Whether you have to be in FEG’s stable or not for a K-1 fighter to fight in another production.
FEG acted as Bob Sapp’s agent. It was FEG that got Bob’s fights in Pride. Obviously they brought him into K-1, Tanikawa being the producer and all.