EliteXC may have breathed its last breaths this past Saturday night.
The promotion’s all-or-nothing fighter, Kimbo Slice, was stopped in just fourteen seconds last Saturday, but not against Ken Shamrock who was forced to pull out of the fight after an injury; Slice was downed by Seth Petruzelli. If you don’t know Seth you’re not alone as Seth is still relatively new to the game with a now 10-4 record going 0-2 in tries in UFC in recent years. The win was a shock no one saw coming as Petruzelli was originally supposed to be on the undercard of the show, but was put against Kimbo on short notice and like Mark Hunt against Wanderlei Silva years ago, he made it work.
After this past Saturday, I believe that Gina/Cyborg should main-event EliteXC’s next CBS show with the numbers from Saturday indicating that CBS should roll the dice at least one more time on this MMA promotion. While Arlovski’s participation may have helped the rating—something EliteXC likely won’t be able to count on next time—Gina and Cyborg both put on entertaining fights both winning and that means that EliteXC has to pull the trigger on this fight for two reasons: it should have happened at this show, people won’t pay $35 for a woman’s match on top, but they will watch it for free on T.V. Gina’s participation on the two most watched of the CBS shows for EliteXC vindicates those two reasons as woman’s MMA isn’t far enough where it can main-event pay-per-views alongside fights with men, but it’s been able to attract an audience when on for free. Plus, every time Gina’s name is mentioned on the broadcasts or even talking about her fight on that broadcast, Cyborg’s name is dropped and the clamoring for that matchup may have undervalued both of their fights this past weekend as those have mostly been seen as merely warm-ups for the other. Gary Shaw is likely feeling the heat from Kimbo’s $500,000 beating and Petruzelli’s statements over the past few days, so making this match happen would at least be a way to sidetrack people from the freakshow element that Kimbo brought and to the more legit competition involved with a fight like Gina/Cyborg. And by the way, with enough below it, this fight would work in the main-event both at the gate and on the tube.
Andrei Arlovski’s win this past weekend gives him two knockouts over IFL alums and more importantly a meeting with Fedor Emelianenko. Ever since the Affliction/Golden Boy merger rightfully cancelled the October 11 Affliction card moving it to January 17 and Fedor himself announced that he wouldn’t be fighting on December 31 for the first time since 2002, most in the MMA community assume that the Arlovski/Nelson fight was to determine an opponent for Fedor in January. With Barnett fighting for World Victory Road in November, but still said to be on the moved card in January, you have to wonder what those within Affliction will do. Fedor/Arlovski is a main-event that will draw people in the same way that Fedor/Sylvia did: the best fighter in the world taking on a former UFC heavyweight champion in a fight not in UFC. Should that fight happen, then Barnett is somewhat left out in the cold having knocked out Pedro Rizzo at the first Affliction show and is above Roy Nelson or Paul Buentello at the moment. A rematch with Aleksander Emelianenko was tossed up as a possibility for Barnett in January with Fedor/Arlovski more of a likelihood than a possibility with Saturday’s result for Arlovski. This match’s main purpose would be for Barnett to beat Aleksander again to set up the fight with Fedor as most would still be betting on Fedor despite the fact that Arlovski will put up more of a fight than Sylvia did.
As for Kimbo, he can still become a star, but he’s going to have to do it in more of a legit way now. His Youtube videos and just general hype was what carried him into MMA as did the almost Mike Tyson-like appeal he obtained after knocking out Ray Mercer and Bo Cantrell. The beautiful thing about a loss like this is that it exposed him, but it doesn’t hurt him the same way Chuck’s loss hurt him. When it’s quick it’s almost painless when it comes to your drawing power. General fans will usually give a guy a second chance after a quick loss more so than they would if the guy was dominated for at least one five-minute round; that will likely be the case with Kimbo.
The beautiful thing about this upset is it did what most MMA purists and people who take MMA seriously wanted to see happen at one point: it exposed Kimbo’s lack of experience in MMA. While this seems redundant because it was only Kimbo’s fourth MMA fight, the majority of people who know of Kimbo add his Youtube fights with his MMA fights thus projecting the invincible myth that was Kimbo until Saturday night; that’s why this was considered an upset and had the line “Rocky is here!” thrown around as the fight ended. This was not an upset in any way that an upset is measured. While Kimbo was the favorite going into the fight and that would constitute Petruzelli upsetting Kimbo, that was determined on perception more than any legitimate way of determining a favorite and underdog. Kimbo’s ground game is a joke and his standup is good, but only to a point as he couldn’t even knock James Thompson out legit—something Butterbean did in England—and the only people he has knocked into putty are either as inexperienced as Kimbo himself or over the hill; it’s no wonder that Ken Shamrock and not someone like Ron Waterman or Brett Rodgers. While the Shamrock fight happening would be more of a ratings catcher on the next CBS show, since Kimbo has been knocked from the heights of the immortals in the public’s eye for the moment, I think the Rodgers fight would prove to be better for Kimbo from a test standpoint; if Kimbo’s looking for a potentially easy win to give him confidence that he can still beat people into tar then the Shamrock fight will likely happen next, if Kimbo’s looking for a potential win that will give him confidence that he’s becoming a mixed-martial artist then the Rodgers fight should happen.
One thing that Kimbo did gain out of this loss was an opportunity for Kevin Ferguson to show his professionalism, something that has been buried under the bravado and persona that is Kimbo Slice. There were no excuses, there was still an afterparty, and most of all there was a guy looking forward instead of dwelling on a big loss. The loss was perceived as an upset for the same reason that Lesnar’s loss to Mir was: the over-the-top marketing of Lesnar and Kimbo respectively. In reality, Petruzelli has fought in multiple promotions, lost to some good fighters, and has ten more fights than Kimbo on his record. This was a character builder in the same way that every loss is, especially with a guy who’s aura is that of invincibility. Kimbo didn’t have to take this fight as he trained for Ken Shamrock, not Seth Petruzelli; odds are he didn’t even know who Seth Petruzelli was until he was told he’d be fighting him instead of Shamrock. Kimbo could’ve backed out of this fight and he probably wouldn’t have received too harsh criticism from any direction. But Kimbo stayed and fought despite not knowing he’d be fighting this guy until the day of the fight—as did Petruzelli—and that’s why Frank Shamrock was quoted as saying, “This is what MMA is about,” when referring to this fight during the broadcast.
