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[Krazikarl]

Yahoo Sports has Iole's weekly mailbag up at:

Mailbag: Signing UFC's free agents - MMA - Yahoo! Sports

Most of it isnt that interesting, but there is some solid information:

What happened to Keith Jardine? He outslugged Chuck Liddell and now I haven't heard a word about him. In the meantime, Chuck got a big fight against Wanderlei Silva and now I've heard he's fighting Shogun Rua this summer. Where's the love for Keith?

Westly Ahlschlager
Russell, Minn.

The UFC has offered Jardine a fight with Wanderlei Silva. Jardine has accepted and now the UFC is awaiting an answer from Silva, who is in Brazil. Expect that fight to happen on the May card in Las Vegas.

So this appears to be the up to date status of that fight which has been discussed a bit.

He also offers a strong argument:

CO-PROMOTE WITH M-1

Former Pride heavyweight champion Fedor Emelianenko recently responded to UFC president Dana White about his comments disregarding him as the top fighter in the heavyweight division. Why won't the UFC co-promote with M-1 to put on a Fedor-Randy Couture super fight? This fight is one that every fight fan wants to see.

David
Short Hills, N.J.

I wish the fight would occur, David, because it would be good for the fighters and it would be good for the sport, regardless of who promoted it. Having said that, there is little chance of the UFC co-promoting with M-1. The UFC holds all the cards. As great as Emelianenko is, he hasn't been a draw in the U.S. He fought on the first Pride show in the U.S., Pride 32, on Oct. 21, 2006, in Las Vegas. In addition to Emelianenko, Shogun Rua, Dan Henderson, Vitor Belfort, Josh Barnett, Kevin Randleman and Phil Baroni competed on the card. Of the 11,727 fans in the building, a large majority of the tickets were given away. The pay-per-view sold less than 30,000 units. Like it or hate it, the UFC has been the only promotion to be successful in the U.S. over the long haul. As a result, it understands that Emelianenko needs it more than it needs Emelianenko.

I think that he really hit the nail on the head here. 30k for that show by PRIDE. How well do you think that M1 can do at best with just Fedor (certainly not enough to recoup Fedor's salary)? Fedor has absolutely no leverage on the UFC it looks like.

And then you have another illustration that Iole is the UFC's bitch:

TOO STACKED

What is the UFC thinking? After a couple so-so undercards, they load up UFC 82 to the point that Andrei Arlovski, Josh Koscheck and Diego Sanchez are not even on the main card. How did Chris Leben bump these guys? I know they have an axe to grind with Arlovski, but Sanchez and Koscheck were on the co-main event of the last pay-per-view shows they were on. It would be a shame for the fans to pay their hard-earned money and not get the see these fighters. Good thing I'm going.

David Harvey
Cleveland

I would rather see them put too many good fights on a card instead of too few, because some fights you expect to do well don't turn out. But think of this: Don't the fans who bother to attend the live show deserve to get a bit more than the fan who stays at home and watches on TV? The person who goes to the arena pays a bigger price for the ticket and also for merchandise, etc.

What a retarded argument by Iole.

[neonatural45]

I think his man love for Dana and the UFC is funny, but it is his job to write his opinion whether it is retarded or not. If we read it and talk about it then he has done his job.

It is bullshit that Jardine is pretty much fighting the guy that Chuck just beat, its like the UFC is doing their best to pretend that Chuck/Jardine didn't happen.

He is right about Fedor, if no company co-promotes with M-1 then they will struggle. Yarrenoka was 95% a K-1 show, all that M-1 provided was Fedor. If no other promotions decide to do that with them then they will fail.