MMA Talk - Interview with Strikeforce VP
Welcome back to MMA Talk. I have a very special edition for you this week. Strikeforce is an organization that has become one of the major players on the MMA scene. Mike Afromowitz is a VP within that organization but has roots that trace back to K-1. Mr. Afromowitz has granted me an interview. He reveals some great insights into Strikeforce, their fighters, and some future plans.
Let’s get started.
Question: You have been a part of the MMA and kickboxing world for a while now. Can you tell us how did you get your start, what was your role with K-1, and how did you end up with Strikeforce?
Mike Afromowitz: In 1999, I started publishing a small newsletter covering Muay Thai kickboxing and, at the time, I was also looking at K-1. I was really impressed with the K-1 product. Martial arts has always been a source of fascination in the United States and K-1 had all the high-impact drama of martial arts along with a Super Bowl-like presentation.
After K-1 returned to Las Vegas in 2000, I lobbed in an email to Scott Coker, who had recently been appointed CEO of K-1 North America. I had never met or even spoken with Scott, but I was eager to see if there was anything I could do to help him market the sport here. I have a dual background in economics and journalism from college so I figured, at the least bit, I could add to his efforts by contributing news coverage of events to existing martial arts publications and websites in order to generate awareness about K-1 and its star fighters.
Scott took me up on my offer and, soon after, asked me to begin writing short biographies about the fighters before the events in Vegas. As time went on and the company grew and entered the TV business, my role expanded into online marketing.
By 2005, the popularity of mixed martial arts was soaring thanks to the efforts of Zuffa and The Ultimate Fighter reality series they had running on Spike TV. It made all the sense in the world for us to enter this segment of the martial arts fighting space so we did so by launching the Strikeforce mixed martial arts series with “Shamrock vs. Gracie” on March 10, 2006. The event was the first sanctioned mixed martial arts event in the state of California and, with it, we broke the all-time record for attendance at an MMA event in North America by hosting 18,265 fans at the HP Pavilion in San Jose.
I am the Vice President of Strikeforce. I oversee and direct all marketing efforts, including media relations, sponsorship sales and activation, and international TV sales.
Q: What is your relationship with Bodog? I saw their logo all over during the tournament event and now I have seen an advertisement for the event in February that says "Bodog presents Strikeforce". Are they a partner? A sponsor?
MA: Bodog has been our Presenting Sponsor for several events, including our last two and our next one, which will take place on February 23rd at Tacoma Dome in Washington State. I initially contacted Bodog in 2006, shortly before they entered the MMA space, about sponsoring our Strikeforce series. After a number of lengthy discussions, we realized that our two companies were a perfect fit for each other and, so, we eventually struck a deal.
The partnership has been great. The Bodog management team is made up of true professionals, who are really passionate about what they do. They’ve been an absolute pleasure to work with and I hope we can continue to strengthen our two brands while working together for a long time.
Q: 2007 was a big year for Strikeforce. You crowned a MW and a HW champion, held an event at the legendary Playboy Mansion, and held the first sanctioned tournament in California. What was your favorite memory from the year?
MA: My greatest memory from last year, without question, is the event we did at The Playboy Mansion. Doing a show at Hugh Hefner’s home was a dream come true for me and for the rest of our team. It was only our second year in the MMA space and we produced a show at one of the most famous landmarks in Hollywood. We had all kinds of celebrities and tons of Hollywood media covering the event. It was a completely new platform for MMA and allowed us to showcase our brand to an audience that might not have otherwise taken the time to look at what we were doing. On top of all that, we streamed the main fight card live on Yahoo! Sports so that anyone, anywhere in the world could watch the action live. It couldn’t have been a better for our first time there.
Of course, crowning two new world champions was a huge deal for us because it set a benchmark for excellence in our league and gave us a foundation for establishing rankings in these two weight classes. We now have world champions in four different weight classes – Gilbert Melendez (Lightweight), Frank Shamrock (Middleweight), Bobby Southworth (Light Heavyweight), and Alistair Overeem (Heavyweight) – and we’re looking forward to crowning a champion in our Welterweight division in 2008.
Q: It was recently announced that Bob Sapp will be making his MMA return at a Strikeforce event in February. This is exciting news to many long-time MMA fans who remember how he exploded on the scene. How did you convince Sapp to return? Is it a multi-fight deal or just for this event? And any word on his opponent yet?
MA: It actually didn’t take much effort to convince Bob to fight again. Bob took some time off recently to focus on his budding acting career, but he’s hungry to get back in the game now. We’ve had a strong relationship with him for quite a while so things fell into place relatively easily.
Bob will be fighting Jan "The Giant" Nortje, another K-1 fighter and an undefeated pro boxer, in the main event of our card at Tacoma Dome on February 23rd. Jan is 6’10”, also weighs over 300 lbs, and is a striker like Bob, so you can expect to see some real bombs thrown.
Q: I heard a rumor that Strikeforce isn't done holding tournaments. The word is that a LW tournament is in the works. Any truth to that? And if so, when will it be held and are any participants known yet?
MA: You’re definitely going to see a lot more Strikeforce tournaments in each weight class. We haven’t set the date yet for our next tournament or determined which weight division the next tournament will be in, but there will, in fact, be at least one in 2008. Tournaments have traditionally been a big crowd-pleaser and that’s our first priority – to promote fights the fans want to see.
Q: I am a huge Frank Shamrock fan. When can we expect to see him fight again? Who will be his likely opponent? It seems like so many people want him from a fan-favorite like Cung Le to tournament winner Jorge Santiago to another MMA legend in Renzo Gracie. Also, how does it work with Frank fighting for EliteXC also? We are also hearing a fight with Ken maybe happening in that organization.
MA: Frank’s next fight will be against Cung Le on March 29th at the HP Pavilion in San Jose. It will be Frank’s first defense of the Strikeforce world middleweight title and the event will be a joint promotion between Strikeforce and EliteXC.
This fight between Frank and Cung is huge on two different levels – worldwide and locally. These are two recognized world champions – Frank, a legend and a world champion in MMA and Cung, a world kickboxing champion and, arguably, the best pound for pound kickboxer on the planet right now. At the same time, both of these fighters are from the Bay Area. Fans there have watched them mature into accomplished world champions over the years and have been waiting a long time to see this fight happen.
Last year, we signed an agreement with EliteXC to co-promote three fights with Frank as the headliner. The fight between Frank and Phil Baroni on June 22nd of last year was the first one. The fight with Cung on March 29th will be the second.
At this point, it appears very likely that Frank will fight Ken Shamrock next year. Both fighters seem to be pushing for it.
Q: Strikeforce recently had some big signings in Joe Riggs and Babalu. Who do you see as their likely next or debut opponents?
MA: Joe Riggs actually made his debut with us at our Playboy Mansion event in September and put on one of, if not, the best show of the night against Eugene Jackson. Joe’s next fight will be on the Frank Shamrock vs. Cung Le card on March 29th. He’s going to fight Joey Villasenor.
Babalu will probably be involved in a title fight in his debut. Whether it’s a direct matchup with the Strikeforce light heavyweight champion or a four-man tournament with three other fighters, has yet to be decided.
I have couple questions from my readers if you don't mind:
Q: How do you plan on chipping away at the UFC's dominance?
MA: First off, let me say that the UFC has done an outstanding job at bringing the sport of MMA to mainstream America. As I said before, I’ve been in the martial arts fight space since 1999, before Zuffa purchased the UFC, so I’ve followed their efforts every step of the way and it is truly amazing what they have accomplished over the course of the last few years.
I don’t really look at our mission as chipping away at UFC’s dominance, even though UFC is, of course, the market leader. I see it more as we are working extremely hard to build our brand and gain market share by offering fans an exceptional product. A big part of it is differentiating ourselves from our competitors. The tournament series is one way of doing that. Producing events at unique, high profile venues like The Playboy Mansion is another.
Q: Anthony Ruiz defeated the Strikeforce LHW champ, Bobby Southworth in a non-title fight during your last event. Does that victory get him a fight for the title?
MA: Yes. Anthony Ruiz’s win over Bobby Southworth in their non-title fight earned Anthony a title shot. Bobby’s next title defense will be against Anthony.
Q: There are still a lot of big name free agents out there after Zuffa disbanded PRIDE FC like Josh Barnett and Takanori Gomi and there are other top fighters like Matt Lindland not signed. Is Strikeforce talking to any of these top fighters? And what is the likelihood of seeing some of them on Strikeforce shows in 2008?
MA: Absolutely. Strikeforce is always looking to recruit new, established talent as well as promising up and comers. We are talking with several top fighters, who are free agents now. I am not at liberty to name names, but I can assure you that we are always very active as far as recruiting new talent. Again, our first priority is to put on fights that the fans want to see. If there are free agents out there, who fans want to see fight, we are going to do our best to recruit them.
Thank you very much Mike. I truly appreciate you taking the time to talk with me. I once wrote one of the most amazing things about MMA was the accessibility of the stars. This interview just illustrates that point. I still think it is extremely cool that you take the time to talk with the fans and answer our questions. I would also like to thank my loyal readers who took the time to submit some questions for this interview.
On a related topic, I want to take a second to announce that tomorrow night at 6:00pm PST Strikeforce MW champion and MMA legend Frank Shamrock will have a streaming press conference on http://www.frankshamrock.com. If you listen, you may hear a question submitted by this blog on TSN!
