UFC buys Strikeforce

Here are some more notes from the UFC-Strikeforce deal:

# UFC approached Strikeforce about purchasing the company.

# The deal was finalized this morning (Saturday). There had been talks for several weeks now. It was done fairly quickly.

# Almost nobody knew that talks between UFC and Strikeforce were ongoing.

# Dana White says he knows Strikeforce is a brand that people like and the purchase opens up more fights.

# Scott Coker will remain in charge of Strikeforce. They will remain separate brands. Strikeforce will continue to run "business as usual". All Strikeforce contracts remain in place.

# Dana White again says "it's business as usual" with both companies running separate events.

# White would not disclose how much the deal was worth but said "it was a good deal".

# You can compare this deal to the UFC/PRIDE purchase years ago as well as the WWE/WCW purchase. This is a huge deal in the MMA world guys.

# The video of Dana White and Ariel Helwani that we posted earlier explains a ton. We've re-posted it again below and it's definitely worth checking out. You'll know the entire situation after watching the video below. Keep in mind that Dana White changes his mind on a daily basis so who knows.

http://video.aol.com/video/dana-white-on-zuffa-purchase/3975139083

This is brilliant news for the sport first and foremost.

Obviously its fantastic business for Zuffa - owning the best pool of mma fighters available and changing the landscape of competition and fighter talent progression. A legitimate bleeding arena, much in the sameway SF had the 'Challengers' events. Not to say the current SF roster is 2nd tier, but that's the plan.

Its a matter of Zuffa using its power to best promote the events upcoming and get the company up to UFC efficiency levels. The events will be superior in production values, the fighters themselves and overall quality, as happened to WEC.

Of course there will be bumps to smooth and it will take time but issues like the HW GP delays and the Louisiana melee will lessen greatly. A much more functional company giving a huge fan enjoyment and benefits after recent disappointments.

The Showtime deal offers them access to a large media audience to advertise UFC during SF events.

For M1-Global, hopefully and deservedly, its a matter of Zuffa waiting for the SF co-promotion deal to expire and they will be out of the picture for good.

They also have all the archive footage that Strikeforce owned which will garner a profit from dvd sales but, more importantly, there are the copyrights and Zuffa's campaign to prevent uncontrolled sharing of their shows. I think we'll see more lawsuits coming. Unfortunately this could mean a difficulty in catching up on any fights you've missed.

All in alls, this deal is the biggest step yet in cementing what the mainstream call, and know as, the sport.

Its not MMA, its UFC.

if UFC have bought out StrikeForce what is the rationale behind keeping them separate companies? Is it for the allusion of competition between the two? Is it to keep the format of the StrikeForce shows that fans enjoy? Is it because otherwise UFC would lose alot of fighters who otherwise wouldn't work for them?

its so they can keep paul daley without having to let him go again!

Think this could be really good for the sport, as long as they can keep brand identity for Strikeforce.

Would only have cross promotional fights once a year, as if you do anymore than this you could end up blurring the lines between the two.

Hopefully a balance can be struck where each roster has it's merits and not just all the best fighters on UFC and all the curtain jerkers being pushed to strikeforce.

Can see in the coming weeks quite a few fighters having their contracts changed to Strikeforce.

mma has been killed with this deal.

Ufc have bought the last of the competition here, i don't think thats a good thing at all, with no one to challenge PPV numbers there now free to do what they want, Pride FC will always be number one in my eyes and its scary to think all the competition has been bought over now, it very well could be the beginning of the end.

i dont see how they can remain separate, if strikeforce has a top fighter he will now move to the ufc, meaning strikeforce will just be a feeder group for ufc. with strikeforce cards being more like fight night cards, this deal only strengthens ufc's dominace in mma.

What I want to know, is what does this mean for Fedor and Paul Daley (one not agreeing terms with Dana, the other being told he would never work for UFC again)