BY WADE KELLER

By Wade Keller, MMATorch Supervising Editor

Today news broke that UFC's parent company, Zuffa, purchased UFC's top competitor in the U.S., Strikeforce. Strikeforce had some big name fighters under contract and a relationship with Showtime that made them relevant. Now being owned by the same company as UFC, what's likely to happen?

We have seen in pro wrestling history that it's not good news for Strikeforce fans. One of the reasons people were fans of Strikeforce was because they weren't owned by UFC or run by Dana White. It was a legitimate alternative, featuring novelty acts such as Kimbo Slice and Herschel Walker, plus women's fights. It had a different look and feel. It also featured UFC castoff such as Paul Daley, cut from UFC for a borderline criminal cheapshot he took at his victorious opponent after a fight. Dana White is essentially now paying the salary of a fighter he said would never work for UFC again even if he became the undisputed best pound-for-pound fighter in the world.

In other words, the days of Strikeforce having a legitimate alternative reason for existing is not long for this world. It didn't help, either, that Dana White looked like he was sucking on a lemon every time he had to say something positive about Strikeforce or reconcile his outspoken negative opinion of Showtime, women's MMA fights, Paul Daley, Frank Shamrock, Josh Barnett, and on and on. White's "tells" on display while evasively trying to seem on board with this deal would cost him his entire poker pot in the opening few hands. His rapid blinks, hard swallows, and overall body language and fidgeting said he's not excited about this. His assertion that while has barely watched Strikeforce, apparently some fans like it, so that's what matters, was not a confidence booster.

In pro wrestling, everyone knew that Vince McMahon couldn't promote WCW as an equal brand to the WWF. They also knew he couldn't remain "hands off" while paying someone else to run it. He runs WWE the way he runs it because he believes it's the best approach. Why would he fund someone else to run another brand differently, perhaps costing him money and repeating the XFL debacle where WWE wrestlers felt their hard work was supplementing a speculative side project.

We also saw Dusty Rhodes, the booker when Jim Crockett Promotions (in essence, WCW) bought Bill Watts's UWF (formerly Mid-South promotion), destroy the UWF out of spite. For years they had been rivals, and once Dusty got his hands on the talent that worked for the competing group, he buried them, as if to show his fans that the UWF/Mid-South was inferior all along.

I don't see Strikeforce lasting as a separate, parallel, separately run promotion, upping the ante for fighter contracts by negotiating against UFC for a big name. It's just not going to happen. History, good business practices, and human nature dictate it's an unviable fantasy.

Over at MMATorch.com, I've written a proposed scenario that would keep Strikeforce viable, relevant, and profitable under Zuffa's ownership. Check it out at this link:

CLICK HERE

APP LINK: http://tinyurl.com/4d5qzwa

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