Rumor flying around that Eddie A will sign with UFC

[Knockturnal]

Just look and see what events like Affliction, Pride and WEC done with far superior talent.

WEC 48 had Aldo, Faber, Pettis, Cerrone, Ben Henderson, Chan Sung Jung etc and it only done around 150,000 buys

Affliction had Fedor, Vitor, Barnett, Arlovski, Lil Nog and all kinds of UFC vets and they only done 75,000-100,000 buys

Bellator could put their best fighters on the entire card and probably be lucky to get 75,000 ppv buys.

To add to this, TNA which has about 1.5M viewers each week, had a PPV earlier this month. That PPV event did a grand total of 12,000k buys.

Knowing this, I don't think Bellator does anywhere close 50k in buys.

Yah cuz I'm not buying

And you won't be the only one. A lot of fans are mad at Bellator for what they're doing.

I was reading on another forum that Eddie Alvarez and his lawyers are saying that Bellator not only has to produce a PPV but do so by March because that was in the contract. They are contending that they can prove Bellator had no intention of doing a PPV in March because they have yet to work out a deal with the providers, secure a venue, start advertising or start signing fighters to bout agreements. The events they already have set for March are tied to Spike TV.

Even if Bellator is telling the truth (we all know they're not and the judge is an idiot for believing that). March is a horrible month to get your 1st PPV off the ground.

Looking at the calendar, Bellator's options are limited:

1. You already have March Madness
2. March 3rd: UFC on Fuel: Silva vs Stann (March 2nd in the US)
3. March 16th: UFC 158: GSP vs Diaz.
4. Then you have TNA which has a PPV event on March 10th.

An interesting turn in all of this is that last night Dana White made a point to come out and say that they have the right to match any offer to Rampage Jackson. So that could get ugly as well.

The UFC is not going to match anything. I don't think they've done in the past and with what's going on, I doubt they'll start now.

[TopsyTurvy]

I was reading on another forum that Eddie Alvarez and his lawyers are saying that Bellator not only has to produce a PPV but do so by March because that was in the contract. They are contending that they can prove Bellator had no intention of doing a PPV in March because they have yet to work out a deal with the providers, secure a venue, start advertising or start signing fighters to bout agreements. The events they already have set for March are tied to Spike TV.

An interesting turn in all of this is that last night Dana White made a point to come out and say that they have the right to match any offer to Rampage Jackson. So that could get ugly as well.

That's very interesting if the March provision was in the contract because now all Bellator has to do is go after planning documents/correspondence to find out when they were planning on hosting an event with Alvarez and when those plans came to fruition - it's actually a very simple discovery (only made more difficult if such plans truly never existed).

In the grand scheme of things, as crappy as the situation is, it likely faces most every fighter changing organizations. The more I think about it, the contract provision makes sense and the whole problem with the fighter's in question is timing. If the opportunity exists to bring someone like Alvarez into the fold for the UFC and get him straight into the top-5 mix, there are only so many opportunities for Joe Silva and Co. to do so. They have to capitalize (quite literally) and force the issue.

The UFC reserving the right to match offers for Rampage is along the same lines. His name could sell a main event for any lesser promotion and you can bet they would all jump at the earliest opportunity to do so.