The Ed Soares Paradox

What's the sign of a good MMA manager?  If you never hear about or from them.  In order to be a good MMA manager, you need to keep your fighters happy without doing anything to negatively impact their career.  This is why you see very few managers ever giving interviews.  Most of the time, it is the fighter or their trainers speaking to the press leading up to a fight.  If a fighter can go through all the pre-fight media requests, fight night and post fight interviews without the manager ever being seen or heard from than the manager probably did a pretty good job.  Ed Soares, on the other hand, does not have that luxury. 

Soares, who manages some of the most elite fighters in the world, happens to be the bridge between the fighters he manages and the media.  This isn't because Soares wants to be in the spotlight, but more out of necessity since almost all the fighters he manages only speak Portuguese or don't speak enough English to be able to conduct a full interview on their own.  This is where the Soares Paradox comes into play.

Soares needs his fighters to do interviews, appearances and other events leading up to their fights in order to make them more marketability which in turn will help advance their careers both financially and in the Octagon.  This means Soares has to be with his fighters almost all the time to translate what they saying when they are doing public events.  The problem is, Soares is regularly blasted in the media for allegedly protecting his fighters by not translating what they are saying accurately. Read why after the jump...

From MMAjunkie's Steven Marrocco:

You may not be hearing every word Anderson Silva says, but none of his words are purposefully hidden, according to his manager. Ed Soares, Silva's manager, has faced criticism for an apparent conflict of interest as the middleweight champion's business representative and translator in the media. Some fans and media wonder if they're getting the whole story in the pause between Silva's Portuguese and Soares' English. "People are always saying I'm covering things up," Soares told MMAjunkie.com (www.mmajunkie.com) on Tuesday evening. "First of all, my job as a manager is to do the best that I can for my client. As far as translating everything he says, I do my best." After the fight, Soares tried to convey Silva's statements as best he could. But when the champion has a lot to say, it's an issue of memory space.  "Let me ask you something: for the past 45 seconds can you tell me word-for-word what I just told you?" he asked. "The truth of the matter is I basically try to make a summary of [Silva's statements]. I try to take what he's saying and translate it to get point across." The switch doesn't always work out perfectly when done on the fly. "Do I miss some things?" Soares asked. "Yeah, I miss some things. I can't say that it's always exactly what he said. Sometimes I'll present it in a way that it still has the same meaning. If you were to translate word-for-word verbatim to what he said, it wouldn't translate. There's a lot of things that just don't translate, so I just kind of have to change it a little bit."The change, he said, is not influenced by his relationship with the champion. He's not holding anything back to protect Silva's image. "I'm not changing it for any particular reason," Soares said. "I'm not a professional translator. Sometimes it's not word for word, but I can guarantee you that I try to summarize it as much as I can.

Soares is right.  It is extremely hard to remember what someone said word for word when they have been rambling for almost a minute.  This is why journalists carry notepads or recorders to catch everything their interviewee is saying so they don't misquote them, but the media isn't wrong either when they say he may be protecting his fighters on purpose by not translating accurately.  Some examples are the now infamous Anderson Silva translating controversy from the UFC 112 post fight press conference and most recently, Soares translating issues during the UFC 117 prefight conference call with Anderson Silva and Chael Sonnen.  Clearly, on purpose or not, something is getting lost in translation which is causing more issues for his clients. 

Another problem arising for Soares is when Soares himself gives comments about or on behalf of his fighters.  Since Soares manages some of the most popular and best fighters in the world (i.e Lyoto Machida, Nogueira brothers, Junior dos Santos, etc), members of the media will constantly go to Soares for quotes when they are unable to reach his fighters for comments.  Lately, it seems that even when Soares is speaking for himself, he still can't avoid controversy.  For example, when Soares was asked about the Anderson Silva vs. Thales Leites fight:

"People have gotten spoiled seeing him finish fights so quickly. Sometimes things don't go that way - like it doesn't happen. I honestly don't think it was a bad fight. I think he went out there and performed. He was attacking all five rounds, but why, just because he didn't go to the ground with him? That's why it wasn't a great fight?"

Or more recently regarding Chael Sonnen:

"No one paid attention to Chael Sonnen.  Before he started talking about Anderson Silva, have you ever heard of his name in the headlines? No. So this is the only thing that's getting him publicity. Congratulations, he found something that's going to get him some attention."

It is understandable that Soares wants to defend his fighters.  Most people would if we were in the same position he is, but he could have gone about responding in a different way.  Take the quote above when he talked about the Silva vs. Leites fight.  In his opening sentence, he called the fans spoiled.  The same fans who are the reason he has a job as a fight manager.  Regardless of what he said afterwards, the only thing people are going to remember is the "spoiled" line.  He also has to remember that even though he was asked his opinion, people are going to associate it with Silva since he speaks for him so often.  If anything, Soares should have simply said "I understand the fans point of view.  Anderson tried to attack for all five rounds, but Leites didn't allow for that to happen.  I do think it wasn't that bad of a fight though".  With that, he could have sympathize with the fans while defending his client at the same time. 

Let's look at the Chael Sonnen quote.  You hear in professional and college sports all the time not to give your opponent bulletin board material.  Why say something negative about your opponent when it will most likely only fuel their motivation and desire to beat you.  Up until this point, Soares had only nice things to say about Sonnen even though Chael had been verbally blasting him and Silva for weeks so why encourage him to keep talking?  Especially since his fighter, not Soares, that has to be the one to step into the cage against Sonnen on August 7.

There has to come a point where Soares may be doing more harm than good when it comes to representing his fighters and that point is fast approaching.  His translating issues and off the cuff comments are now not just causing problems for him but for his fighters as well.  But what can Soares do to fix it?  Hire someone to translate for his fighters instead of him so he won't be accused of protecting them?  Never talk to the press?  Hire an English tutor for his clients?  The only solution to this problem is if all of Soares's fighters learn English and speak for themselves, but that is easier said than done.  It could take years for some of his clients to learn English well enough or feel confident enough to give interviews on their own and that is if they even want to.  Until all his clientele are fluent in English, Soares is going to be stuck in the same position he is in, a lose-lose situation.