What could Dana’s meeting with Vince McMahon mean?
by N. Rodriguez on Jul 22, 2011 4:09 PM EDT
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An article in USA Today mentioned Dana White recently meeting with Vince McMahon. Besides Dana referring to Vince as "the guy that basically created the pay-per-view market," the piece lacked any details, speculation, hints, or elaboration. The writer, Dan Gelston, left the bait out there for the MMA community, and it was bought – hook, line and sinker. Just two sentences intended to show off Dana’s outside the box approach turned out to be the most intriguing news of the week.
The hardcore fans have been going back and forth with possible topics the two mega-powers would meet about. The article left everything to the imagination, so MMAFightling.com’s Ariel Helwani asked Dana about the meeting in an exclusive interview:
For those who can’t watch, the only thing he gave out was that it was both business and personal. Some of the things fans have come up with are off the wall, while pro-wrestling news sites – infamous for posting blind guesses disguised as bits from “insider sources” – claim the meeting was about Brock Lesnar. Comment sections and message boards have been analyzing every word in the USA Today article and the video looking for context clues. So what can be deduced from the little bits that have been given to us?
(The following is my pure guesstemation, inferred from only what’s been mentioned in the article and video.)
It’s my belief that Dana White and Vince McMahon met about television distribution.
If you look and listen closely, the mentions of the meeting were preceded by mentions of broadcasting rights. Both the UFC and WWE are interested in creating cable channels that would exclusively feature their product. McMahon has been trying to establish one for the last few years, while White spoke on the subject just a few months ago. They’re in similar situations: hundreds of hours of product that span the history of their field, trying to get a channel off the ground, dealing with networks (especially NBC), and how to structure discussions with Spike TV.
The latter seems to be overlooked in the mentions of the story. The WWE has experience with leaving the Viacom subsidiary because of their jump to Universal in 2005, so it could be a case of Dana looking for tips to emulate Vince’s exit strategy when the UFC’s deal expires this year. (Again, this is all just pure speculation.)
In any case, Dana White asking Vince McMahon for business tips is newsworthy, even if we don’t exactly know why yet.
The FanPosts are solely the subjective opinions of Cageside Seats readers and do not necessarily reflect the views of Cageside Seats editors or staff.
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What is so funny about this situation is how really casual fans on both sides of this story think A) These two hate each other, or B) Don’t know or care about each other.
Or the group that thinks Dana was just playing tourist. Haha…right. Like Dana has time to do that anyways.
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Here is my theory. Alistair Overeem is probably going to WWE
after what Werdum did to him. :P
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A joint Network?
I was wondering if they would be crazy about pulling a joint network together. With UFC and WWE’s library ontop of the new programs they can do that could work for a network.
It also will bring new fans to UFC and potentially bring back some jaded WWE fans.
I remember a few years back there being interest from the mcmahons about getting involved with mma. I hope that Vince finally sees how much ppv $$ is being taken in by ufc and that rather than dismissing it by stating that ufc is not competition to WWE, both have decided to do something that mutually benefits them. My feeling is that it has to do with a Brock lesnar dvd. Perhaps ufc’s future was discussed, once their spike tv deal ends, and how it would benefit both companies by ufc doing a lead in to raw on Monday nights. But at the same time ufc doesn’t need to play lead in for anyone, could have something to do with a joint tv product, should mcmahon feel he stands a better chance in pulling off a joint venture rather than a WWE network?
Scott Druyan
by matz57 on Jul 23, 2011 5:01 PM EDT via mobile reply actions
Dana to Vince
So I bought all this damn stadium equipment for GSP vs Shields and it’s getting rusty. You okay with me doing a yearly PPV called MMAMania? Yes, just like the blog.
Mike Goldberg: "You know Joe, When Matt and his brother Mark Hughes were growing up, they would pound each other behind the barn."
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Vince McMahon would be the last person Dana should go to for advice on how to effectively leave Spike TV. Vince’s hardball strategy backfired when Spike TV publicly pulled out of negotiations with them early, which weakened their leverage with the USA network and forced them to take a worse deal than the one they originally had with Spike. Unless he’s learnt his lesson and tells Dana that the grass isn’t always greener.
Except to the WWE the grass is greener on the USA Network and what did Spike get in return for not having WWE programming bringing in millions of eyeballs…TNA. If anything Spike should take that as a lesson as to how not to deal with a popular brand that brings in millions of eyeballs to your one note network.
The grass wasn’t greener. WWE expected their ratings to rebound on USA, which they didn’t. Spike coped fine without WWE for years until their UFC shows started declining in viewership over the last year.
by Keith Harris on Jul 24, 2011 3:35 PM EDT up reply actions
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