(Continued)
Ultimate ultimate 96 behind the scenes through quotes by the promoters and fighters in it (part 3) :
Varelans: I think SEG feared [DePersia's involvement]. They were about as childish as you can get. Anyone trying to establish a measure of control in the business, they're going to hate your guts.
DePersia: I had every one of them and was able to approach the management and basically say, "Look, I have all these guys. You really can't do an event without me." I had the ability at that point to change everybody's pay structure and everybody's salaries to where they could actually make a living as opposed to just getting $500 to participate. We also created opportunities for multifight deals, which never would've been done before.
Davie: Meyrowitz and I talked about the fact that the UFC was the brand and that it was bigger than the fighters. There was nobody we felt in MMA at that point in time that was bigger than the UFC. The brand was the star.
DePersia: We tried to get name recognition and star power. I started to develop that with my guys despite what the UFC group wanted. They didn't want any type of star power. They wanted the brand name. You had interchangeable components that cost minimal money. I tried to go the other way, to create identities.
Hall: I didn't think I could get anywhere in the business without having a good manager like that, who has everyone else hooked up.
Isaacs: We weren't thrilled with the idea DePersia could exercise pricing power or decision-making power on our product simply by representing the fighters.
DePersia: They couldn't do a show unless we agreed. You took a union-type position. It really benefited everybody because it raised the entire pay scale for everyone. They didn't expect it and, obviously, they hated it.
Nothing angered SEG more than when DePersia sent several fighters to Japan to participate in a show that took place only three weeks prior to the Ultimate Ultimate. Dubbed U-Japan, it featured Frye, Hall, Varelans and Kimo -- virtually half of SEG's tournament lineup.
Frye: Meyrowitz was pissed. He was screaming at me on the telephone. I love old Bob, but s---, I was 30 years old, 10 feet tall and bulletproof.
Davie: If there was a potential injury, you're damaging a show we've booked. Marketing materials were in circulation. There was concern DePersia was booking these people too close to the event.
Isaacs: It was bulls---, absolute bulls--- from DePersia. He thought he was very sneaky, thought he'd have a monopoly on the talent and could exercise that pricing power with us. We didn't know about it. It's not like we said, "Oh, good plan!" There were guys at risk of potentially losing.
DePersia: You have to understand, it's not like it is now where you look and constantly see there's an event on. At that point, events were far and few between. If one was coming up and you weren't part of it, it might be several months before one came up again. You fought like crazy to get on that card. Who knew when the next one was coming?
Isaacs: He was operating as though he was an independent player in this business. It wasn't helpful for a fighter to be represented by DePersia at that point. I would never say I would not use a fighter because of who represents them, but I would say to them that it was hard for us to work with him.
Beck: We were looking for a smaller venue, with screaming, enthusiastic, drunk fans. That was our target audience.
Worsham: We had curtains backstage, almost like an ER. So you hear, "Ahhh!" Guys all around you, guys from the prelim fights coming in moaning and groaning, "Stop the bleeding," and all this stuff. It was kind of crazy.
Abbott: When I get there, I'm getting the cold shoulder from [referee] John McCarthy and his wife, Elaine. [Abbott had exchanged words with Elaine several months prior over his participation in a ringside brawl.] Then I get to the arena and everybody's got a dressing room. That was part of Elaine's job at the show. I have a broom closet, a little broom closet. I'm like, "Are you kidding me?" She's like, "Oh, that's all we have." I told them all to f--- off.
Shamrock: I remember when I fought Royce Gracie. I thought the same thing -- I was kind of stuck in a small room. He got the bigger room with all his family in it, the closed-circuit TV. But to me, he's the champ. He's the guy on top. Until you get to that point, don't bitch.
Worsham: There was a training area within the hotel with mats. All week long, it stayed the same order: everyone else, Tank, then me. I got the last slot of the night. And this particular room at the hotel in Birmingham, they had glass walls and papered it over. It was a storage area for all of their holiday ornaments. The room was fairly dark because of the paper and only a little bit of light from the lobby would come in.
I'm literally in there two minutes or less and somebody in my group yelled, "Stop, you're bleeding." I looked and there were dots of blood all over my legs, my arms, my back, my face. What we had found was that somebody had taken some very small Christmas light bulbs and had crushed them up and thrown them on the mat. I can't prove who did it, but I can tell you nobody else complained about it but me. So you can figure out who did what and when.
Abbott: That is absolute, pure fantasy. To even go to that level, that people are trying to sabotage you, he's just making up stories. Cal Worsham I wouldn't even think about at all, much less, "Oh, let's put Christmas ornaments on the mat."
Isaacs: If it did happen, I would say it may not have been Abbott. Abbott is a wrestler. I don't think he would mess with that. He respects things like that, but his guys were not above pulling dirty tricks.
Shamrock's first-round opponent was Johnston, a capable Judoka who had competed -- and lost -- to some of the sport's best in Frye and Coleman.
Johnston: He took me down off a kick, a beautiful takedown. It was textbook. But my guard really lacked. I didn't attempt a sweep. There were 100 different things that I knew how to do by that point, but I didn't do them. Ken, with his stature at that time -- I could've done so much more.
Shamrock: Brian was always a decent-sized guy. But when he came into this fight, man, he was big. Immediately, I changed what I was going to do. By staying in his guard and driving his head against the fence like I did, I had easy access to punching him.
Johnston: Hitting someone in the skull so many times, you're doing more harm to [yourself] than to them.
Davie: Ken came in buffed up, tight, strong. But again, looking at him with Brian Johnston pinned up against the fence, knowing Ken's hands tended to be brittle, seeing him throw as many punches as he did, I remember David Isaacs grabbing my coat and saying, with panic in his eyes, "Is he going to be OK?"
part 4 in the next comment
