"You could kind of imagine what we're trying to work and we're just kind of waiting on that and if we don't get that deal done, we'll have a show either late summer or early fall," stated President of HDNet Fights, Guy Mezger, as he talked about the possibility of a showdown between Randy Couture and Fedor Emelianenko. Check out what else he had to say as he discussed the future plans for HDNet Fights and shares his thoughts on Ken Shamrock, Mark Coleman, Tito Ortiz, Brock Lesnar, Kimbo Slice, Anderson Silva and much more.
PC: How have you been doing?
GM: Everything is good. I'm a little tired today. We had our show in Tulsa and we didn't get done with our post-production meeting until 1:00 or 1:30 and I had to get a 5:30 wake up call to get our flight so I'm pretty tired.
PC: Man, you're staying busy huh?
GM: Oh yeah!
PC: When can the fans in Dallas expect to see HDNet Fights back down there again?
GM: We're kind of saving it for a big thing. I'm not at liberty to tell you at this time, but you could kind of imagine what we're trying to work and we're just kind of waiting on that and if we don't get that deal done, we'll have a show either late summer or early fall. That's the gameplan.
PC: You guys have developed many partnerships in the sport. How important is it for you to continue to work with these other organizations?
GM: It's important because our idea and our promise to our viewers is that we're going to have 24 live events on HDNet. It's no way we could do that ourselves, obviously, so it's very important that we do something with these other partners. We're trying to work with everything from big-level companies to mid-level companies.
PC: The channel is blowing up and I think the Inside MMA show is a brilliant idea. What has the response been like for that program?
GM: It's been great. That's why we do an hour show instead of a 30 minute show. It's very popular and next to Dan Rather's show, it's the most popular show we have.
PC: Are you guys still planning on having Trigg/Mayhem 2 on your show?
GM: Well, we may or we may not because the problem we're having is that Trigg suddenly wants to go to 170 pounds so I don't know. We'll have to look and make sure he wants to make the weight and if he does want to fight at that weight, it really kind of throws a monkey wrench into things, but we're not going to make him fight at a weight that he's not comfortable with.
PC: Do you still have a relationship with Bob Meyrowitz and if so, what do you think of him getting back into MMA?
GM: I haven't had a relationship with Bob Meyrowitz since I first started in mixed martial arts, you know? He's doing that YAMMA Pit Fighting Championship on pay-per-view, which I think is going to be a freaking disaster.
PC: You go a long ways back with Ken Shamrock. After watching his last fight, would you like to see him contribute to the sport in another way besides competing?
GM: Yeah. I saw the fight and it just didn't look like the Ken Shamrock that I knew so yeah. I think that he needs to consider what he wants to do in the future. If he wants to fight, then hey, he can do what he wants to, but I think it's a good time. He's 44 years old, he's a legend in the sport and I think this may be a good time for him to consider a change in what he's doing.
PC: Can you speak at all about the Randy Couture situation or is it still too sensitive?
GM: With our end of it, it's simply this: we filed a lawsuit and we mainly filed a lawsuit to find out exactly what the interpretations are by law because it's two interpretations. Randy's interpretation, which is in October, he's off his contract and the UFC's contention is that he has 2 fights regardless of the contract so that's all we're doing is trying to find out which guy is right in order for us to do something. Obviously, if we could do Emelianenko and a Couture fight, that would be off the hook, but it's too premature at this point for us to figure out how we can do it so we're working as diligently as we can so we could have an answer to what's going on and after that, we'll know what we're doing.
PC: Do you think Kimbo Slice or Brock Lesnar could be a force in this sport?
GM: I think it's a little premature. Do they both have athletic ability? Yes! I think Kimbo really hasn't been tested with a significant wrestler yet and I think that's going to be one of the deals to see how well he does with somebody that has good grappling skills. I think that's going to be key. As for Brock Lesnar, yeah he's a freaking giant and he was the 2000 NCAA champion and a 4-time All-American. Obviously, if he gained some knowledge in the submission game, he would do well. The problem is I don't think much of the crowd really likes ground-and-pound anymore. It's sad that it's kind of come to that because submissions have really taken a back seat and it's gotten to the point now where we see sloppy submissions and attacks. Before, we saw great submission wrestlers and Jiu Jitsu guys, but now, it's for the most part, we don't see too much of that and I think with Brock Lesnar, he'd be less appealing to people because he's strictly a ground-and-pounder to where Randy Couture has the advantage in that because he's a 40-plus-year-old guy and part of that is the mystique of Randy Couture, a 40-year-old guy in there. Randy knows though because look how he's changed up his fighting. He dropped Tim Sylvia with an inside leg kick, right hand. I think just a strictly ground-and-pounder is not going to be that sellable. The guy is a tremendous athlete so I'm sure he will be able to adapt and pick things up and hopefully he does.
PC: What did you think about Mark Coleman's induction into the UFC Hall of Fame and do you think you will ever get that accolade?
GM: Oh I don't know. About Mark, he deserves it. He was a good champion, a phenomenal champion in his day, and I think him fighting Lesnar, you know, again, he's a 42-year-old guy and I'm not sure that's the wisest decision, but it's his choice and his thing and I wish him luck in it because I think Mark's a good guy. As far as me getting in, I don't know. A lot of the UFC is more politically charged than an objective voting situation. Me being a part of what they consider a rival organization, we don't want to put ourselves in a rival position, but I think it probably cut down my chances for that. It would be an honor to be in that and be recognized by my peers and fans and I think I've laid it on the line enough to be in there, but I've been inducted into the International Hall of Fame, the Texas Martial Arts Hall of Fame and the Universal Martial Arts Hall of Fame, all great things, but outside of it kind of being a plaque on a wall, it's not that significant. I would like to be recognized mainly for my contributions in mixed martial arts, being one of the pioneers and one of the early champions, but if it doesn't happen, I'll be just fine.
PC: I know you and Tito had some bad blood and I'm not sure if you guys ever patched that up, but it doesn't appear that he plans to resign with the UFC. Is that someone you guys would like to have?
GM: Absolutely. We buried the hatchet with all of that crap a long time ago and he has a good future in this still. I think Tito is smart and we would definitely like to talk with him about his future and what he wants to do. I'll be honest, I think it has a lot more to do with what Tito wants to do rather than what we want. Whether or not our visions fit his plans would probably be the factor. We would probably have to sit down and see what he wants to do and see if that works. I guess it's a long drawn out answer saying that we would like to work with Tito if it works out for us and it works out for him.
PC: Anderson Silva is really dominating fighters right now. Who do you have as your pound-for-pound best fighter right now?
GM: I kind of look at it like this, because it's hard for me to do the pound-for-pound thing because I look at the lightweights as more of the skilled fighters. I also look at it as okay. Fedor stepped in and squashed just about any human being we know and that kind of racks up him being the pound-for-pound toughest guy if he could kick everybody's ass. Anderson Silva is a great fighter and could probably kick 90% of everybody's ass. I lean towards Fedor, but the problem with that is that he hasn't fought anybody in a while so he probably slips down. I think personally, he's one of the greatest fighters, but he's kind of slipping out of the ranks because he hasn't really done anything right now. The only reason I kind of keep him in there right now is because he's young and has the potential to fight and I just don't see anybody that could beat him. I like Anderson Silva a lot, but I don't think there has been anybody quite as dominating as Fedor, although Anderson just beat Dan Henderson, who is a very tough guy. I really didn't expect Anderson to win that one to be honest.
PC: I appreciate it as always. Thanks for taking the time to talk with me. Is there anything you would like to say in closing?
GM: I just want to appreciate everybody. HDNet viewership is going up drastically and it's directly involved with the people that want to watch mixed martial arts and it's been the largest request that we've had. We do survey's and overwhelmingly, the new subscribers have been interested in mixed martial arts. I want to thank the people for that and keep it going because the more that we grow and the more you let us know this is the product you want to see, the more we'll be doing them. Next year, we would like to be doing 36 live events. Imagine that dude, a live event every week. That would be off the hook and hopefully we continue to grow. We've been working hard and we appreciate the response.
[ Follow Percy Crawford on Twitter @MrLouis1ana ]