Cro-Cop Coming Back To The UFC???
By Bryan Levick on Jul 03, 2009
Is he or isn’t he? Will he or won’t he? What the hell is going on now in the strange saga of Mirko “Cro Cop” and the UFC?
According to a report on a Croation speaking website, UFC co-owner Lorenzo Fertitta flew to Croatia to meet with Cro-Cop and discuss a contract that would see the superstar back inside the octagon sometime this fall.
As many of you are aware Cro-Cop made his much ballyhooed return to the UFC when he defeated Mustafa Al-Tuk last month at UFC 99 in Germany. Dana White had gone on record as saying that this fight was the first in what was supposed to be a three fight deal.
Then Immediately following the event it was reported that Cro-Cop had never signed a deal and that he was going to sign a lucrative deal with Dream. Cro-Cop said that he was concerned about the amount of time between fights that came with signing a UFC contract.
Dana White was certainly not happy and went off on the Croatian fighter explaining that this was the reason he has never done a handshake deal and never would again. To his credit Filipovic has been consistent when he has said he has never signed a deal with Dream even though there was a bout being discussed for their next event.
Today’s news comes as quite of a shock considering how fighters who get in Dana’s doghouse rarely emerge. Fertitta has apparently offered Cro-Cop a deal that would keep him more active than the original deal and will more than likely compensate him at a higher rate as well.
No one from the UFC or Cro-Cop’s camp has made any statements as of this post, but it will be interesting to see how this works out and how involved Dana White is involved in all of this.
Filed Under: MMA
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We have a fluent Croatian speaker on our staff who is a big CC fan and he doesn’t even know WTF is going on. My *hunch* is that this is a negotiating ploy by CC’s people to get him a better deal in Japan. It doesn’t really make sense for him to fight in the UFC when he has rock star like status in Japan….
If this is about the money would anyone happen to know what kind of money Cro-Cop makes per fight in Japan? Just curious.
Not sure exactly what his salary was in Japan as they did not report them to my knowledge. But you figure aside from his fighter salary he has done endorsements over there (as have Bob Sapp, Marc Coleman, Wanderlai Silva, etc…) that were for major companies. Unlike here in the U.S. he has the potential to earn a large amount of money outside the Octagon. Unless you are a top fighter in the UFC like Liddell, Couture, Ortiz, Griffin, etc… in terms of popularity you may not earn nearly the same. Heck I am sure his movie did fairly well over there. But if the UFC is seriously moving into Europe he is a fighter they need and could do well there.
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