Can Affliction Do Well In The Long Run?

 I'm not sure what Affliction's long term strategy is.



Affliction has done pretty much everything they can do on paper to develop a great first show.



there is never any guarantee that the show will turn out to be as good as it looks on the ads, and they might have horrible luck and end up with a UFC 33, but they seem to have stacked the deck as far as they reasonably can in their favor.



Their advertising is also solid and professional, as you would expect from a company dealing heavily with fashionable clothing and the image business. I thought the quotes were a nice touch.



however, there is no doubt they are going to be dropping a huge chunk of change on this show. Right now, it's probably not sustainable to keep trying to put on shows close to this magnitude one after the other.



Affliction can raid it's clothing division profits for the inital cash they will need to put the first few shows over the top, just like Zuffa could from the Feritta Brothers casino profits, just not at quite the same level.



So I think they are going to last longer than one or two shows, and they aren't gonna pull a WFA immediately.



What are their long term plans? How are they going to develop rising talent and keep them fighting in an Affliction promotion, at least most of the time? Also, how are they going to get a huge share of the existing talent that isn't locked up with the UFC? They have a great heavyweight division, but I'm not sure about the future of their other divisions.



so what's their gameplan? Get a network TV deal? Get a cable network deal (reality show anchored or non)? Try to find a new medium they can use to promote their shows and fighters and still rake in PPV?



I think that they are potentially a much more serious and smarter opponent for Zuffa than EliteXC, but the next few EXC shows on TV might prove me wrong if they're blockbusters.

All very good questions, to say the least...I would speculate, but I'll appear as wise as a Chinese monk by saying, "Only time will tell, my friend..."

If they are willing to sink a ton of money into it they might make it. Being in a ring kinda hurts them a little imo.

 I think the dirty little secret of MMA is that the "plumbing" is the really important part of building a major promotion. Having the right flow of fighters at the right prices for a good long time under your roof is really key.



the UFC has built up great plumbing. TUF is great plumbing, Long term contracts with lots of lock-in are good plumbing (for UFC anyway). Building the WEC up as a smaller league to the UFC for regular weights and giving a place for the smaller weights to shine is also excellent plumbing.




Expected to lose 4 million if they can draw 50-60k buys. Fedor drew 15k buys last time in the US.

If they change the name to Affliction Extreme Cage Wars, then yes, they can do well in the long run.

hope so. Rooting for them

RoR, are you a plumber?

Good analogy, BTW.

Make good cards. But dont try and stack every single card. I know you want to have fans come your way. But if your paying out your ass every single card cuz your stacking it up then your going out quickly. Have maybe 2 maybe 3 big name fights and then fill it with young talented guys. Less money spent longer time spent out there.

I'll buy it once, we'll see from there. Hope so.

"RoR, are you a plumber?"

only when he's | in a shell script

Affliction is taking over. Mark my words.

'MMA' will be synonymous with 'Affliction'

The best thing they could do is advertise on Spike.

hopin that the names of Arlovski, Sylvia and Rothwell will get the american fans involved. If anything, maybe people will tune in to see the ones they know (and dislike) get their heads kicked in.

 Where is their TV advertising? I haven't seen it and don't know how you get a TV PPV audience without advertising on TV.

DefenTac -  and the corrupt judges is enough.quote]

if your not aware the state ac's appoint judges not the promoter. as for affliction id love to see them do well but i dont see it happening going to war with the ufc out of the gate is just dumb build up a stable base of fighters and fans then go for bigger names so its not a make or break type of thing. regardless il buy every ppv affliction puts on.

Without decent tv advertising exposure, it isn't going to work.

I think it will be a great show, but what I think doesn't matter. Nobody else that I know has a clue that this show it even happening, and even if they did, they don't know the fighters, so they don't care.

UFC got where it is because of SPIKE.

They need a TV deal quick.

 THey will fail miserably. They may put on 2-4 decent shows but they'll keep hemorrhaging money



The main overall problem they have is that they're de facto advertising for their shitty clothing line



They have this unrealistic notion that their shitty splattered skull t-shirts are going to be trendy forever, and that their clothing line will keep expanding bigger and bigger



Lots of shitty trend companies have made this mistake, like Von Dutch or whatever other poser douchebag clothing line you want to compare them too



With the economy slowing, retail is withering and dying right now, and the trendy $50 t-shirt market isn't the most stable



They'll eat a big loss or two with their MMA shows, but when their clothing line predictably goes down the tubes, they'll jump ship from taking losses promoting in a heartbeat

Affliction may very well succeed!

After all they created a million dollar business out of selling ugly designed t-shirts. They aren't as dumb as you might make them out! Buy the PPV.