October 21, 2008

Down for the Count: Less than three weeks after its marquee fighter Kimbo Slice was knocked out in 14 seconds by a journeyman replacement, MMA company Elite XC has closed its doors for good.

posted by Mr Bismarck to other at 10:02 AM - 9 comments

SI.com's version of the story here.

Showtime had a 20% stake in the company and were rumoured to be interested in buying a controlling interest, but got cold feet around the controversy of Seth Petruzelli's comments, (previously on SpoFi), and when their money wasn't on offer any more the rest of the company collapsed.

posted by Mr Bismarck at 10:04 AM on October 21, 2008

Almost posted this myself, but my last post about EliteXC died a miserable death.

I find this rather amusing. Kimbo's 15 minutes is over (though arguably was anyway after that fight) and he'll have to go back to fighting hobos on YouTube, and a company implicated in fight fixing is dead and gone.

Were it not for the fighters who are now out a paycheque, there'd be no downside to this IMO.

posted by Drood at 10:57 AM on October 21, 2008

Since Kimbo is on this thread, am I the only one that thinks Shamrock would have destroyed Kimbo? The Shamrock family are some bad dudes, I think Kimbo was lucky he got beat in 15 seconds by a second rate fighter.

posted by sandmst at 03:28 PM on October 21, 2008

I think it has been a while since Ken Shamrock has destroyed anybody. Frank Shamrock is still a bad dude, Ken Shamrock is just bad.

posted by sportsblitz at 06:01 PM on October 21, 2008

At this point I think Gina could take Kimbo...

Talk about getting humbled.

posted by Drood at 06:13 PM on October 21, 2008

"Since Kimbo is on this thread, am I the only one that thinks Shamrock would have destroyed Kimbo?"

The same Ken Shamrock who has five straight first round losses?

People talked about his ground game as a solution to Slice, but he hasn't submitted anyone since Sam Adkins in 2001.

Sam's MMA record is 7 wins and 20 losses.

Looking at records is not always illuminating and Slice was knocked on his ass by a jab from a guy standing on one foot, so who knows what Ken could have done, but I think there's a good reason Slice wanted more money to fight Petruzelli.

posted by Mr Bismarck at 06:24 PM on October 21, 2008

Last Shamrock fight I saw was him being screwed by stupid stoppage in PRIDE.

posted by Drood at 07:07 PM on October 21, 2008

That was a bizarre fight. I thought both Shamrock and Sakuraba were going to get yellow carded for lack of action and then Sakuraba lands a couple of punches, Shamrock takes two steps back and falls down all on his own and then completely gives up his back.

Sakuraba wanders over and lands to Shamrock's undefended head and the ref stops the fight.

Shamrock jumped up pretty quick to dispute the decision, but when I saw it my first reaction was "Wow! Shamrock quit!"

It seemed like he was good to go on, but being on all fours while a standing opponent lands uncontested to the side of your head is not "intelligently defending yourself", so if he was clear headed, (as opposed to just quick to recover after he stopped getting hit), then Shamrock screwed himself really.

Still, as I said, bizarre.

posted by Mr Bismarck at 08:43 PM on October 21, 2008

Thanks. Had forgotten who the fight was against. Only thing I really remember is Ken Shamrock's "WHAT THE FUCK?" look on his face.

posted by Drood at 11:27 PM on October 21, 2008

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