Let's Get It On!_ The Making of MMA and Its Ultimate Referee - Big John Mccarthy [105]
An engineer drew up a revised schematic and rebuilt the Octagon with aluminum, eliminating the wooden struts. Extra padding was also added to both the cage posts and the Octagon floor. Zuffa was raising the bar.
There were exactly forty days until the next scheduled UFC event, so Zuffa had to work fast. The company had been created from scratch to run the UFC, so many of the employees were new to promoting. There had been some talk of certain employees crossing over to work for Zuffa, but it was clear that not everyone would be invited to join the new company.
Paula Romero, who’d taken over as event coordinator at UFC 22 after Elaine had left, wanted Zuffa to hire her for more money than she’d made with SEG. However, Zuffa had hired its own coordinator, Lisa Faircloth, to oversee the events.
James Werme, who’d served as a producer since 1995 and had been an on-air roving reporter for the last few SEG shows, was let go.
Following UFC 31, Jeff Blatnick was replaced in the booth after having commentated every event since UFC 4. I felt especially bad for Blatnick because it was clear Dana White didn’t like anything about him, from his looks to his commentating skills. However, Blatnick had been integral to the sport’s growth.
Frank Shamrock, the retired middleweight champion who’d sat in on the play-by-play duties for the last few events, also decided to part ways with Zuffa. There was a falling out over what exactly Shamrock would do with the promotion. I was told that Shamrock wanted to take more of a role on the business end, but Zuffa wanted the retired champion commentating only. Shamrock’s and White’s personalities also seemed to clash, which sped up his exit.
The commentary booth would become a revolving door of auditionees for the next few shows, until Zuffa settled on the duo of Mike Goldberg and comedian and TV actor Joe Rogan in 2002. Rogan, who’d reached national acclaim as host of NBC’s Fear Factor, was an avid martial artist himself and had been a backstage interviewer for the UFC in its earlier days.
Joe Silva replaced John Perretti as matchmaker. From his legendary MMA tape collection, he’d sent Meyrowitz copies of fights from Japan and other countries. SEG had paid Silva in free posters and tickets for a few shows, but when they couldn’t afford to do that anymore, commentator Jeff Blatnick had paid Silva to research and write up fighter bio notes Blatnick could refer to during the broadcasts. When Zuffa bought the UFC, I think it was Blatnick who told Fertitta and White they might want to talk to Silva because of his vast fighter knowledge. John Lewis, their Brazilian jiu-jitsu teacher, was supposed to get the matchmaker job, but Zuffa took a chance and went with Silva instead.
As for me, I hoped I wasn’t about to share the same fate as Blatnick, Werme, and Perretti. I’d fought hard for MMA and been through a lot of good and bad with it. The UFC wasn’t perfect, but it was like one of my kids, and I’d always love it unconditionally. I was relieved when I got the call to go work UFC 31.
One more momentous development was about to happen for the sport, though. On April 3, 2001, just a month before UFC 31, Fertitta, White, Silva, Blatnick, IFC promoter Paul Smith, King of the Cage promoter Terry Trebilcock, Pride Fighting Championships representatives Yukino Kanda and Hideki Yamamoto, a few others, and I met at Commissioner Hazzard’s request in Trenton, New Jersey, in a NJSACB conference room. NSAC Executive Director Marc Ratner participated by phone. We were there to discuss and agree upon a set of rules. The meeting lasted about four hours.
The board started with the UFC’s current rules and discussed other hot topics like the use of elbows and knees on the ground. The board’s physician weighed in on everything, giving his medical opinion of whether a move was acceptable within the realm of fighter safety. The doctor nearly had a fit over one fighter kneeing another downed fighter at the IFC show in 2000, and I think we