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Quick Quote: Rogers’ Coach Unhappy with Overeem
By: Sherdog.com Staff
Dave Mandel/Sherdog.com
Mike Reilly, Brett Rogers’ coach, was disappointed with Alistair Overeem’s effort in building up their Strikeforce “Heavy Artillery” main event. During a Beatdown After the Bell interview Saturday shortly after the fight, Reilly compared Overeem’s prefight promotion to Rogers:
“(Rogers) comes out here to St. Louis and he carries the show. Overeem won’t do an interview. Our greatest disappointment was that we really love Strikeforce and we really love what this organization has brought to the table and what they’ve done for the sport, and personally I don’t think Alistair Overeem has ever shown this organization any respect whatsoever. That’s one of the tragedies is that he gets to carry their belt. He won’t do interviews. He won’t do anything. We come on and we really carry the promotion side of it, and we did with the Fedor fight too. We go around and do all of the personal appearances. We do the lion’s share of the interviews, the lion’s share of all the promotional work. Part of it, you want to say, ‘Well, maybe that’s a distraction? That actually kind of ends up hurting us.’ But again, that should be part of the job. I would wish that other fighters would be more willing to do more of that and willing to step up and help promote the show as much as Brett does. And respect the promotion and the sponsors and the organization as much as we do, but that’s neither here nor there. The end result is that you still gotta win.”
More » Reilly Breaks Down Rogers’ Loss and His Future
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Post-Mortem: Overeem in Overdrive, Dull Shine and More
By: Jake Rossen
Dave Mandel/Sherdog.com
Two tales of the weekend: Alistair Overeem flew into the States, suffered repeated questions about his physique, assaulted an American citizen, and then flew back to Holland, settling into a role as a legitimate threat to Fedor Emelianenko’s status as the best.
In North Carolina, several fighters arrived prepared to fight but left emotionally drained with nothing to show for it.
There is always a winner and a loser. It’s not always decided in the ring.
Strikeforce prevailed Saturday, with Overeem’s pre-sold reputation as a destroyer on full display against a curdling Brett Rogers. The man who gave Emelianenko a rough first round last fall had virtually nothing for Overeem -- not even the hyped right hand that promised to at least keep Overeem honest. Now, only two obstacles remain in Strikeforce assembling their best chance at a high-profile heavyweight match: Emelianenko getting past Werdum and Strikeforce getting past Emelianenko’s notoriously difficult management.
Both are problems, but nothing compared to what might have been the most spectacular meltdown of a burgeoning promotion to date. Shine Fights spent most of Friday and Saturday in court answering charges that their contract with eccentric boxer Ricardo Mayorga violated Mayorga’s promotional agreement with Don King. Shine’s game from the beginning was to stick their heads in the sand and presume that King would somehow roll over for their stunt casting of Mayorga as an MMA fighter. (Mayorga had filed suit against King last year, but dropped it without explanation. That should’ve been clue one.) It ended the only way it was going to, with Mayorga sitting on the sidelines and Shine trying to assign blame to the North Carolina boxing authority and King.
In fact, the show’s cancelation is one hundred percent a result of their building an event around the toothpick-supported premise of Mayorga breaching a valid contract. We’re a long way from the ninjitsu experts of the 1990s, but this business will always be home to amateurs. Read more -
Weekend Primer: Strikeforce Heavy Artillery/Shine Fights 3
By: Jake Rossen
File Photo: Sherdog.com
How remarkable is Alistair Overeem’s physique? The former 205 pound fighter -- who has ballooned to in excess of 250 pounds while competing in the freewheeling fight culture of Japan -- is so awesomely proportioned that most of this week’s dialogue revolves around whether or not his urine sample cup should be stainless steel. Handicapping his fight with Brett Rogers has become an afterthought.
That kind of extracurricular drama is shared by the other major show of the weekend: in employing professional boxer Ricardo Mayorga, the Florida-based Shine Fights promotion has invited the wrath of Don King Productions, which has filed an injunction claiming sole ownership of Mayorga’s athletic career. Against Din Thomas, a mixed-fight veteran who should manipulate his arms and legs in new and interesting directions, he’d better hope King gets it.
What: Strikeforce: Heavy Artillery, a 12-bout card from the Scottrade Center in St. Louis, Mo., (10 p.m. ET, Showtime); Shine Fights: Mayorga vs. Thomas, an eight-bout card from the Crown Coliseum in Fayetteville, N.C., (9 p.m. ET, pay per view).
Why You Should Care: Because for all his controversies, Overeem is a man who combines K-1 level striking with Brock Lesnar’s horsepower; because Andrei Arlovski with head movement is going to be a scary prospect for anyone in the heavyweight division; because light-heavyweight Roger Gracie is good enough on the mat to give anyone in his division problems -- if he can drag them there; and because Mayorga’s rejection of his reputation in boxing to take a huge risk in MMA has to be appreciated. Read more -
Audio: Overeem/Rogers Strikeforce 'Heavy Artillery' Conference Call
By: Mike Fridley
Strikeforce held a conference call for the media on Tuesday to promote its May 15 St. Louis, Mo., event.
Strikeforce heavyweight champion Alistair Overeem, challenger Brett Rogers and CEO Scott Coker participated in the call. Audio from the teleconference is available in the player below.
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Overeem Wants Badr Hari in MMA
By: Jake Rossen
D. Herbertson/Sherdog.com
Who can make sense of Alistair Overeem’s career? After packing on 30 lbs. in the past two years, fans fawning over his puffed, exaggerated frame, he’s rattled off a bunch of semi-quality wins in both MMA and kickboxing. None of them were against particularly qualified opponents, and the one that was -- a KO over Badr Hari -- came three weeks after Hari had three fights in a K-1 Grand Prix.
Overeem hasn’t fought in the states since November 2007. No one really knows what that new body can do against a top-ten opponent in a mixed-style setting.
Now Overeem, per HeadKickLegend.com, wants a rematch with Badr, but this time in MMA. Hari is likely to decline, just as he did when Overeem floated the same idea earlier in the year. (A man with 42 pro fights in MMA would seem to be an unnecessary risk for Hari’s 0-1 mark, regardless of their results in a neighboring sport.)
What’s the endgame here? Overeem is a good striker with increasing power and a better-than-average submission game -- including a guillotine that put away some talented fighters -- but we have no idea how that flank steak of a body is going to survive three rounds or more of mixed-style fighting.
Hari or not, Overeem will likely cash a nice payday on New Year’s. It just doesn’t seem to be in the service of anything. He’s become more renowned for a body than a body of work. Read more -
Incredible Bulk: Overeem Discusses Diet
By: Jake Rossen
I have a lazy habit of comparing well-built fighters to action figures. “That James Irvin, body by Mattel.” Ha, ha, ha. So very clever. Yes.
In assessing the increasing proportions of Alistair Overeem, the analogy (thankfully) ceases to work: Overeem, who looks to have softballs stuffed in his arms, makes He-Man look like a malnourished hobo. Combat sports usually strip you of lean mass through intense conditioning -- the same conditioning that burns so many calories you can’t usually entertain the idea of putting weight on.
Yet Overeem continues to grow. In this K-1 promotional video, he discusses his nutritional choices. “I like beef,” he says, hovering over a frying pan. “Beef makes you strong. Cow beef, horse beef…horse is very good protein. Better than beef.” He rattles off more from the menu: Yogurt, quark, potatoes, nuts, fish, and genetics. “My mother’s a strong woman, big.”
Overeem competes in the K-1 Grand Prix, an eight-man elimination tournament, Saturday. Read more -
'Fedor vs. Rogers' Post-Mortem: Russian Roulette, Network Exposure, More
By: Jake Rossen
D. Mandel/Sherdog.com
The expectations created by Fedor Emelianenko’s media profile make it impossible for him to perform in a way that pleases everyone: if he had crumbled Brett Rogers Saturday in a manner akin to Tim Sylvia -- women sobbing cageside, Medivacs hovering overhead -- fans would sigh and complain that Rogers never belonged in the ring with him.
In taking nearly seven minutes to finish Rogers off, gushing blood all the while, Emelianenko is instead viewed by a portion of the audience as a less-than-prime fighter. The paint, some would argue, is coming off the pedestal.
There is some truth in the idea that we don’t yet know how impressive it really was to beat Rogers: maybe he’s a devastating heavyweight who hasn’t had much of a chance to show off. (His lone win over a top-10 opponent, Andrei Arlovski, earned him this slot.) Maybe he’s a one-dimensional athlete who won’t go much further. Read more -
Dream 12: Sakuraba, Overeem, Alvarez Get Cagey
By: Jake Rossen
D. Herbertson/Sherdog.com
If you had trouble sleeping Saturday night and happened to possess the attention span of someone with a gun to the head, you could’ve watched virtually eight hours of prizefighting with a tandem UFC 104/Dream 12 marathon. One session like that and you’d be ready for a job as an EMT: nicely desensitized.
Dream aired on HDNet in the early-morning hours Sunday with big names throughout, but none in any particular mood to be fighting one another. Alistair Overeem, looking like he has ingested the 2003 Alistair Overeem for the proteins, sunk in a trademark guillotine choke against James Thompson; in the newest chapter of the world’s slowest public execution, Kazushi Sakuraba took another few years off his life by eating several flush punches to the head courtesy Zelg Galesic before securing a kneebar. Not an even trade; Bellator lightweight champion Eddie Alvarez survived a demoralizing first round -- and gave Bellator CEO Bjorn Rebney some slight palpitations -- before getting an arm-triangle submission against Katsunori Kinuko.
Bouts for the event were held in a white circular cage, a departure from most Japanese events using a ring: eventually, Dream will adopt Michael Buffer and possibly ring girl Edith, and the bizarro world will be complete. Read more -
Maximum Overeem: Strikeforce Champ Defeats Aerts in K-1
By: Jake Rossen
Overshadowing his victory over kickboxing legend Peter Aerts this weekend in Seoul, South Korea, were Alistair Overeem’s engorged trapezius, pectoral, and bicep muscles. The man who had fought at 205 lbs. as recently as 2007 appeared to have been sculpted from Apoxy putty, looking as though he weighed a minimum 240-250 lbs. with a body-fat percentage in the single digits.
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For a man who could do what he pleases with a syringe overseas, talk quickly turned to what, exactly, Overeem is doing to achieve that kind of physique. While it’s certainly possible to pack on that muscle naturally -- if mom and dad’s genes are hospitable to the cause -- it’s substantially more difficult to do when an athlete is engaged in the cardiovascular, catabolic demands of fight training. Several athletes have said that a camp frequently shaves 10-15 lbs. off of them. Adding 20-30 lbs. during one is some kind of feat. -
Overeem: K-1's Bigger Gloves Better for Recovering Hand
By: Jake Rossen
Alistair Overeem is a difficult man to reach. Situated in Holland and with far better things to do than tolerate a bad international cell connection with some typing-monkey blogger, you sometimes have to settle for getting word via email correspondence with manager Bas Boon.
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Approaching Overeem for comment came following reports that the Strikeforce heavyweight champion, once scheduled to defend the title in August against Fabricio Werdum, has agreed to two kickboxing bouts in the fall. It’s a curious schedule for a man who claimed an infected hand (from a bathroom brawl at a nightclub) over the summer.
