Report: Lorenzo Fertitta Offers Mirko Cro Cop a Contract He Can’t Refuse
According to index.hr, UFC co-owner Lorenzo Fertitta recently traveled to Croatia to personally offer heavyweight Mirko “Cro Cop” Filipovic a contract the report says “can’t be refused”:
Index understands that Lorenzo Fertitta, the head honcho and part owner of the UFC flew to Zagreb with his own private jet earlier this morning. He was driven to Mirko’s residents shortly after, where he stayed for two hours talking with the Croatian fighter. He returned to the airport afterwards, smiling, where his private jet flew off in to an unknown destination.
There is no doubt that Fertitta came to Zagreb to persuade the Croatian fighter to change his mind and to sign with the worlds strongest fight sport organization. We understand that Cro Cop has been offered an incredible deal that should see him fight with the UFC once again . Although Filipovic was unavailable for comment, its clear that this is a major development in the ongoing negotiations. We will almost certainly, see CroCop in the world’s strongest organization once again despite the Cro Cop close ties with Dream.
Cro Cop refused to extended his UFC contract at UFC 99 due to the oragnziations long breaks in between fights. Filipovic has stated that the UFC heavyweight title is a lifelong dream, though he didn’t want to wait another six months for his next bout. Clearly the two parties have come to some sort of an agreement. Cro Cop’s value to the UFC has become even more evident with Fertitta himself flying to Croatia. Such a move is almost unprecedented with most deals being handled by UFC president Dana White.
Nearly two years after leaving the Octagon following back-to-back losses to Gabriel Gonzaga and Cheick Kongo in 2007, Cro Cop returned to the UFC in June, defeating Mostapha Al-Turk via first-round TKO at UFC 99. Competing under a special one fight deal under the premise that he’d return for additional fights, Filipovic reportedly signed with DREAM following the bout in a move likely to end his UFC career. However, the latest rumors indicate that Cro Cop has yet to sign with either promotion and is considering offers from both the UFC and DREAM.
(Translation courtesy of Robert K at BigOddsMike)
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I find this really surprising with the ufc seemingly going to all this trouble to resign a fighter who hardly pulled up any trees in each of his ufc bouts to date. Cro Cop is one of my favourite fighters of all time but when all is said and done he hasn’t had a notable victory since Barnett & Wand back in 2006.
Why exactly are they bothering with Cro Cop? He’s washed up and never going to be a serious contender. Why not let him go waste away in Dream?
Because ZUFFA doesn’t like to have egg on its face, and what CC “did” made them look silly sooo Mr. Fertitta flew his happy asss out there and said hey, you still work for me right!!?
In other words, “You can’t quit, you’re cut?”
lol
My guess would be that the UFC would like to re-sign Mirko so that the Fertitas and Dana White can have the pleasure and satisfaction of sitting in the front row and watch guys like Shane Carwin reduce Mirko, a guy that publicly disrespected and embarrassed them, to a chunky red smear on the Octagon mat.
A couple of HW fights within the cage, which is CLEARLY not conducive to Mirko’s strike-heavy MMA game, will find UFC fans wondering, “whatever happened to Mirko CroCop?”
And the answer will be, “oh, we found CroCop in the droppings of some 280 pound super HW right outside of the Octagon”…
Man you nailed it on that one!!!
Mirco is a big name and more than likely can help sell some tickets, but come on he has looked less than stellar in his past few bouts. I honestly wouldn’t mind seeing him fight one more time to see if it was mostly his injury holding him back or is he just warshed up. He will have more than a one fight contract and from the sound of it, it’s gonna be a very decent contract so says Lorenzo.
I think because the ufc is the biggest and the best, they want all of the biggest and best, even if that means they were the best like 5 years ago. he may be washed up and not nearly as stellar as before, but i think the ufc just wants all the best (and past best) fighters with them, and retiring with the end of their career being in the ufc. you never know, if they let him go he may have done absolutely incredible in dream then they wold feel dumb for letting him go, if he comes back now and sucks they sell tickets and own another legend.emphasis on OWN
He is big in Europe and well the UFC likes to go and play over there every now and again…. Also (if this is true) it keeps him out of the hands of StrikeForce and Affliction, regardless of his down~ward slide as of late (no brutal Head Kick KO’s and well no seeming his best) he will still put asss’ in the seats, hell I would go and see him live.
also Dana has said multiple times he wants to go back to Japan with the UFC and having Cro Cop there would be one more commodity to have.
I think looking at this from a performance level is this wrong way to look at it. Cro Cop is a draw regardless of how he performs(I think his style is suited for the cage because he’s so much better at using the ropes in fights) also when making an international push it is a good idea to have international names. I couldn’t see him going to Affliction or Strikeforce since neither go to Japan or Europe(and have no plans to I believe) so I really believe this is more to pick up the name that Cro Cop is rather than the fighter.
I’m not saying that StrikeForce or Affliction will take their Org international (well atleast not this year, I do however see StrikeForce going “soon”) but StrikeForce is open to work with Japanese promotions, it doesn’t really matter if it is K~1 or DREAM, plus StrikeForce is looking to build up thier HW division and if they were to sign CC and let him fight in Japan once or twice, then at the end of this 09 year rematch with Overeem in San Jose, California for the title that would be a sound finacial investment on their part because that fight would sell, and to keep things “clean”, CC could be on loan to fight the org’s HW champion. So Lorenzo flying there to aquire CC makes business sense to me…
I think we’re making the same point just in different ways haha
is fertitta in the mob? “I made him an offer he cant refuse” thats Godfather talk right there. he probably told mirko if he wins his next fight in the ufc then cro-cop gets the next title shot in december or januarary. makes sense since after carwin who is the top contender that has a chance against brock or mir. [I hate saying mir even has a chance against the vanilla gorilla.] or maybe cro-cop gets the next shot without having to fight. he is coming off of a vitory. shogun got a shot before anyone else and shogun didnt defeat a top contender. I personally would like to see mirko-brock just to see what brock looks like after being headkicked. one of the best all time mma quotes “my right foot puts them to sleep, my left puts them in the grave” that is awesome!
I reckon that dana and co are still pissed at the way cro-cop played the ufc after his 99 fight he said he was going over to dream, that was a punk move, but he made it. maybe mirko was bluffing and went all in with that, and it seems to have worked because he got one of the owners of the ufc to come to his house and offer him a new contract for him to stay with the ufc.
As a Sicilian I will tell you the mafia does not exist. I will also tell you that a large group of Italian families did relocate to Vegas when Vegas boomed in the fifties. I will also tell you that several of these families did gain a real controlling interest in many of the Casinos in Vegas… so Fertitta may not be in this mythical organization but he may know some friends who have heard of it…
and no I am not…
I agree bigchris that is definately one of my favorite quotes.
Dude, this is the UFC acting as though they are the ones in control of this situation when in reality, the final decision obviously lies in cro cops hands and the UFC for the first time is on the other side of the deal. I like cro cop but he isn’t worth all this effort. Shiit, they are putting more effort into signing him then they have fedor. If cro cop comes back, he will not become champ. As much as i would like to see him “cro cop” someone else, it aint gonna happen. The HW division is way too stacked for a guy near the end of his career.
the ufc put in alot of effort for fedor, but his “handlers” wanted asssloads of money, upwards of a few million per fight, and for the ufc to pay almost the whole cost to build a arena in russia, as well as allowing fedor to still do his sambo comptetitions, among other things. the ufc does not like to have their fighters who are under contract particapate in another organization. they put effort in it, the price and conditions were too much imo.
right kick hospital…….left kick cemetery
In related news, Dana White gave Bob Sapp an offer he couldn’t refuse and the first title chance of 2010. Um, that makes as much sense as this.
would make sense if they started a super heavy division haha
give him a title shot let him get his ass kicked(i dont believe he can beat brock or mir) and cut him.
Its quite possible that Mirko is being brought in for reasons relating more to the business side of the UFC than the actual in-cage activities.
Mirko can help sell tickets in Europe and in Japan, if the UFC ever gets its act together over there.
Also, considering Germany’s luke warm reception to the UFC, the thinking might be that someone like Mirko is needed in continental Europe to be their “man on the ground” the same way that Bisping is in the UK.
If it turns out that Mirko is being promised in this “unrefusable offer” some sort of title shot upon his return and one subsequent victory, thats sort of a mixed blessing. Sure, the UFC will throw someone soft at Mirko in his first fight back, but after that then what??
If Mir somehow gets past Lesnar, it wouldn’t be that difficult or take him that long in a cage to corner, hook and submit Mirko, who seems to have little to no feel for the ground game and/or cage fighting.
If Lesnar murders Mir like many predict, and in the process proves himself to be for real, I can only assume that Mirko would get to be next, as in, next victim. Lesnar’s championship-level college wrestling alone would vex Mirko, but when you compare it to his Neanderthalic size, power and g-n-p, it turns out that Mirko is flying an awful long way from Transylvania or wherever the heck he lives to get every square inch of his @$$ kicked by the Vanilla Gorilla…
The assumption in many of the comments is that Lorenzo offered Cro Cop a lucrative contract to persuade Cro Cop to stay in the UFC.
However, an “offer that can’t be refused” typically means that the offer has negative consequences if the offer is refused. This might suggest that UFC’s offer came with negative consequences if Cro Cop refused.
This is just baseless speculation for the sake of amusement.