Tito Ortiz and Quinton Jackson everything!!!!
Tito Ortiz and Quinton Jackson are two of the biggest names in the history of MMA. They previously made names for themselves in the Ultimate Fighting Championship and headlined some of the biggest pay per views and television specials that company ever produced. Spike Television, Bellator, and Impact Wrestling are swinging for the fences, bringing in two former UFC stars of this magnitude to help gain interest to their product. Last night on Impact Wrestling we saw both of these men make appearances in the same segment. The night before the two men faced off in the cage of Bellator Fighting Championship. This is the type of synergy Spike TV wants between Bellator and Impact.
HBO Boxing Commentator and one of the greatest boxers ever Roy Jones Jr was sitting in the front row Wednesday night at the Bellator broadcast. The majority of the public assumed he was there to answer Quinton Jackson’s challenge in a boxing match on PPV. In a move that fooled the entire internet Quinton tells the crowd that he will not face Roy in a boxing match, he will instead face an unnamed opponent on Pay Per View. The unnamed opponent was later to be reviled as Tito Ortiz. The next night on Impact the Main Event Mafia and Aces and Eights were having a staredown/brawl segment in the ring. Music that is unfamiliar to the crowd hits and Tito Ortiz is reviled as the August 1st Warning guy! August 1st Warning guy was teased through a series of videos not shown on television and were exclusive to the internet.
Internet fans were fooled! Bellator and Impact Wrestling now have Quinton Jackson and Tito Ortiz on the roster. Jay Bradley cleverly points out that internet fans get angry when they can’t predict such big moves, and they don’t even know the endgame! Fooling the internet and keeping them unaware of the endgame are staples of successful promotion. Bravo! on pulling all these things off, even going as far as to fly Roy Jones Jr out which was a nice touch on the deception.
Michael Chandler and Ben Askren two of Bellator’s young champions had dominant performances against tournament winners. Creating new stars used to be staples of the plan by Bjron Rebney to create success for his new fighting league. His idea was a guy would win a tournament and either become a champion or challenge the champion. His theory was his title contenders go into a title fight with multiple wins and aren’t handed title shots. With the new direction of the company and all the talk of fooling internet fans, flying in Roy Jones Jr for a prank and, Rampage and Tito everything!! we aren’t talking about the new stars and their performances. The plan is still to create new stars…. Right?
— Alex Goff (@AlexGoff84)