Dana White delivers and shocks MMA world with big announcement!

Last week between ranting about Elite XC and cursing Kimbo Slice, UFC president Dana White promised us that he would "blow our [fucking] minds" with an announcement that would shock the Mixed Martial Arts world. Immediately following his announcement, the MMA world was buzzing with rumors. Some were outright asinine (Floyd Mayweather joining the UFC and a proposed super fight with BJ Penn). Others were too good to be true (Dana had signed a network deal with Fox Sports). A few days later Dana went on CBS and denied all of them and even went on to say that his announcement was "so [fucking] left field that no one [at the press conference] would guess it." Below is what White had to say:

"You have no idea some of the stuff that we have planned. I’m going to make an announcement next week that is going to blow people’s minds. That deal is done, but my employees don’t even know yet. I’m renting out a place next Thursday and I’m going to tell them. Then we’ll make the announcement later that day. It’s an indicator of where this business is going over the next five years."

For all anyone knew, White was starting WWE-esque tag team octagon matches. Brock Lesnar and Chuck Lidell vs. BJ Penn and Rampage Jackson. Winning team gets to fight (and lose, probably via first round KO) to Anderson Silva (pictured below).

Anderson being awesome.

Alas, the actual announcement was predictably anti climatic. Ken Iole of Yahoo! Sports reported that current owner of the UFC Lorenzo Fertitta was quiting his day job as president of Station Casinos in Las Vegas to work full time at the UFC alongside Dana White. Below is what Fertitta had to say:

“The problem, if there is a problem, is that the business has gotten so successful, it’s requiring more time, focus and attention,” Fertitta said. “Station Casinos is a business my family and I have built and now it’s a multi-billion dollar company. But the reality is, the UFC has gone through so much growth in the last eight years, my brother and I felt we’d be better in divide and conquer mode. He’ll stay at Station Casinos and take care of that and I’ll come over here and work on the issues involving the UFC.”

Perhaps I am being to harsh. This may not be huge news in the world of Mixed Martial Arts but from a business stand point it's pretty big. Fertitta earned $138 million last year as Station Casinos CEO. That's 138 million Jr. Crispy Bacon Burgers at the BK Lounge. All lameness aside, I compare this to Steve Jobs quitting his job at Apple to work exclusively at Pixar. It's a big deal in business for sure, but as an MMA fan it was a bit of a let down.

Fertitta plans to focus exclusivly on expanding the UFC internationally. India, Brazil, Spain, Japan, Turkey, and the Phillipines were named as countries of possible UFC events. I can't speak for the non third world countries on that list, but of the 360 million Indians in the 18-34 demographic that the UFC wants to target, 350 million earn $1 a day. It would take them a couple months before they could even afford a pay per view..