Cage Rage - Does anyone like it?

Derek Coleman

Things I hate about Cage Rage
1. The Name. (Its not the worst)
2. The Presenters/owner. (Dave O'Donnell)
3. The pole dancing-stripper-like ring girls. (Embarassing)
4. The Ring announcer. (Moe Syzslak)
5. The Fighters (Butterbean, Ziggy, etc.)
6. The way its promoted (Sky call it 'no holds barred')

Things I like about Cage Rage
1. Laura Jones
2. The funny auditions for Fighting Hurts!
3. emm........

So basically the only thing I watch Cage Rage for is to see Laura Jones.
I think the rest of it is just embarassing. Its a freak show.
I just wish it would go away.

Does anyone know if Cage Rage is in danger of closing down after Pro Elite pulled out? God I hope so.

bjj-fighter

Provides fighters with jobs

Derek Coleman

Yeah thats a positive.

JohnMc1

So when are they starting up under their new name?

Derek Coleman

Tried to get some info on Cage Rages future but didn't find much. Dave O'Donnell is co-founding a new organisation called Ultimate Challenge UK.

So Cage Rage is no more in its current format but I'd guess the new product will be much the same. Not sure about the name either. Even Cage Rage sounds better than Ultimate Challenge UK.

ShawnRaven

Can give or take it really. We saw one of their events screened from last year a couple of hours before Lesnar/Couture started, to my surprise Herb Dean was fighting on it (I didn't even know he fought, showing my newbness there).

Sweet jesus, Herb's a lot bigger than i gave him credit for.
I'd probably watch if i was flicking and it happened to be on, but i definitely wouldn't go out of my way to watch it. Sure as hell wouldn't pay to go to a live event.

Clive

Derek Coleman wrote: »

Things I hate about Cage Rage
1. The Name. (Its not the worst)
2. The Presenters/owner. (Dave O'Donnell)
3. The pole dancing-stripper-like ring girls. (Embarassing)
4. The Ring announcer. (Moe Syzslak)
5. The Fighters (Butterbean, Ziggy, etc.)
6. The way its promoted (Sky call it 'no holds barred')

Things I like about Cage Rage
1. Laura Jones
2. The funny auditions for Fighting Hurts!
3. emm........

So basically the only thing I watch Cage Rage for is to see Laura Jones.
I think the rest of it is just embarassing. Its a freak show.
I just wish it would go away.

Derek Coleman wrote: »

Seriously guys, do you care how the UFC runs its business? Does it affect you? Are they big evil corporate Bullies? Get a bleedin grip.

Its good to read all this cause it gives us something to talk about but don't get all high and mighty and curse the UFC and Dana White. Are any of us running a successful MMA organisation? No. Chill out, let them do what they've been doing for 10 years +. They've survived this far with great success.

Bit of a double standard there surely?

Cage Rage went from being one of the many shows in the UK to being the biggest in Europe - from small venues to Wembley Arena. They gave Irish fighters such as Aisling Daly, Greg Loughran (even though his title fight fell through) and Francis Heagney a chance. They brought in massive international stars and got themselves on television.

I dislke plenty of things about Cage Rage, but at the end of the day, they did what they had to to make money and put on big shows.

If you really dislike it so much, just change channels.

Derek Coleman

Thats hardly a double standard cause they are completely different things. I don't care how Dave O'Donnell treats his fighters or whether he pays them X amount. I only care about the product I'm watching!!!

I'll watch the fights in Cage Rage cause I love MMA. I have no problem watching the fighting part. I watch fight Network all the time and see great fights in ****ty organisations. It's the other circus type bull**** that lets it down. I mean one of their fighters enters the arena in a monkey suit!! Come on whats with that?

I want to see all these fighters fighting on tv and getting paid but if they want to appeal to new audiences they are going about it the wrong way. UFC market the sport really well. It looks professional. Cage Rage looks like Peter Stringfellow is producing it.

unknown13

I hate Cage Rage , the way it is presented and the open guard rule make it one of the worst out there

Dan133269

unknown13 wrote: »

I hate Cage Rage , the way it is presented and the open guard rule make it one of the worst out there

The open guard rule was abolished by cage rage good while ago.
Didn't really agree with it myself, although it was a lot better than the foot stomps which were allowed in pride in my opinion

Pride Fighter

They never used Stephen Quadros as commentator correctly IMO.

Clive

Derek Coleman wrote: »

Thats hardly a double standard cause they are completely different things.

I'll just quote the relevant bit:

Derek Coleman wrote: »

Are any of us running a successful MMA organisation? No. Chill out, let them do what they've been doing for 10 years +. They've survived this far with great success.

Derek Coleman

I said successful MMA organisation!!

Cage Rage = Successful....... No.

bjj-fighter

I would say Cage Rage are very successful

The Sparrow

bjj-fighter wrote: »

I would say Cage Rage are very successful

Are they making any money?? I very much doubt that they are now or that they ever have. Therefore not successful at all. If it hadn't been for Proelite buying them out for a ridiculous amount of money I doubt they would have lasted this long.

To me Cage Rage embodies everything that is bad about promoting MMA. They are tacky and crude and they approach it as a bunch of scraps instead of the athletic contests that MMA should be.

Clive

LMAO at Cage Rage not being successful.

Building from one of many average sized promotions to using Wembley Arena, being the biggest show in Europe, a TV deal, the only European show with any name value in the States, big name international fighters, then sold off for a dumptruck full of money.

If that was my company, I'd call that pretty successful.

Or maybe the whole thing was a philanthropic exercise on the part of Dave, Andy and Proelite

Maldini2706

How much was it sold for? Didn't Dave O'Donnell just file for bankrputcy or something? Remember reading something along those lines on mma.tv

Derek Coleman

woooo232 wrote: »

Are they making any money?? I very much doubt that they are now or that they ever have. Therefore not successful at all. If it hadn't been for Proelite buying them out for a ridiculous amount of money I doubt they would have lasted this long.

To me Cage Rage embodies everything that is bad about promoting MMA. They are tacky and crude and they approach it as a bunch of scraps instead of the athletic contests that MMA should be.

totally agree.

Its hard to find Information on Cage Rage but I think Proelite own it and Dave O'Donnell was only a minor shareholder so he took his money and walked away. He is the co-owner/founder of Ultimate Challenge UK now.

Found an article after I posted this saying that $18million of the $55million debt that Proelite has is from the Purchase and running of Cage Rage. Jesus!

The Sparrow

Clive wrote: »

LMAO at Cage Rage not being successful.

Building from one of many average sized promotions to using Wembley Arena, being the biggest show in Europe, a TV deal, the only European show with any name value in the States, big name international fighters, then sold off for a dumptruck full of money.

If that was my company, I'd call that pretty successful.

Or maybe the whole thing was a philanthropic exercise on the part of Dave, Andy and Proelite

But has it ever made any money? How can a company be successful if it never made much money!!

And they got a TV deal which didn't last very long as their ratings were minuscule and Sky dumped them. They basically had no real competition in Europe from any other promoters as most shows are small because it is so expensive to run a big show.

So if you had a company that never made a cent but did a few flash things that they clearly couldn't afford you would call that successful?

Your right it wasn't a philantropic exercise by any of those but it was complete stupidity on all of their behalf. LOL at having Cage Rage Contenders when the actual Cage Rage wasn't even making much if any money.

And Proelite have proved themslves to be complete idiots. Plus one of the main reasons they were in so much was debt was the laughable amount of money that they spent on Cage Rage.

It doesn't matter whether you are a green grocer, a builder or a MMA promoter, the only way to be successful is to make money. End of.

Clive

woooo232 wrote: »

But has it ever made any money? How can a company be successful if it never made much money!!

It was sold for for quite a bit of money. Pro Elite went bust but that's nothing to with DOD/AG who built the show and set the production values which were what the complaints were about.

woooo232 wrote: »

Your right it wasn't a philantropic exercise by any of those but it was complete stupidity on all of their behalf. LOL at having Cage Rage Contenders when the actual Cage Rage wasn't even making much if any money.

Contenders events are effectively a franchise - other promoters put them on with some small backup from Cage Rage. They acted as feeder shows for talent and spread the Cage Rage brand further at no cost.

woooo232 wrote: »

They basically had no real competition in Europe from any other promoters as most shows are small because it is so expensive to run a big show.

So it's too expensive to run a big show for most promotions, yet Cage Rage managed to do it consistently, all while making no money. Did they have a golden egg laying goose?

woooo232 wrote: »

It doesn't matter whether you are a green grocer, a builder or a MMA promoter, the only way to be successful is to make money. End of.

Yep, building a promotion and selling it for a lot of money = success.

Maldini2706

Here's a rant I went off on elsewhere about 6 months back:

Before I start my rant, I just want to recognise the fact that they provide a relatively high-profile arena for UK fighters and they do some good in that regard.

Having said that, I think they're having a hugely detrimental effect on MMA's progress in the UK. Their promotion is everything the sport should be trying to get away from IMO. They sell their product on boobs, blood and bad taste and the sport will never be regarded mainstream if people continue to take it down this road.

I watched Saturday's event and cringed almost the entire way through.

Firstly, some of the fighters have no business being in the cage, there are some awful awful fighters taking part in these events, how can a guy be in with a chance of a title shot if he is 2-5 in your organisation or if he's 5-12 overall?

Secondly, the production values of both the event and the broadcast are embarrassing. I know Dave O'Donnell is an owner of the company, but he does himself no favours getting in front of the camera. If anything the other guy should have stayed, he could at least link the items together. That OJ Borg guy is a complete moron, a vapid, dull uninteresting Hollyoaks reject who clearly knows **** all about the sport.

Who does the production for the show? They should be strung up, so many small things are wrong it makes it seem so amateur. All the fight records are wrong, people are given the wrong weight, the wrong country, names are spelt wrong and most notably on Saturday the wrong ages are given. The commentators must have mentioned Cahoon and Freeman's ages 50 times throughout the night, then the graphics pop up and they have a different age. The commentators then continue saying Freeman is 41 and Cahoon 31 (which is right of course)

They need to get the hell away from the blood and guts image they're trying to cultivate at the moment. It's embarrassing to see graphics that instead of saying "welterweight fight" or welterweight bout" say "welterweight war"

Finally, Ziggy from Big Brother? Are you kidding me? Seriously? What the f*ck was that sh*t? The audience spoke for EVERYONE EVERYWHERE when OJ Borg asked if we wanted to see him fight and for the first time in the night the crowd woke up and screamed "NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!" in unison.

Keep it simple, get fighters of a similar level, put them in the cage with each other. Try and make those fighters as good as possible. Let the sport speak for itself, sure hype it up a bit, but quit the gory bull****, you lose more people than you gain with that ****.

Rant over...for now

Fozzy

Clive wrote: »

Yep, building a promotion and selling it for a lot of money = success.

They sold it to a totally incompetent company. Cage Rage never made big profits and as mentioned they've lost $18,000,000 in the last 15 months. It was a success for the previous owners, but not for anybody else

Their website is down now, are they even operating anymore? There was so much wrong with how they were run

rovert

Cage Rage was a horrible company and really set back the preception of the sport with all the Kevin Courtney esque geezer bollox.Pro Elite did the sport a favour.

Dragan

As soon as all you kids go off and learn the difference between promoting to local and international markets then you might have a better chance of getting to the bottom of the Cage Rage issue folks.

The Sparrow

Dragan wrote: »

As soon as all you kids go off and learn the difference between promoting to local and international markets then you might have a better chance of getting to the bottom of the Cage Rage issue folks.

Perhaps you could enlighten us kids with your wisdom?

Ok let me put it very simply. Are Cage Rage still in existence? It doesn't seem so and therefore how can it be considered a success?

When they were in existence did they make any mainstream stars out of any homegrown fighters? FFS they were on Sky Sports and they barely received any mainstream attention. Being on Sky Sports was a bigger deal than UFC originally getting on Spike but look at the difference of what both companies did with their exposure.

In fact for all their supposed success did they manage to make the sport of MMA anymore mainstream than it was before they started? If anything they held it back with all of their nonsense. Name one Cage Rage fighter that they made into a mainstream name with their shows in Wembley Arena or on television? And don't start with fighters who happened to fight for Cage Rage and were nobodies until they went to UFC.

For sure it was a successful deal for the original owners who sold it for a vastly inflated figure to a group of morons who have now gone bankrupt in no small way because of stupidly buying Cage Rage. But a successful promotion in itself?? No way!:rolleyes:

RNCFAN

They had some decent fights and fighters and pretty much did what I expected from a local show. The production values etc are to be expected really considering the money they were taking in through Gate/Sponsorship etc

As far as them having guys with 0-2 records etc - well, I know thats frustrating but the problem is that once a fighter starts tearing a blaze through any of these smaller shows he will get picked up on the undercard of a DREAM/Strikeforce/UFC - so you will always have the mid to lower level tier fighters in the smaller shows. I don't mean any offense by that and I am sure there are exceptions that prove that rule.

Anyway, look at it this way -- At least they got rid of RICHARD BLACKWOOD!!!! :pac:

Clive

This is starting to get into a fairly meandering argument so I just want to clarify what I'm talking about.

The OP criticised Cage Rage (fair enough, there's plenty I don't like about it myself) but had stated on another thread that people shouldn't criticise the UFC's business practices since we're not promoting a successful event ourselves.

My point was simply that Cage Rage was also a successful show, in that DOD and AG, the original owners who set the production values (which was what the criticism was about) managed to fill large venues, increase their profile and sell the promotion for a handsome sum. To me that's a success story.

I think that if you ask any of the promoters who post here whether they'd like to work up to using the Point for shows, having a TV deal (however unsuccessful!), getting big name international fighters over, then selling up to the Yanks, I think they'd say hell yeah.

If you want to look at Cage Rage from start to finish, including after Proelite took over and went bust (as Dragan says, stupidly trying to push Cage Rage accross the pond, a place where they needed subtitles for Ross Pointon) , then yes you can say that they were not successful - after all Cage Rage is done, ergo not a success.

However, that means that you consider Pride was not a success either.

The Sparrow

Well at least Pride left a legacy of great fights and they created lost of stars that were able to head to other promotions and build on what they achieved there. Plus they raised the profile of MMA both in Japan and around the world.

All that Cage Rage left was a bitter taste in the mouth.

Derek Coleman

Yeah I think the point of this thread was lost because I was quoted on something I said in a different thread about how UFC (Dana) treated their fighters.
I mentioned nothing in the original post about how Dave O'Donnell ran the business. My annoyance was directed towards how they tried to sell their product to me..... the MMA fan.

The successful versus unsuccessful arguement is all relevant. It depends what criteria you view as successful.

Anyway....... Glad Cage Rage is dead. And interestingly enough I was reading that the Cage Rage library and name and all that **** will probably be up for sale. I wonder whether UFC would want to have a European based company on their books?

Professey Chin

The main thing I dont like is the commontators.
They don't help watching it when theres 2 fighters grappling and one of them keeps goin "Oh hes 'ard.Hes so hard.Isn't he hard?He's hard":eek:

Dragan

woooo232 wrote: »

Well at least Pride left a legacy of great fights and they created lost of stars that were able to head to other promotions and build on what they achieved there. Plus they raised the profile of MMA both in Japan and around the world.

All that Cage Rage left was a bitter taste in the mouth.

So do we gloss over all the issues with Pride ( mis managed to **** at the end, Yakuza connections and possible fight fixing ) because of that?

Some fantastic fights took place in Cage Rage as well.