MMA’s hottest free agent officially hit the open market eight days ago, and the chase to reel-in Fedor Emelianenko has heated up from all directions. Strikeforce CEO Scott Coker states that his company is also making a push for the Russian’s services.
“We’ve had a good conversation about the strengths of what we do, and what we can offer,” Coker told MMAWeekly.com about their negotiations with Fedor’s camp. “They had the meeting (Tuesday) with the UFC, and they’re going to meet with a couple boxing promoters that have been calling up. You can imagine . . . he’s like the hot free agent.”

Strikeforce appears open to the prospects of co-promoting events with M-1 Global and allowing the WAMMA heavyweight to compete in other mixed martial arts organizations, the top two sticking points that M-1 and the UFC cannot seem to find middle ground on.

It looks like the UFC and Team Fedor may once again walk from each other, in spite of what the MMA world is begging for.

“They’re talking to everybody and they’re not going to make a decision right away,” Coker stated. “They’re going to take their time. They basically said we’ll get back to you and we’ll probably make a decision in the next couple of weeks.”

One thing that will definitely have to change for the small-scale Strikeforce is the fact they will have to put Fedor on pay-per-view cards in order to finance his massive, yet deserved, salary demands.

Showtime has broadcast several of Strikeforce’s shows this year, none of which have been a PPV event.

“I don’t think we’d have to, but I think that’s where it would lead to,” Coker said of charging their fans. “You’d have to get there.”

With Fedor’s rumored asking price hovering around the six-fight / $30 million range, a company like Strikeforce would have no choice but to charge a premium for fans to witness “The Last Emperor” perform.

However, if they are somehow able to maneuver the numbers to make sense, everything else lines up nicely for Strikeforce as they already employ Brett Rogers, an opponent Emelianenko had previously expressed interest in fighting.