Cage Rage Not For Sale

By David West

Returning from his trip to LA, Cage Rage promoter Dave O’Donnell has confirmed that the promotion has not been sold and that there are no plans on the table to sell the show any time soon. Instead, the LA trip was to finalize the alliance with K-1, BodogFight, Pro Elite, Strikeforce and Spirit MC which will make it easier for the promotions to share fighters and tap into each others TV markets.

The alliance with K-1 should be a boom for Cage Rage and may open the door for their former Light-Heavyweight World Champion, Melvin Manhoef, to return to the show. Similarly, Cage Rage’s Lightweight World title holder, Vitor “Shaolin” Ribeiro recently signed with K-1 but should now be able to defend his Cage Rage belt while pursuing a title in Japan.

The inter-promotion alliance raises the highly intriguing prospect of the six organizations gradually working towards unified titles, although it creates potential problems for Cage Rage fighters with Pride contracts, like James Thompson and Zelg Galesic, now that Pride is owned by the Fertitta brothers.