Calvin Ayre took time out of his busy schedule to address growing speculation that his Bodog Entertainment Group was looking to acquire Pride Fighting Championships to compliment bodogFight.
"We are not in any discussions with Pride or any other league, bodogFight.com is a unique and new model in how we showcase the exciting sport of MMA and for now we are sticking to the current plan" stated Ayre.
The first installment of bodogFight was the culmination of nine weeks of mixed martial arts combined with lifestyle and entertainment, all captured on film in beautiful Costa Rica. The final event was broadcast live on pay-per-view and on broadband to millions of viewers from around the world from the Agrodome in Vancouver, Canada. The final event pitted the USA's toughest and brightest fighters against the elite Russian Red Devils.
MMA, short for “mixed martial arts” was recently featured in a segment of the popular CBS News show “60 Minutes”. The sport is growing in popularity with the key male 18-35 demographic advertisers love to target.
Despite denials from Dream Stage Entertainment, it has been reported by other sources that the company has been shopping Pride Fighting Championships. With Bodog out of the picture, other potential suitors for the Pride Fighting Championship include Showtime, Vince McMahon of the WWE & the owners of the UFC (Zuffa LLC).
Meanwhile, Ayre is having fun on location in St. Petersburg, Russia filming his second installment of bodogFight which is set to start airing in March 2007.
