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Dan Lambert was so close to buying the UFC in 2001 that he had a deposit down and there was a closing date scheduled. But the American Top Team owner is glad it didn’t work out.

Lambert told Ariel Helwani on Monday’s edition of The MMA Hour that if he had bought the Ultimate Fighting Championship back then he would have kept it small — he didn’t have nearly the vision or funds of Lorenzo and Frank Fertitta and Dana White.

“If it ever comes up, the only thing I think is how fortunate all the fighters and managers and fans are that it ended up the way it did, in the hands of the guys it was,” Lambert said. “They put a ton of time and a ton of money and ate a lot of losses before it turned around. I’d love to think of what the business was back then and how the fighters survived back then and then I look at how many people have jobs and make livings now and pretty decent ones at times based on that.”

Lambert said had he bought the promotion he would have kept it small, running just two or three shows per year and hoping MMA would get regulated in every state. After New Jersey regulated a UFC show in 2001 and Nevada was set to do it, the Fertittas came on and made Semaphore Entertainment Group (SEG) a better offer. Lambert said he never got his deposit back and took SEG and owner Bob Meyrowitz to court for it.

Under Zuffa, the UFC has flourished and become a global entity. That was never Lambert’s intentions.

“I probably wouldn’t have gotten anywhere near any of those goals,” he said.

Lambert was in talks with the Fertittas to buy the UFC again in 2004 after the casino owners were more than $40 million in the red with it. The Fertittas and White decided to stick with it and The Ultimate Fighter reality show helped the UFC earn a television deal with Spike TV. The rest is history.

If Lambert had purchased the UFC, he said it would look quite different today.

“It may have stayed around, but it would have been on a very, very, very small scale,” Lambert said. “I just didn’t want to see it go out of business. I wanted a place for our guys to fight.”

So, in the end, it was a win-win. Zuffa has its now billion-dollar business and Lambert still has a place for his American Top Team athletes to compete. Lambert said he would have never been able to pour $40 million into the UFC initially like the Fertittas did.

“I don’t have that kind of money, dude,” he said.

Lambert still has some hard feelings for Meyrowitz, who he believes screwed him “royally.” But overall, he is more than content with how everything happened.

“It was kind of a disaster that worked out pretty well for everyone in the end,” Lambert said.

 
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With one big blow, Hisaki Kato made a name for himself on the United States MMA scene and derailed the career of a potential star.

Most people thought the unheralded Japanese import was brought into Bellator as cannon fodder for Joe Schilling, one of the best middleweight kickboxers in the world. Instead, Kato knocked Schilling out in brutal fashion with one punch in the second round of their fight at Bellator 139 on June 26 in Mulvane, Kan.

“I think I wasn’t supposed to win, but now it’s done,” Kato said. “You beat the big name and you become the guy of the moment. I’m going to use that.”

Kato (5-1) was an unknown, a karate fighter coming off a loss in the small Heat organization in Japan. Schilling (2-5), arguably the top American kickboxer right now, was a sizeable favorite with the expectation that Kato would stand and strike with him. Kato didn’t do that in the first round, taking Schilling down and grinding him out. In the second round, Kato kept things on the feet and the southpaw stunningly laid Schilling out with a Superman punch.

Of all the potential outcomes of the fight, that seemed to be the least likely. Kato is suddenly a favorite for Knockout of the Year and Schilling is likely to be off Bellator’s Dynamite card in September where Schilling was supposed to represent GLORY in a kickboxing match due to medical suspension.

“I know that I was just the man they had to be punched and knocked out by Joe Schilling, and for him to be back on winning before the big event in September,” Kato said. “I knew that, but it’s a part of the game. For me, I just had to focus on having a chance to fight for Bellator. The rest wasn’t my concern.”

Kato, 32, is now someone MMA fans will be curious to see again, though he’s only been a pro fighter for two years and was knocked out in the first round in his last fight back in March.

“I just have six professional fights,” Kato said. “Everything has been really quick so far. It’s really quick, but at the same time I’m 32, so I’m glad it’s quick. I don’t have a lot of time remaining. I guess it’s OK.”

The Superman punch was not a fluke, either. It had been something Kato was working on for some time at his Alive gym in Japan where he trains with the likes of UFC featherweight Hatsu Hioki.

“I know with that Superman punch I had some good results, even during training,” said Kato, who grew up in France and has trained with kickboxers there. “I’ve been using it a few times in different fights. I know I could have big damage. I was surprised to see him go to the ground into unconsciousness.”

So was everyone else. Despite the calls by some fans for a rematch in the GLORY ring, Kato said he wouldn’t be interested.

“What would be the point?” Kato said. “[If Schilling said,] ‘Yes, I told you I was better than you, stronger in kickboxing rules that’s why I didn’t want you to go on the ground.’ If he wants to make that point, it makes sense. But not for me. I’m trying to fight MMA. You can’t be a boxer, kickboxer at the same time. I guess maybe that’s a part of why he lost that fight, too.”

Jorge Masvidal has won five of his seven fights in the UFC and spent a year ranked in the top 15 of his division. But as far as he’s concerned, the slate has been wiped completely clean.

The former Strikeforce star is making the move up from lightweight to welterweight and fully expects to be put in the 170-pound cellar. Masvidal doesn’t mind working his way up, though.

“I definitely gotta start out from the way, way bottom,” he told MMAFighting.com. “I don’t think I’m gonna get any type of leeway. And I’m happy as long as they’re giving me the toughest fights possible. I don’t want to fight any Ultimate Fighters like I always did at 155. No upcoming guys. I want to fight the guys that are world-class beaters. That’s who I want to get in there with.”

Masvidal (28-9) will first meet Cezar Ferreira, who is moving down from middleweight, at The Ultimate Fighter 21 Finale on July 12 in Las Vegas. Ferreira will likely have a significant size advantage. Not that it matters much to Masvidal.

“I don’t give a damn,” Masvidal said. “As long as he makes the weight and he doesn’t try to cheat out of the weight. I don’t give a damn where he’s coming from. I’m just going to get in his face and make him break.”

Masvidal, 30, has been thinking about moving to 170 since after he lost a Strikeforce lightweight title against Gilbert Melendez in 2011. But after the UFC purchased Strikeforce, Masvidal figured there might be bigger fights at 155, so he stayed around.

That didn’t quite work out. Even though Masvidal was ranked at lightweight for about a year, his only fight against a fellow ranked opponent was versus Al Iaquinta in April. Iaquinta ended up winning the bout by split decision, though many felt Masvidal should have gotten the nod from the judges.

“I kept telling myself that I was going to get a bigger, marquee fight if I fight at 155,” Masvidal said. “And if I fought at 170 I wouldn’t get the big-name fight that I would at 55. But I was wrong. It’s not like I got it anyway.”

After falling to Melendez four years ago, Masvidal was out for seven months. At that point, he didn’t keep himself in peak condition and his weight cuts have not been the same since. The Miami native, who walks around at about 185, expects to be fresher and healthier at 170.

“It’s always been real stressful on my body, whether I’ve got 12 weeks notice or not,” Masvidal said. “I do a very strict diet. At a certain point I’m just a certain percent of body fat and I just don’t get no load. Once I’m at 173 pounds, I’m 5 percent body fat. My energy is already a little bit low. I don’t feel the same explosiveness.”

Masvidal seems to have quite a bit in common with his American Top Team training partner Dustin Poirier, who just recently moved up from featherweight to lightweight. Poirier has looked phenomenal at 155, going 2-0 with two first-round knockouts.

“Dustin was cutting so much weight for featherweight,” Masvidal said. “Being in training camps with him, he’d be on a strict diet and then at the fight he’d still have to cut 18, 19 pounds of water. A month before the fight he just wouldn’t have the same speed as he would, the same strength and same energy out there. When he told me he was moving up, I was like, ‘Hell yeah, man.’ I fought with every body at 55 and I was telling him I don’t think you’re gonna have a problem at 155 strengthwise.”

Maybe 170 isn’t necessarily Masvidal’s best fit, but 155 definitely isn’t, either. He wishes there were more options — another weight division or two in between 170 and 155, kind of like boxing.

“I think the sport is growing and along with it weight classes have to be added,” Masdvidal said. “I think between 155 and 170 is most of the population of the world within that weight. I feel like if they added a few weight classes it wouldn’t change up the dynamics of the sport. You can still have champions and it wouldn’t be like boxing. Boxing got messed up, because they’ve got so many belts, so many unifications. It’s crazy.”

Masvidal won’t have to deal with a crazy weight cut any longer. He acknowledges he might not be the biggest guy at welterweight, but he doesn’t feel like he’ll be giving much up to anyone, even someone like Johny Hendricks, who walks at upwards of 200 pounds.

“He’s a midget,” Masvidal said. “He’s short. I’m not a big-boned person, but I won’t be the shortest dude in the division. I won’t be the tallest, either. But I can speak from experience that cutting the most weight doesn’t make you the most dangerous guy. Look at Anthony Johnson. He went up two weight classes and he’s a f*cking beast, man. He’s just World Starrin’ people up.”