This is Showtime’s attempt to market Fedor Emelianenko and his fight with Brett Rogers in the same way that HBO markets their big fights with 24/7 or that UFC does it with Countdown or Primetime. How are they going to do it with their main star who doesn’t speak much English? Let’s see.

The show starts with Fedor training in a small gym in Russia where children also train, as to show that he’s not above training with the common folk. His striking coach says they don’t change their training style often, only maybe to tweak it based on the opponent.

Against most of his opponents, Fedor doesn’t look that big. But sparring with his partners, he looks like a huge monster.

In a sense, the training almost makes it look like the Fedor camp is taking Rogers lightly as they are shown laughing after Fedor throws around his partner.

The Rogers camp says that they have to look at Fedor as a man because that makes him beatable. He also says that Rogers does work on the ground as well, but he wasn’t very convincing.

Brett’s wife’s name is Tiuna and I’m not exactly sure how to pronounce that. They show him getting his mohawk tightened and talking about his upbringing. What’s up with hype shows and guys in the barbershop?

Fedor believes that “banya”, which is a sauna like cultural way of resting your body so that it is strong works better than just taking a weekend off and resting. Then we see him in his speedo. Thanks Showtime.

Rogers goes back to the auto shop that he used to work at. They show his new house which isn’t the end of his goal, but the beginning. He says that he thanks Fedor for the opportunity to knock him out and says he will “rock him stupid”.

Fedor isn’t a machine and we have proof! He’s shown with his wife and daughter. In a first since Rocky II, we see a fighter filmed in a church. He says that Father Andrey is his spiritual advisor and close friend, even going so far as to call him a close part of his family.

Rogers’ camp thinks they’ve found holes in Fedor’s game. They want to bully Fedor like Andrei Arlovski did. Fedor’s camp looks at tape of Rogers as if they’ve never seen tape of him before. They think he’ll be easy to hit.

They show Fedor sparring without headgear. He says fighting is his job and he simply tries to do his best.

Rogers tells people that he’s going to take Fedor out in the first two to two and a half minutes. Fedor understands that Rogers has to believe in himself and hype the fight. Fedor says everyone has the same chin. Rogers will be hunting his and he’ll be hunting Rogers.

Based on the footage, you get the feeling that Fedor is winning this fight, but they did a pretty good job at pushing Rogers as a hungry guy who can win the fight. The special is short, but it’s still effective. It’s lacking fight footage, but that’s more because the UFC owns it all.

We’ll have play by play of the fight on Saturday.

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