Tom Atencio has helped build Affliction Clothing literally on the back of some of the best-known names in sports and entertainment. Now the Affliction vice-president is looking to use all his connections in building the California-based company's fledgling fight promotion business.
The Affliction celebrity crew includes the likes of musicians Ozzy Osbourne, Megadeth, Korn and Cradle of Filth, baseball's Brad Penny and Ryan Braun, surfers Sunny Garcia and Charlie Carroll, basketball's Shawn Marion, football's Junior Seau and hockey's Ray Emery and Derek Boogaard. Among others.
In the fight world, the company can count on boxers Sugar Shane Mosley, Ricky Hatton, Ricardo Mayorga, Zab Judah and Kelly Pavlik.
And in mixed martial arts, Canadian Georges St. Pierre, Randy Couture, Quinton Jackson, Keith Jardine, Matt Serra, Josh Barnett, Sean Sherk and Fedor Emelianenko all favour Affliction.
You can't beat a walking marquee billboard, after all.
Atencio and colleagues have used such ties to move into the world of MMA promotion, with their first card "Affliction Banned" set for July 19 at the Honda Center in Anaheim.
Atencio's ties to the sport go back a ways. He has worked as a fight photographer, put on jiu-jitsu competitions and even competed. Ask him about it and he will list his bona-fides.
Now he works those ties as he looks to grow Affliction Entertainment, a fledgling sister company.
His journey in signing Emelianenko and his younger brother Aleksander is a lesson in how contacts - and little things - can pay off.
The initial connection was through Barnett, who fought Aleksander in Pride in May 2006.
"The funny thing is when Josh beat Aleksander Emelianenko, he handed him a shirt in one of the Pride fights and it was one of our shirts," Atencio recalled in an interview. "Vaya Con Dios was the shirt, Go With God (in English) and the reason he did that is because of the big tattoo on Aleksander's back. It was very similar to the design of the shirt, so that was how we first got to them, and then he introduced me to Fedor. And it just kind of grew from there."
Fedor Emelianenko is headlining the Affliction show, taking on former UFC heavyweight champion Tim Sylvia. Aleksander faces off against Paul Buentello.
Securing Emelianenko is a coup for Affliction. The Russian, often simply referred to as Fedor in MMA circles, is an iconic figure in the sport with the lone blemish on a 27-1 record due to a cut.
After the UFC bought Pride, UFC president Dana White was dogged with questions for months about when Emelianenko would sign on. "I'm trying," White would say.
Then negotiations broke down and White, blaming Emelianenko's advisers for the failure, started dumping on the Russian - questioning who he has fought recently.
"I think it's just another way to make himself think he's got the best fighters out there," Atencio offered by way of explanation for White's attitude. "Unless he opens his doors and says 'Yeah we'll let your fighters fight ours, you can't say.' ...In my eyes, he (Fedor) is the No. 1 fighter in the world."
Others on the July 19 card include Barnett, Andrei Arlovski, Matt Lindland, Ben Rothwell, Renato (Babalu) Sobral, Antonio Rogerio Nogueira, Pedro Rizzo, Vitor Belfort, Terry Martin, Mike Pyle and Canadian Mark Hominick.
