Here's the ad Affliction is using to promote its next show, Day of Reckoning:

The ad looks professionally done, just like everything Affliction puts together, but I have my doubts that the names on this show are enough to sustain a pay-per-view. The three guys they mention are Josh Barnett and Andrei Arlovski, who will fight in the main event, and ... Ozzy Osbourne.

I realize there are a lot of Ozzy fans out there, but are they really going to pay $40 or $50 to buy Affliction: Day of Reckoning on pay-per-view because Ozzy is going to play a couple of songs? And what about all the mixed martial arts fans who don't like Ozzy Osbourne? Do they really want the fights interrupted by a performance? The quality of the MMA in this show will be fine, but I just don't think they have the right names to sell it as a pay-per-view.

After Japan's Satoshi Ishii won the gold medal in heavyweight judo this week, he made a bold statement: Ishii said he wants to fight the top heavyweight in mixed martial arts, Fedor Emelianenko.

Dave Meltzer reports that Ishii is a national hero in Japan, and that if he did fight Fedor, it would probably be a bigger draw in that country than an experienced, legitimate MMA heavyweight taking on Fedor would be.

Fedor is currently sidelined after breaking a bone in his hand while punching the daylights out of Tim Sylvia, but he has said he expects to be ready to participate in his annual New Year's Eve fight in Japan. So could Ishii be his opponent?

It sounds like a long shot, but not totally out of the question. There's no such thing as professional judo, and if Ishii wants to make a living off his skills, MMA might be the best bet. I'd prefer to see Fedor fight an experienced MMA heavyweight, but if Ishii is his next opponent, I'll be watching.

Although a Tito Ortiz vs. Renato "Babalu" Sobral match has been widely expected at the October 11 Affliction: Day of Reckoning event, it clearly isn't happening. Ortiz still hasn't signed his long-awaited Affliction contract, and now Babalu has agreed to fight for Strikeforce.

Strikeforce announced today that Babalu will challenge its light heavyweight champ, Bobby Southworth, at the Playboy Mansion on Saturday, September 20, and Strikeforce VP Mike Afromowitz confirmed to me via e-mail that Babalu will not fight on the October 11 Affliction card.

Affliction's October 11 card has some solid fights on it, but it's almost certain to be a money loser, and the inability to close the deal on the Babalu vs. Ortiz fight is a disappointment. Strikeforce doesn't spend the kind of money on star power that Affliction does, but Strikeforce clearly has a better understanding of how to run an MMA business than Affliction.

The Affliction mixed martial arts organization has signed its biggest star yet, adding former UFC light heavyweight champ Tito Ortiz. And Ortiz made clear to Arash Markazi that he did it for the money:

"I guarantee you that my contract will be like no other," said Ortiz, stopping short of giving away the specifics of a deal that could include responsibilities outside of the ring. "It will be a ground-breaking record contract for sure, without a doubt. There's so much money to be made right now in mixed martial arts and it's all about the fighters trying to make that money. It's going to be a long-term deal where I put my heart and soul into the company and help build them. That's something I'm interested in doing. They're going to bring me on, not just as a fighter but also doing some of the back work also."

At age 33, Ortiz isn't as good a fighter as he was a few years ago, but he's still enormously popular, and he's the only fighter in the Affliction stable who's a proven pay-per-view draw. After the news that Fedor Emelianenko is out of Affliction's October 11 show, Affliction needed to secure Ortiz, and now it has.

Fedor Emelianenko will not return to the ring as previously scheduled at the next Affliction show, as he reportedly suffered a hand injury in the process of beating down Tim Sylvia last month. So Affliction's official web site is now featuring the poster on the right, suggesting that Andrei Arlovski vs. Josh Barnett will be the main event for their October 11 show.

I like both Arlovski and Barnett, but I hope Affliction has something more in store than just that. If they think an Arlovski vs. Barnett main event is going to sell on pay-per-view, the folks at Affliction are going to be looking at the kinds of pay-per-view numbers that put companies out of business.

That's why it's so important that Affliction finally get Tito Ortiz signed, as they've long been reported to be close to doing. Ortiz isn't a great fighter anymore -- he isn't as good as Arlovski or Barnett -- but he is the biggest draw Affliction can get on the card in time for October.

Affliction's first show was a success in terms of the quality of the product on display, but I'd argue that it was a failure if Affliction's long-term goal is to build a profitable mixed martial arts company. I have a feeling that its second show will be a failure as well, but if Ortiz isn't on the card, that feeling will be a certainty.

On today's installment of ESPN.com's MMA Live, a reader poll of the Top 10 pound-for-pound fighters was unveiled, and there weren't too many surprises on the list. In fact, the Top 5 was identical to the top of my MMA Top 25:

1. Anderson Silva
2. Fedor Emelianenko
3. Georges St. Pierre
4. B.J. Penn
5. Urijah Faber

So no controversy, right? Well, not quite.

Tito Ortiz, long one of UFC's most popular fighters, has reached an agreement with the upstart Affliction organization and will fight on its October 11 pay-per-view show in Las Vegas, Steve Cofield is reporting.

Ortiz's opponent will be Renato "Babalu" Sobral, a former UFC fighter who won his match on this month's Affliction: Banned undercard. Babalu called out Ortiz after winning his Affliction fight, which Ortiz attended, and this match-up has been expected since then.

Ortiz is still one of the most popular athletes in mixed martial arts, but he has appeared of late to be past his prime: In his last three fights he has losses to Chuck Liddell and Lyoto Machida sandwiching a draw against Rashad Evans. However, Ortiz does have a win on his record over UFC light heavyweight champion Forrest Griffin, which Affliction will no doubt mention a few times in the run-up to the October 11 show.

Babalu is a very experienced fighter with a 30-7 record. He was kicked out of UFC after he failed to let go of an anaconda choke after opponent David Heath had tapped out.

Looking just fine a week after getting pummeled by Fedor Emelianenko, Tim Sylvia said in a Houston Chronicle interview that he expects to fight in Affliction's second show on October 11, and he supports the idea of considering the World Alliance of Mixed Martial Arts champion as the undisputed world champion:

Asked who he considers the top heavyweight champ, Sylvia said, "No doubt in my mind, the WAMMA belt holder. Definitely, Fedor's proved that."

Sylvia added that "The wave of the future is free agency," and he suggested that fighting for Affliction is better than fighting for UFC. It sure pays better; Sylvia got $800,000 for 36 seconds of work against Fedor.

Here's the latest edition of ESPN's great MMA Live program:

This week's installment focuses, of course, on last Saturday's UFC and Affliction shows, followed by a preview of this Saturday's EliteXC show. UFC heavyweight Frank Mir continued to lavish praise on Affliction and WAMMA heavyweight champ Fedor Emelianenko, although he did suggest that UFC middleweight champ Anderson Silva is the top pound-for-pound fighter in the world. (I agree.)

I liked the way Franklin McNeill phrased it: "Fedor's presence makes the heavyweight division relevant."

And, of course, the man everyone wants to see Fedor fight is Randy Couture, who appeared as a guest on the show and had some interesting comments.

Forget our report that there is a 90 percent chance that Fedor Emelianenko would defend his heavyweight title against Andrei Arlovski: Kevin Iole of Yahoo reports that it's 100 percent: The fight will take place on October 11, and the Thomas & Mack Center in Las Vegas has already been booked.

The October 11 date is significant because it's going to be very, very hard for UFC to counter-program Affliction the way it did last Saturday. UFC 89 is scheduled for October 18 and UFC 90 is scheduled for October 25, and it would just be asking too much for UFC to do three straight Saturday live shows.