That seems to be the case now according to a
new interview with Overeem. I'll admit that I've been pretty hard on Overeem as of late for not defending the Strikeforce title for 2 years, but if he's telling the truth I very well may owe him an apology. Here's what he had to say about not defending his title:
My contract with Strikeforce was only made about three months before the incident, I think they let me fight against (Vitor)Belfort and Paul (Buentello) to lose, but I won. Normally in a contract it says you have to defend your title within a certain period. But my contract just ended there. As I had a long term contract with FEG, I kept fighting for Dream and K-1. It’s ironic that we finally got an offer from Strikeforce and reached an agreement, and I get in some stupid brawl and cut my hand. In jail it got infected and it took longer than expected.
How on earth can you let someone fight for you title without having a clause or extension in place or something? I know this all happened before Strikeforce became the Strikeforce of today, but I still think it's crazy for them to do that. Which is basically why everybody and their momma has been trashing Overeem for not defending his title. Apparently he has a new contract with Strikeforce, and has two fights he needs to complete before he can defend the Strikeforce heavyweight title. So if that doesn't come to fruition, it'll be time to get back Overeem for not doing so.
