Strikeforce Cancels Melendez vs. Healy

It's been a rough 2012 for Zuffa, as the organization Sunday night was forced to cancel its second event this month. This time, thanks to an injury to ightweight champion Gilbert Melendez, "Strikeforce: Melendez vs. Healy," scheduled for this Saturday in Sacramento, was 86'ed.

Showtime was to air the event, headlined by Melendez's title defense against Pat Healy, but once the champion had to back out, the cable network decided not to air the card.

"When Showtime informed us that it would not be airing the event, we made the difficult decision to cancel Saturday's card in Sacramento," Strikeforce CEO Scott Coker stated. "Without a television partner, we simply could not move forward with this event. We wish Gilbert a speedy recovery and will work diligently and quickly to reschedule the fighters affected by this news on upcoming cards."

[Related: More on the cancellation from MMA Fighting]

Former lightweight champion Josh Thomson was supposed to face Caros Fodor and Jorge Santiago to battle with Quinn Mulhern. Thomson, incidentally, offered to face Healy in either a three- or five-round bout to "save the event an integrity of the sport." While the UFC dealt with a perfect storm that forced the cancellation of UFC 151 -- whether they actually handled it correctly is up for debate -- to scrap a second show in less than a month rather than accept Thomson's proposal creates another bad situation.

Like for UFC 151, flights and hotels were booked and Strikeforce undercard fighters, who frankly make a lot less than those on the UFC roster, were screwed out of a needed pay day. Showtime was wrong to back out of its commitment due to circumstances beyond anyone's control and Strikeforce was obligated to find a way to keep its obligation to employees and loyal fans. Melendez's injury hurt the card, no question, but when Thomson offers to step up why not explore it?

"Melendez is a class act, hit me up and apologized last night," Healy tweeted. "Everyone's upset but that's not where the blame should go."

Thoughts?

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