{"id":15382,"date":"2023-12-18T21:50:13","date_gmt":"2023-12-18T18:50:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wikidollar.net\/15382\/mma-confidential-inside-the-minds\/"},"modified":"2023-12-18T21:50:14","modified_gmt":"2023-12-18T18:50:14","slug":"mma-confidential-inside-the-minds","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wikidollar.net\/?p=15382","title":{"rendered":"MMA confidential Inside the minds of MMA managers after PFL&#8217;s acquisition of Bellator"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>MMA confidential Inside the minds of MMA managers after PFL&#8217;s acquisition of Bellator\u060c<\/p>\n<div>\n<div class=\"article-meta\">\n<ul class=\"authors\">\n<li class=\"mugshot-shown\">\n<div class=\"author-img\"><\/div>\n<p>Marc Raimondi, ESPN editor<span class=\"timestamp \">December 18, 2023, 3:15 p.m.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<p>LAS VEGAS \u2014 Ali Abdelaziz posted a few lines Dec. 10 on social media that raised collective eyebrows in the mixed martial arts industry.<\/p>\n<p>The prominent MMA manager, who helped guide the careers of all-time greats such as Khabib Nurmagomedov and Kamaru Usman, wrote on he had never felt this way before.<\/p>\n<p>The message was vague and Abdelaziz didn&#39;t provide much explanation as a follow-up.  Many fans wondered exactly where he was going with this.  The post has been viewed nearly a million times.<\/p>\n<p>But others in the sport share Abdelaziz&#39;s concerns about the future through 2024. The Professional Fighters League acquired Bellator MMA last month, removing one of the major non-UFC promotions.  Some in the industry feel like another major promotion, ONE Championship, is in trouble.  PFL is healthy, has significant coffers and is growing.  But it would be impossible to bring in every Bellator fighter.<\/p>\n<p>So what about those athletes, those who perhaps fall somewhere between the UFC and regional level fighting, and who still rely on paychecks from their fights to support themselves and their those of their families?<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI think the market is a very scary place right now,\u201d Abdelaziz told ESPN.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"inline editorial float-r\" data-behavior=\"article_related\">\n<h2 class=\"editorial-title\">Editor&#39;s Choice<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/wikidollar.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/MMA-confidential-Inside-the-minds-of-MMA-managers-after-PFLs.jpg&#038;w=130&#038;h=130&#038;scale=crop&#038;location=center.jpeg\" width=\"65\" height=\"65\"\/><\/li>\n<li><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/wikidollar.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/1702925413_670_MMA-confidential-Inside-the-minds-of-MMA-managers-after-PFLs.jpg&#038;w=130&#038;h=130&#038;scale=crop&#038;location=center.jpeg\" width=\"65\" height=\"65\"\/><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>1 Related<\/p>\n<\/aside>\n<p>Bellator has about 250 fighters under contract, according to former Bellator matchmaker Mike Kogan, who was hired by the PFL last <a class=\"wpil_keyword_link\" href=\"https:\/\/wikidollar.net\/tag\/week\/\"   title=\"week\" data-wpil-keyword-link=\"linked\">week<\/a>.  Kogan&#39;s role within the PFL has not yet been announced.  Abdelaziz fears this could leave up to 100 fighters without a clear home next year.  Some will hang on to other promotions, but probably not for the kind of money Bellator was paying them.  Promotions like LFA, Invicta FC, Cage Warriors, Combate Global and others offer solid products and quality fighters, but they are either smaller operations, regionally based or focused on specific audiences .<\/p>\n<p>No one in the industry blames PFL.  Viacom was getting out of the combat sports business and if PFL had not acquired Bellator, the promotion would have simply disbanded and all of its fighters would have lost their jobs.  Abdelaziz said he believes &#8220;the PFL saved the day&#8221;, but that there are only a limited number of fighters the PFL can retain logistically.  The plan is for the PFL to hold about 30 events next year, leaders said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cOne of my biggest worries is that everyone will go bankrupt and only the UFC and PFL will be left standing,\u201d Abdelaziz said.  &#8220;And after that, as managers and fighters, we have no bargaining power. And the UFC needs ONE FC, they need Bellator and they need PFL because, in reality, they don&#39;t can&#39;t make everyone grow from the bottom up. These guys. [the other promotions], they do that.  Sometimes people leave for UFC or they are in UFC and go to PFL or ONE.  It\u2019s good for the fighters.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>UFC President Dana White had been flippant about the PFL&#39;s acquisition of Bellator, telling a media scrum that it was &#8220;a shitty organization buying a another shitty organization.\u201d  But even he acknowledged Saturday night during the UFC 296 post-fight press conference that losing another global promotion isn&#39;t good for the health of the MMA ecosystem.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"inline inline-photo full\">\n<figure><picture><source data- media=\"(min-width: 376px)\"><source data- media=\"(max-width: 375px)\"><img class=\" lazyload lazyload\" data-image-container=\".inline-photo\" height=\"320\" width=\"570\"\/><\/source><\/source><\/picture><figcaption class=\"photoCaption\">Dana White thinks fighters with fewer promotional options at home are bad for mixed martial arts. <cite>Photo by Cooper Neill\/Zuffa LLC via Getty Images<\/cite><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/aside>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s a bad thing,\u201d White said.  &#8220;It&#39;s not a good thing that there are fewer options, not only for fighters and fighters, but also for guys who have just had fewer options. So yeah, it&#39;s not certainly not a good thing.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Several managers that ESPN spoke with for this article don&#39;t have much confidence in ONE as a destination in this perceived weak market outside of the UFC.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI know ONE FC was looking at coming to America more, but it doesn&#39;t look like that&#39;s going to happen,\u201d one of the managers of many fighters across promotions told ESPN, speaking on condition of anonymity.  \u201cObviously I&#39;m not privy to some of these closed-door conversations, but we&#39;ve only seen one event so far in Denver, which seemed to be a success, but we haven&#39;t seen anything since . It worries me that they won&#39;t have a physical presence in America like we thought.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>ONE announced over the summer that it planned to air four shows in the <a class=\"wpil_keyword_link\" href=\"https:\/\/wikidollar.net\/tag\/united\/\"   title=\"United\" data-wpil-keyword-link=\"linked\">United<\/a> States in 2024. However, one <a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.dealstreetasia.com\/stories\/one-championship-qia-extra-funding-371455?utm_content=buffer2c433&amp;utm_medium=social&amp;utm_source=twitter.com&amp;utm_campaign=buffer\">report from financial publication Dead Street Asia<\/a> said that ONE&#39;s &#8220;runway is set to expire&#8221; by the third quarter of 2024. In other words, the promotion needs more investors or it could risk going bankrupt.  Bloody Elbow reported from financial filings that ONE lost $110 million in 2021 and losses are mounting.<\/p>\n<p>ONE declined to comment directly, but referred ESPN to quotes President Chatri Sityodtong told the South China Morning Post earlier this month.<\/p>\n<p>Sityodtong said &#8220;you can&#39;t believe everything you read&#8221; and that ONE&#39;s revenues will be more than $100 million in 2023. He said he has &#8220;literally no&#8221; concerns about the finances of the promotion.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s regrettable [that] \u201cThere are haters who have interests to defend, but they can defend them,\u201d Sityodtong said.  \u201cMy team and I, my board and my investors, are 1,000% committed. It would be a different story, it would have more credibility, if all of our measures collapsed or something like that.<\/p>\n<p>Meanwhile, there is hope in the industry for what PFL could become.  The promotion made a splash in 2023. PFL signed Francis Ngannou, who was the UFC heavyweight champion, and Jake Paul, the lightning rod YouTuber turned fighter.  The Public Investment Fund of Saudi Arabia has invested approximately $100 million in the PFL.  And, to top it all off, PFL acquired Bellator in a sweet deal, adding several high-end talents to its burgeoning roster.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"inline float-r inline-track\">\n<h2 class=\"img-title\">Top stories of the week <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/wikidollar.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/1697166059_76_NBArank-2023-24-reaction-Snubs-surprises-and-players-who-could.png\" width=\"49\"\/><\/h2>\n<p>Get exclusive access to thousands of premium articles per year from top writers.<br \/>\u2022 The 3 most disappointing teams in the NFL are&#8230; \u00bb<br \/>\u2022 50 Best <a class=\"wpil_keyword_link\" href=\"https:\/\/wikidollar.net\/tag\/football\/\"   title=\"Football\" data-wpil-keyword-link=\"linked\">Football<\/a> Recruiting Courses in 24 \u00bb<br \/>\u2022 Rookie rankings: Who&#39;s behind Wemby?  \u00bb<br \/><strong>    More ESPN+ content \u00bb<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/aside>\n<p>The PFL has signaled to the MMA industry that it is going to become a legitimate player for free agents.  Earlier this month, free agent Michael &#8220;Venom&#8221; Page appeared at a PFL Europe event in Ireland and entered the cage to face PFL prospect Cedric Doumb\u00e9.  Page, a former knockout artist at Bellator, ended up signing with the UFC, but sources said the PFL was in the running with a lucrative offer.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThey made a statement that all of us in the market need to see,\u201d said Audie Attar, CEO of Paradigm Sports Management, which represents, among others, Conor McGregor.  \u201cWhether it was Ngannou or Paul, they made a statement about how they structured these deals, based on their visibility. [stated in] some media reports.<\/p>\n<p>The PFL&#39;s commercial relations with the Saudis do not harm its strength either.  When this deal was announced, shares of the UFC&#39;s parent company, Endeavor, and WWE, which merged with the UFC as a new publicly traded company called TKO Group, both fall.  The UFC will also make its first trip to Saudi Arabia in March and will receive a $20 million venue fee for it, Endeavor President Mark Shapiro said at a conference earlier this month.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I think [PFL]\u201cThe cap table and their investors are just too smart to fuck up,\u201d an MMA agent told ESPN on condition of anonymity last month. \u201cI don&#39;t think they&#39;re going to be a day No. 1, but I think they will be competitive.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"inline inline-photo full\">\n<figure><picture><source data- media=\"(min-width: 376px)\"><source data- media=\"(max-width: 375px)\"><img class=\" lazyload lazyload\" data-image-container=\".inline-photo\" height=\"320\" width=\"570\"\/><\/source><\/source><\/picture><figcaption class=\"photoCaption\">Scott Coker is the former president of Bellator MMA. <cite>Photo by Amy Kaplan\/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images<\/cite><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/aside>\n<p>One of the byproducts of PFL&#39;s acquisition of Bellator is former Bellator President Scott Coker&#39;s absence from the sport, at least for now.  Coker also owned and built Strikeforce, which was purchased by the UFC and boasted some of the best talent in the world.  MMA analyst and former UFC title challenger Chael Sonnen said he hopes a promotion would at least bring in Coker as a consultant if he&#39;s interested.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHe\u2019s one of the top three minds in the history of the sport,\u201d said Sonnen, who fought for Bellator under Coker.<\/p>\n<p>Could there be room for a new major MMA promotion with Bellator integrated into the PFL?  One official said that might be the case in North America, &#8220;provided it is properly funded and can attract talent.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The PFL&#39;s hiring of Kogan received near-unanimous praise from Bellator fighters and others in the industry.  He&#39;s been involved in MMA for over two decades, helped create the best team in Bellator history and has previously managed players like Nate Diaz.  Kogan said those worried about the state of the sport should pump the brakes a bit and let the PFL do its job.<\/p>\n<p>It&#39;s not out of the question, he says, to one day see the PFL organize more than 40 events a year and have more than 600 fighters under contract like the UFC does.  It may not happen in 2024, but the PFL has a vision and a lot of ambition, he said.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;[PFL buying Bellator] It&#39;s not bad for the sport,&#8221; Kogan said. &#8220;It&#39;s good for the sport.  Everyone will be fine.  You know what would have been bad for the sport?  All Bellator fighters will receive a release letter on January 1st.  It would be bad for the sport.  \u00bb<\/p>\n<p>Yet some athletes may not have the luxury of patience.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI think the fear is that there will be fewer opportunities next year for fighters to make an honest living,\u201d one manager said.  \u201cIt\u2019s certainly a concern of ours and a fear of ours that we\u2019re trying to be proactive about and address as much as possible.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><script async src=\"\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>MMA confidential Inside the minds of MMA managers after PFL&#8217;s acquisition of Bellator\u060c Marc Raimondi, ESPN editorDecember 18, 2023, 3:15 p.m. LAS VEGAS \u2014 Ali Abdelaziz posted a few lines Dec. 10 on social media that raised collective eyebrows in the mixed martial arts industry. The prominent MMA manager, who helped guide the careers of [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15383,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[4622,6008,7870,4773,7871,3807,7872],"class_list":["post-15382","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-sports","tag-acquisition","tag-bellator","tag-confidential","tag-managers","tag-minds","tag-mma","tag-pfls"],"blocksy_meta":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wikidollar.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15382","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wikidollar.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wikidollar.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wikidollar.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wikidollar.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=15382"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/wikidollar.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15382\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15384,"href":"https:\/\/wikidollar.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15382\/revisions\/15384"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wikidollar.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/15383"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wikidollar.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=15382"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wikidollar.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=15382"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wikidollar.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=15382"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}