“” and Rizvan Magomedov, director of the Dominance MMA company, known for his collaboration with Khabib Nurmagomedov, Islam Makhachev, Sergei Pavlovich and a number of other successful Russian fighters, publish Magomedov’s first martial arts column mixed.
The UFC’s two closest competitors, PFL and Bellator, could become one in 2024. Let’s see where that leads.
You can find out who Rizvan Magomedov is in these two interviews (one and two)
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Negotiations on a deal between PFL and Bellator, to my knowledge, are close to being completed. We can only guess what will result from this and what this agreement is for. I think we’ll know the answer early next year.
For now, I only understand with what both participants approach the agreement. Actively engaged in fundraising (attracting investment funds – editor’s note from ), PFL has entered into a partnership agreement with SRJ Sports Investments. It is an offshoot of the Saudi Sovereign Fund (PIF), which invests in all sports projects. As we see, there is now interest in different sports: Cristiano Ronaldo plays for Al-Nasr, Anthony Joshua had two fights in Jeddah and Diriyah. Investing in PFL is an expression of interest in MMA. But if they abuse the Bellator purchase, they will simply ruin a decent organization and waste a lot of money.
Bellator now has a very good roster with very strong champions. Vadim Nemkov made four defenses and moved up to heavyweight. Usman Nurmagomedov became a champion and, at 25 years old, is a rising star in the league. Johnny Eblen, in my opinion, is one of the strongest middleweights in the world. These guys are of interest to American viewers. Even if we take a fighter who doesn’t speak English very well, but wins, he still has some kind of role. Here I would compare Serega Pavlovich and Vadim Nemkov, they have images of invincible Russian heroes or heroes like Ivan Drago, who come and beat everyone. And people wonder if anyone will beat them next time.
At the same time, as a manager, I would say that for the fighters, the merger of the two leagues is bad. There are fewer places to play, less choice, less competition between leagues. A solid player leaves, and on one hand you can count the leagues that make a decent product, pay fighters fees, and put on good fights. The Bellator League has scheduled 13 tournaments in 2023. The PFL hosts 14 events per year. I’m not sure the PFL will hold 27 or more events in 2024. And importantly, it’s even less than the UFC (43 tournaments in 2023).
UFC 259 / Photo: © Jeff Bottari / Contributor / UFC / Gettyimages.ru
To understand whether the PFL, after merging with Bellator, will be able to overtake the UFC, we need to decide what to do for this, because, of course, we are not only talking about the number of tournaments per year. In my opinion, the UFC’s market leadership is a combination of media presence and opinions on major television platforms. From there, the gains and recognition build. The UFC has found an effective formula for creating and monetizing the content it produces.
The 50-55 tournaments they hold each year serve several important functions.
First, in most of these tournaments they make a selection and look for new projects. Probably not everyone pays attention to this, but, for example, Francis Ngannou and Conor McGregor got their chance in the UFC at the biggest events in Stockholm and Orlando. A fighter may fight once or twice, he will notice it and try to go with it more. He will live up to expectations, that’s all, he’s a star.
Secondly, when the league enters other markets, organizing events in Europe, Asia or Australia, it already covers an international audience, because, in addition to paid broadcasts, there are licensing agreements with television channels. television in different countries.
Third, they create a lot of additional content: analytical broadcasts, audiences, documentary videos. They are like satellites, programs that pique fan interest and get people to watch upcoming tournaments. Having this consistency, they taught the public that every Saturday night, we already know that there will be fights. When you don’t have such consistency, it’s harder for you; you need to inform everyone again that there will be some kind of tournament that you will organize once or twice a month.
Another small problem is that there aren’t enough charismatic, high-profile promoters promoting their leagues like Dana White does. It seems to me that Bellator and PFL were inferior in this component, and now I don’t see anyone who could promote their product with the same charisma.
At the same time, Bellator and PFL have managed to catch up in some areas. Probably 10 to 12 years ago, not many people could do it. Both leagues held a Grand Prix with a million dollar prize for the winner. At the PFL Grand Prix, my fighters became the winners of the tournament, and the amount was actually paid minus taxes. True, now the guys who received the payment are surprised how quickly this money runs out and want to make another million.
The PFL also introduced unscheduled drug testing for Grand Prix participants, starting with the semi-finals. I think this is important, because if we are talking about sports, where the competitive component comes first, we do not want any external factors to interfere with this. If an athlete in your league becomes a champion, but he doesn’t undergo regular drug testing, you can’t know if he’s really that good or if something was created in a lab and injected into his blood that caused him given an advantage. Unscheduled testing of all fighters is expensive. I don’t know if the PFL will do this for everyone in the future.
I’m sure investments in the PFL won’t lead to the league attempting to steal UFC stars en masse. Contracts are, in principle, written in such a way that it is not possible to overbid. According to the rules, after the contract expires, you have a period of exclusive negotiations. Then, even if you receive an offer from another league, your current employer has the opportunity to repeat the conditions that the competitor offered you, or improve them – and there he can go into auction mode.
The UFC is not a machine that prints money and then throws it away. Let’s say they have a champion, Jon Jones, and an organization comes along and says they’ll pay $50 million to have him. They will just sit and count. For them, it is purely about economics and not about competing with anyone for money. They have a certain formula for evaluating a fighter based on what he brings to the company. If it is mathematically advantageous to them, they will give it. Otherwise, they will fight for it. Any league that simply starts buying champions from the UFC will collapse financially, because they will start spending more than they make. I don’t think the main goal of the people who invested in PFL and bought Bellator was to spend as much money as quickly as possible.
Live broadcasts of mixed martial arts tournaments can be seen on and Match! Fighter”, as well as on the sites matchtv.ru and sportbox.ru.
Source : MatchTV
I am Ashley Ortiz and I am a professional journalist working for Athletistic. My specialty is in sports journalism, particularly boxing. I have written articles for some of the most renowned publications on the subject, and my work has been featured across both print and digital media platforms.
