Can Bellator make UFC tap out?
Can Bellator Fighting Championship Make UFC Tap Out? It wasn’t that long ago when boxing was everywhere on television. For…
Can Bellator Fighting Championship Make UFC Tap Out?
It wasn’t that long ago when boxing was everywhere on television. For fight fans, Latino stars such as Julio Cesar Chavez, Hector “Macho” Camacho and Roberto Duran, were regular fare on the networks and cable television.
But today, boxing has vanished from the airwaves, knocked out by a different form of thrilling combat — mixed martial arts.
UFC has been the dominant MMA company on television, but other businesses such as Strikeforce have risen in popularity.
Now add the Chicago and Los Angeles-based Bellator Fighting Championship to the list of MMA companies with a growing presence on television, and dreams of MMA supremacy.
Bellator, Latin for “Warrior,” recently locked up a deal to broadcast Season 2 and 3 of its innovative show on FOX Sports Net, NBC and Telemundo. The combination of the three networks means Bellator will be available in more than 250 million homes, when season 2 kicks off on April 8. Prior to the blockbuster deal, Bellator was only available on ESPN Deportes.
For Bellator CEO Bjorn Rebney, a longtime boxing and television promoter, and athlete himself, his company is presenting a revolutionary change in mixed martial arts.
“We are the only mixed martial arts organization where fighters compete to become champion,” Rebney told HispanicBusiness.com. “We are a purely objective company where fighters control their own destiny.
We are very much like March Madness.”
Rebney is making a not-so-subtle reference to MMA’s most popular company, the UFC, which has successfully marketed itself as the premiere MMA organization in the world.
But like professional wrestling, the UFC uses old-fashioned Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey tactics to draw people to the shows. UFC’s fighters go by the handles of “Rampage,” the “Iceman,” and “The Natural,” and promotion of the fights is usually as much about personality as it is about the sport.
In fact, UFC’s popularity can largely be traced back to the success of its “Real World,” style reality show, “The Ultimate Fighter,” which placed aspiring UFC fighters in the same house competing for a contract.
While it’s a formula that works, Bellator’s appeal is its purity and similarities to tournament-style athletics.
During Season 1 …
