Coker: Changes coming to Bellator in 2015
Scott Coker: “That’s what you’re not going to be seeing next year. You’ll see big fights that people will want to see, starting in January.”
Earlier this year Bellator MMA announced a huge move, releasing President Bjorn Rebney and replacing him with former Strikeforce President and Zuffa employee, Scott Coker. Coker announced some changes, including the end of the tournament format which Bellator built it’s brand on. The promotion has continued to run shows as it had, but new President Coker said some more changes are coming in 2015:
“If we have a show every week, sometimes you have to get fighters to fill the card because there’s nobody left,” he said. “That’s what you’re not going to be seeing next year. You’ll see big fights that people will want to see, starting in January.”
“They’ve been working with our team,” he said. “It’s like one big team. Before, I felt there was separation when I walked into the building, a division between Bellator and Viacom. Now, everyone is working on the same page for the same goal and I think you’ll be seeing the results of that. I talked to Kevin (Kay) and we came to the consensus that we’re taking this company to the next level. Let’s build some stars. We’ve been very successful at identification and star building in the past. We’ll have some legends fights. And we’ll put them all on free television before 100 million households. We thought that was a better model than going into the pay-per-view business. That doesn’t mean pay-per-view is out. If the situation is right, we’ll do it.”
Coker noted the main difference with the relationship as compared to when Strikeforce was on Showtime is that Showtime had to approve of all the matchmaking, which could slow down the process.
“Our job is to put on the best fights,” he said. “Showtime had the right to approve the matchmaking, which is completely different. We can match make our own fights here. Their infrastructure is much bigger than Showtime’s. It’s a different animal. At Showtime, we were really a vendor. We provided a product for them. Viacom owns Bellator, it’s fully integrated, and they are going to use all their assets to grow the product. It’s a different animal than the last opportunity. I’ve never had so many people in the room working on one thing, which is to grow this company.”
