PFL’s 2020 season is its last
Make no mistake: This is not my hope by any means. The more MMA promotions that exist and thrive means more options for fighters, which means a healthier sport overall, especially when it comes to a promotion like PFL, which is paying significant money to its athletes with those $1 million year-end incentives.
After milking its former promotional namesake of WSOF for all its worth before re-branding, 2020 marks the third year of operations for PFL, and it feels like a do-or-die year. From all indications, the investors behind PFL have deep pockets, but thus far it hasn’t shown to be a moneymaking model. The best thing that can be said is that PFL has afforded opportunities to fighters who fail to generate any sort of traction for anything but their skills. And while that’s great, it’s no secret that’s not what drives big business in MMA.
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Signing Rory MacDonald was a nice move, and it will be interesting to see what other talent PFL can recruit in the coming months before the next season begins in order to create a fresh dynamic going into its most crucial year yet. 2020 marks the last of PFL’s two-year broadcast deal with ESPN. If the promotion does not get a renewal offer with a meaningful increase for rights fees, the financial support to press on might disappear.
It's a crowded MMA landscape out there, but @thegoze has an idea for what could make @ProFightLeague more appealing in the 2020 season. #SpinningBackClique | Full episode: ▶️ https://t.co/qoVi2jwwfh pic.twitter.com/8O3oHw0C4J
— MMA Junkie (@MMAjunkie) January 8, 2020
UFC, Bellator go head to head on ESPN, CBS
With the CBS and Viacom merger last year, it seems the Bellator product isn’t long for Paramount. The channel just doesn’t fit the product, and the merger opens up different opportunities and platforms for it to move around. It’s been a long time since a major MMA event was televised on CBS, but the channel has a history with the sport. Getting Bellator on there seems like a great way to get exposure for the brand.
Although the days of UFC president Dana White holding a tombstone with rival promotion’s names engraved are long gone, he’s still highly competitive. Perhaps it will be out of pure scheduling luck, but if and when Bellator lands on CBS, the UFC will attempt to drag it down with some good ol’ fashioned counter-programming on ESPN.
No champ-champs in UFC or Bellator
When all is said and done at the end of 2020, neither the UFC nor Bellator will have an active simultaneous two-division champion. The start of this trend kicked off late in 2019, with Henry Cejudo giving up his UFC flyweight title in order to pursue his reign as bantamweight champ.
With Cejudo out of the mix, the lone remaining dual-champs are: Nunes as UFC women’s featherweight and bantamweight champion, [autotag]Patricio Freire[/autotag] as Bellator featherweight and lightweight champ, and [autotag]Ryan Bader[/autotag] as Bellator light heavyweight and heavyweight champion.
Not to say all those fighters will lose in 2020, but that’s a lot of weight classes under the roof of just a few fighters, and sometimes politics comes into play that causes belts to be separated from their owners.
UFC-Reebok relationship ends
It hasn’t been a major topic of conversation yet, but 2020 marks the final full year of the UFC’s sponsorship agreement with Reebok. The deal, which has gone by various names such as “Athlete Outfitting Pay” and “Promotional Guidelines Compliance Pay,” has been controversial, has been controversial since it began in mid-2015..
The partnership between the UFC and Reebok essentially killed what was left of the independent sponsor market in MMA, and many fighters were hit hard in their bank accounts. It wasn’t for something entirely positive, either, as there’s been a long list of flops that we need not go into the details of. But, just look at Conor McGregor’s UFC 246 walkout shirt. That thing costs $60.
We’ll know by the end of this year if the UFC renews its deal with Reebok, but it will only happen if there’s no better alternative (because the promotion certainly won’t go back to letting fighters wear what they want). The UFC brand has come a long way since 2015, and there’s a good chance it’ll succeed in finding another partner who will pay more and (hopefully) create a superior product.
Another former UFC champion gets ‘traded’
Although calling the Demetrious Johnson-for-Ben Askren deal that happened in 2018 a “trade” is a somewhat inaccurate, it’s a term that resonates with sports fans and brings some understanding to the exchange in fighter contract rights.
Many believed that deal between UFC and ONE Championship was a one-off, but it won’t be. Not only will the UFC make a similar deal for one of its fighters, but, like “Mighty Mouse,” it will be a high-profile name who held a title for a significant amount of time.