MMA Fighting - Town Hall w/ PFL's Donn Davis Pt. 2

Episode Date: January 16, 2025

PFL founder and chairman Donn Davis joins the channel to discuss changes to 2025 for the promotion and to answer viewer questions about anything and everything, hosted by MMA Fighting's Mike Heck.  Watch replay: https://youtube.com/live/OHEPm3hSflc Follow Mike Heck: @m_heckjr Subscribe: http://goo.gl/dYpsgH Check out our full video catalog: http://goo.gl/u8VvLi Visit our playlists: http://goo.gl/eFhsvM Like MMAF on Facebook: http://goo.gl/uhdg7Z Follow on Twitter: http://goo.gl/nOATUI Read More: http://www.mmafighting.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Nice travels. Wi-Fi available to Aeroplan members on equip flights. Sponsored by Bell. Conditions apply. See Air Canada.com. You're listening to the Vox Media Podcast Network. Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the MAA Fighting YouTube channel. Welcome to the MMA Fighting Podcasting Network if you're listening after the fact.

And welcome to Town Hall. I'm your host, Mike Heck, excited to have you all here because this has been and is a very big week in our sport. We have, of course, UFC 311 coming up on Saturday, all sorts of news and notes. And also the Professional Fighters League has been in the news quite a bit with a lot of changes, a lot of announcements, and a lot of other things. So the timing could not be better for this second iteration, excuse me, of Town Hall. And today we're going to run it back in October shortly after PFL's Battle of the Giants pay-per-view. We did our first one where my questions, your questions about anything and everything were featured. And today, right now, there's even more questions to answer about the PFS.

PFL about 2025 for the PFL and everything that has happened with the organization since then. So without further ado, let us welcome back the founder and chairman of the Professional Fighters League, Mr. Don Davis. Don, thank you for doing this again. Means a lot. How are you? I'm glad to be here. I'm doing this for all the great MMA fans. Obviously, a busy week this week in terms of getting ready for our world tournament, busy week next week, heading to Dubai. And this is the only thing I'm doing. I wanted to do it because this is where the fans were.

Fans have questions, and I'll do my best to answer it. So I'm delighted to be here. Before we get into, I guess, the meat and potatoes of the matter, you decided to do this again. And with anything in this space, we were actually talking about this before. We actually went live.

There's things that go over well, some things not so well. But people have been hitting me up personally in different ways asking if you took anything away from the first town hall back in October that maybe gave you a different perspective on things. So I'll pose that question to you right out the gate. Was there any kind of impact, any sort of shift perhaps that you had from Town Hall Part 1? Yeah, look, I'll answer broadly and specifically.

For anybody who follows the company or me, I say something all the time. We listen, we learn, we improve. We innovate. And a lot of times I make these posts and people even get negative on those posts. We don't want to be right. We want to win. So we're here to listen. We're here to learn and we're here to improve.

I started the company for fans and for fighters to do something different than what was happening with the UFC. The UFC is a great product. What we're doing is different business-wise. different product-wise, different strategy-wise, different focus-wise. So we're just here to do something always as good as we could do. That's true very broadly all the time, right? And in terms of specific, yeah, what I really took from town hall was how passionate the

MMA fans are in a way they're not even about a sport. I grew up with football. You could see behind me of Cincinnati Bengals, right? My dad's 94. And I watch Bengals games still. You know, it's wonderful that he's still alive. I could be on the phone. I can watch games with him.

So all of us who even grew up with a traditional Big Four sport, we're not passionate sometimes about them, even like MMA fans are. So that's really what I took from the town hall because certain things I said might even got misinterpreted. Certain things I might have said might have got amplified. You know where that comes from? Passion, caring, engagement, love of the sport. So that's really what I took specifically from that last town hall. Because I hear what's going on.

I know what's going on. And why do I do that? I want our company to get better and better all the time. Love to hear it. Of course, we're going to talk about all the changes we found out this week as it relates to the organization, to the tournament structure. And we want to get to the fans as they and myself, we have a lot to ask you. But I want to start here because this is the big news that has gotten people talking the most.

Patricio Pitbull. It's been quite vocal on social media about his standing in the promotion, not getting fights and all of that and had been asking for his release for several months now. And then after the news that Bellator is a brand, which you're sure to tease the last time we did this, that it would be no more,

that everything would be under one umbrella. You made that official on Tuesday. Plus Holly Holm getting granted her release from the UFC. That eventually led to Patricio Pitbull asking for his release again, which you publicly granted. So I want to give you the floor here. Why did you ultimately make the decision

to release Patricia Pitbull, who is ultimately the face of the history of Bellator in a lot of respects. Yeah, and I'll state a little bit more, but it's no different from what I said in the release. Full respect for Pitbull. Nobody's done more for Pitbull for Bellator, the company we acquired, than he did. And you even saw that in our social media post. Most fights, most wins, biggest brand of a fighter and

to our history. Total respect, point one. Total respect. Point two, we wanted him here. Okay. So we were trying to work out a way for him to be here. So had you requested his release for several months? No. We were working on a way for him to be here for several months. But for several weeks, had he said, hey, I don't think it's going to work out and I want to go? Yes. So why did ultimately I do it? Because he didn't want to be here. This is about opportunity. PFL is about opportunity. Opportunity for fans who want more MMA or different MMA, opportunity for fighters who want a different way

and a different approach from a different company. So it's opportunity. That's all. And so we want people who want that opportunity. He wanted, he said, look, I wouldn't go anywhere other than the UFC. But can I have that opportunity? We said, sure, done. Nothing more than that.

So obviously when news like this drops, our job is to dig a little deeper. And we were told once this news dropped that there would be matching rights, which Patricia brought up on Twitter after you put out that tweet that you were releasing him. He then came back and said he was told by his management that it was going to be an outright release. And he can sign with whoever without interference. And then we confirmed along with others that as of this morning, Pitbull nor his team had received this letter.

And then about 90 minutes ago, he tweeted he is indeed an unrestricted free agent. So I just want to check from the promotional side. Is Patricia Pitbull, is he able to sign with the UFC today if he wants to? Yes. Yes. Just because it was such a big story and he was talking so vocally, he's putting out things before even legal mechanics aren't finished yet. That's all that's going on. But no intention from our side, anything but when I said he was released, he was released.

Fair enough. And we've seen other Bellator champions sort of express their frustrations as well. Corey Anderson is one, but he has an outright said publicly, I want to release, I want out. Patchy Mix, the Bannaway champion, has publicly asked for his release not that long ago. So what is going on with Patchy? Is he going to get his wish or have you guys been able to smooth things over? Yeah, look, all fighters are different. And I think, you know, for fans out there, you know, I'll show.

both sides of what people in MMA organizations say, whether it's the UFC, whether it's PFL. Sometimes people say, hey, you should go public and you should share the details of what's really going on. How many fights have you really offered a fighter? How many fights did they turn down? Did you really pay money for a camp they didn't attend? Why didn't that fight really happen? Because remember when a fighter or an athlete says something, just like you or me, if we're in a fight, we say something. There's two sides to every story. Nothing is black and white.

Everything's gray. So everything you're hearing is always one side of story. So a lot of times the company has to make a choice. Do you want to say your side of the story in great detail or not? The choice I've always made at PFL is not to do that. We want to do business privately. We want to do that respectfully. We just think all that noise doesn't help get a deal done or doesn't help resolve matters.

I just don't think it's respectful. I don't think it's that professional. It's not how I've done things for 35 years to build other successful companies. Now, a lot of people say, hey, this is the fight game, Don. Everybody gets into it in a fight game and you should come out with our story. That's not what we do. So I just think that's interesting background to the fans. Some may say, hey, I respect that about PFL.

may say, hey, no, man, I really want to know the details. You guys should be coming out like other companies and telling us. There's two sides. We don't always tell the other side of the story what's really going on from our perspective. That doesn't mean we're right. That doesn't mean the fighters, right? That means most of these situations are gray. They're not black and white. So regarding patchy, regarding any other fighter, we always want to resolve the situation. We always want to be happy. Fighters always want, 10 fights. a year and every fight to be $10 million. We consider all fighters together. Remember, my job is PFL. My job is to put on 30 great events a year. My job is to manage 250 fighters for the most

success for the 250 fighters. That's my job. In fact, that's what fans kind of pay me to do, or else PFL won't be successful. 30 events, 250 fighters, commercial success, and the best and most great fights we can. That's the job of the chairman of PFL. So that's what I try to do each and every hour of each and every day. The fighter's job is advocating for themselves. Top dollar, most fights, what they want today. And those are the dynamics.

That's always what's going on. That's always what's going on. And I think most people who in their own life, in their own management role, in their own job, they completely understand what that is. So that's everything that's going on. But specifically, we want every fighter here who wants to be here. And specifically, as we've announced, we have 30 events this year, the most ever in company history, two times the number of events as 2023 to 2025.

We're going from 15 events in 2023 to 30 events in 2025. And there are only two premium high-paying companies left in the world, UFC and PFL. So that is our goal to serve 250 fighters to put on 30 events and they put on premium produced products around the world. And that's my focus every hour of every day. So is Patchy Mix going to be fighting for the PFL in 2025? Will you see him compete under your umbrella? I believe yes. I believe yes.

I think Patchy's going to be happy. I think Corey Anderson's going to be happy. I think fighters are going to be very, very happy. But once again, if they're not, we're going to help them get the solution they want that's not here, right? This isn't MMA prison camp. This is opportunity camp. And so if fighters don't want to be. want to be here and they believe they can do better elsewhere, it doesn't help us to have

them here. It doesn't help us. We have a pipeline of incredible fighters. We discovered and promoted and developed people like Dakota or Paul Hughes or five years ago, Kayla Harrison, right? We have a system around the world to create opportunity and to pay fighters and make fighters active. So we want to focus on the fighters who want to do that. But Patchy, a star. We love him. I want him here. Any other fighter, we want him here.

Am I super confident that this noise is a blip and this noise will go away? I am. But might there be another fighter that is unhappy and wants to go? There might be. And we'll accommodate that. Fair enough. I do want to turn over the people, but I just want to talk about this real quick because, again, big news. I want to talk about the decision to change the season format,

something you also teased the last time we did this. No more points, no more quote unquote season, eight divisions, middleweight and bannam weight included tournament style, eight fighters, two altered, single elimination, first round in April, semis in June, finals in August. I believe this got to go real fast, which is pretty awesome. And to me, I think this is a great move. I also think putting all the fighters under one brand,

also a great move. And I know I'm not alone in this. Why the decision ultimately to change the season format to the classic tournament style? I hope 99 out of 100 fans love this because this is what we heard from them. We started doing research, and I put research in quotes because there's a lot of different kinds of research, right? Some is quantitative, some as you talk to fans, some as you look at data. We started doing research 18 months ago. And we've done the season format five years, and we created it from scratch.

Never been done. People said, you can't do one in advance or you can't do a season or you can't do anything like that other than one-off matchup. And I created it five years ago. And 18 months ago, I said, how can we do it even better? And we heard three things from fans, people that watch, people that attend, people that stream, people that engage. And they said three things. And this addresses all three. Number one, they said, hey, I'm still not so sure I understand the point system in this regular season playoffs.

Can you make it simple? Like, what about just March Madness? I think it's easy to follow. But you know what? Doesn't matter what I think. Matters what fans think. And half of our audience are sports fans. They are not MMA fans.

Half are die-hard MMA fans. They watch UFC. They might watch Brave. They watch a lot of stocked, and they might watch a lot of stuff. But half are sports fans. They're big fans of the Premier League or the NBA or something. And so we heard make it simpler. It is now simple.

PFL's March Madness meets MMA, single elimination, win in advance. Boom. The second thing they said is the eight months are too long. Man, that drag of two months before the finals, can you make it shorter? Our goal was six months. It's now five. It is awesome. April to August, boom, five months.

And the third thing I said is, can you add more weight classes? We actually like this thing. Can you add more? It's going from six eight weight classes to eight. Six weight classes to eight. So I hope. And remember, I read a lot. My wife thinks I read too much.

She thinks I listen too much. You know, sometimes it's good to listen. You don't want to sometimes, you know, always respond. You want to lead here. We believe we're both leading. and responding with this product. And I couldn't be more excited for the start of this April 3rd. There are reports.

There are some screenshots from some contracts that circulated social media about the million-dollar prize being shifted to half a million grand prizes. But also it's being reported that the $500,000 grand prize, it's on top of the regular purses. So if a fighter makes 50 and 50 wins all three fights, they get their entire purses plus the 500K for winning their bracket and whatever else is offered on top. Is that correct? Are those reports accurate?

That's true. And that change was in response to managers and fighters. So we have a wide variety of win and show money now in the season. That wasn't true when we started out. Remember, if you rewind seven years, very few fighters wanted to bet on PFL. They said, hey, there's been hundreds of organizations that have come and gone. So most of our fighters made like 15 and 15. And we had two fighters ranked in the top 25, our first season.

Okay, this year we got 55. Okay, we had two. So therefore, everybody made about the same for the win and show money. So how it used to work is in the finals, there's no win and show money. It's you win, you get a million dollars. You lose, you get 100,000. But your contract is not your contract. It's the finals, just like the NBA or just like the NFL.

Well, over time now, we have a wide variety of fighters. Some make low, some make medium, some make high. And they did not like that. They wanted their contract honored. So now every single fight, you get your win and show money. And it's now a pure bonus, pure bonus. So that is exactly how it works now, and that's why it works that way. And last thing before we turn it over to the people, this is the biggest question I had,

because like I said, I like all of this, what does the winners, what do the winners of these tournaments get besides the $500,000 prize? Like, does it guarantee them a title fight later in the year? Like what meritocratic stakes are there for these tournaments? That's great. Look, there's two things. first of all, you are the winner of a belt. It is the World Tournament Belt.

So you're still the winner of the tournament, just like you used to be the winner of a season. And there's a belt that will never be taken away from you. Just like you won the NBA title in 2024, you now win the PFL World Tournament 2025. That's a belt that will never be taken away from you. Somebody next year will win the 2026 World Tournament Belt. That's different from the World Tournament.

champion of the company. That will now be contested on a PFL champions series event. We're all champions will have to come to fight. Are you a Bellator champion? We're a PFL tournament champion. That is where that will be contested. And we'll talk more about that at a later date when we announce exciting things such as the schedule, the media partner, and how the PFL champion series will work. But the PFL champion series is where the world title, the highest level, will always be contested. But you win a belt, and that is the world tournament belt. And you've heard that? That's a big deal. And obviously, you will be able to, if not be immediately in line, very soon be in line to contest for that world title, depending on how crowded your weight class is,

but it's going to happen in the next year or so. So it's going to be close. But what that exact mechanism is will depend on, you know, how proud of your division is and who are the title holders in that now. So say I'm a middleweight and I win this tournament and I say, and I get the option. Like I could just maybe fight in the next tournament or I can fight anybody else. If I say like my next fight is for the belt, how confident are you that the winner of these tournaments, their next fight will be for a world title? Remember, I don't want to say their next fight because that's asking if they may come back

into the world tournament again next year, for example. Okay. So it's not as though that is your next fight. You know, it is not as though, but are you most likely in line for that? Yes. What will be the timing of that? Will you be another? Ren and Lottnman came back into the season three times, right?

Certain people will come back and Pichenko was in the season three times. She's not in the season this year. Dakota was in the season, probably won't be in the season this year. So remember, how you want to be. want to deploy as a fighter is still a discussion we have with you. Many fighters, there's a lot of economics in the world tournament, a lot of economics, and the ability to fight three times a year. Remember, the average fighter, whether it's the UFC or whether it's PFL, fights two times a year. If you took all the events and all the fights and all the roster and divided it, it's two.

So the PFLs call it world tournament still has a lot of financial impact and a lot of opportunities. So people may want to keep entering that, not just one year. Black Friday is here at IKEA and the clock is ticking on savings you won't want to miss. Join IKEA family for free today and unlock deals on everything from holiday must-haves to cozy at-home essentials, all the little and big things you need to make this season shine. But don't wait. Like leftovers at midnight, our Black Friday offers won't last. Shop now at IKEA.ca.ca slash Black Friday.

IKEA, bring home to life. Okay, only 10 more presents to wrap. You're almost at the finish line. But first, there, the last one. Enjoy a Coca-Cola for a pause that refreshes. All right, I don't want to hog the spotlight anymore, Casey. I could do this all day because I'm a stubborn person at times. So let's go to the peeps.

Let's see what they have to ask you on this fine Thursday. That was one of the questions I had. But Don, another organization that is reportedly spending big money right now, the Global Fight League, they're bringing a team format, a laf the IFL, back in here in 2025. They're expected to kick off in April and just like you've probably seen. Lots of dollar signs being thrown around, lots of name value. There's a lot of retired fighters on the roster.

at least they were retired from the UFC. It's a who's who of names. It is kind of weird to look at these names, if I'm being honest, but the money being thrown around is obviously very interesting. But what have been your thoughts? What has been your reaction to the introduction, if you will, of the GFL? I'll give three short thoughts because it's hard enough building my own company. And I don't like to opine on other people's company.

And I respect all entrepreneurs. It's hard. And many of you are listening, you know how hard your job is. Every job is hard. So that's the first thing I'd say. Second thing I'd say is PFL's in year seven. We've paid 36 individual fights, $1 million, the champions. That's non-pay-per-view.

We've paid $250 million in fighter purses in seven years. A lot of people have come and gone. It's hard. So good luck. And number three is 50% of nothing is nothing. So when fighters focus on share or fighters focus on stuff, man, I started this company to be fighter-driven. And that's opportunity. Let's go as far as you can go and have a financial economic system that is global and growing and pretty transparent.

I'm telling you how hard it is in year seven. We've done something nobody ever did. Beltor is gone. And you know why they're gone? It wasn't because they didn't have great fighters. One because they didn't have great fighters. So to me, it's easy to say some stuff. It's hard to do some stuff.

And we're in year seven doing some hard stuff. So good luck. Thank you, the last stand, zero one for that question. What else we got, Casey? Jedm Shoe, hi, Don. Credit to you for coming back and doing this again. Again, with PFL moving away from its season format, what do you all plan to do to establish your brand and connect with the fans?

Hey, look, that is a great question. There's not obviously one answer. We have to do many things. Oftentimes, and I'll just tell you two things, oftentimes I go to Chick-Flay every day. I get iced teas. I drink too much iced tea. I'm not a coffee guy. And I get a biscuit.

and I go 536 in the morning, start my workday. And like you, people, Chick-fil-A, it took them a while. They didn't even know they were watching the PFL, but they were MMA fans. And they told me, I love this product. I'm watching on ESPN Friday night. They have this thing. It's like a tournament. They don't even know they're talking to me.

And they go, you know, and I go, what's it called? And they go, I'm not so sure. They were watching the BFL. The point of my story is, we got to build our brand. Our product is pretty good. People who come to our events or watch our product, they like it. But our awareness is still not what it needs to be. And we have to do a lot of things around awareness.

And you're going to see some announcements starting in February and March that are really going to engage the fans uniquely and differently than we have before. We made several new hires in our company, fortunate to add really great thinkers and doers. But we have to raise our awareness and we have to do that. But I want to say something specifically as number two. The international leagues is a big deal focus for us. We're serving fans that UFC is ignoring. Many of you probably listening this are in United States, but 550 million of the MMA fans are not here in the U.S. with us. They're really under served and sometimes not even served. We launched PFL Africa this May. We're going to launch PFL

Australia next year. PFL Latin America the year after. PFL mid-east this year, Hatton, who's just an amateur. I don't know if any of you have seen Hatton, who is the first women Saudi fighter that we discovered and developed. She had twice as many views of her fight event in the mid-east as Rinaldo had the same night for his winning goal for his team. in Dubai, twice as many on social media, and she's a three and oh amateur Saudi women fighter. So the engagement and the brand awareness we're getting with our international leagues is really extraordinary. And we're going to continue to build on that.

We do that because they're local fighters, they're their hometown heroes, and they're all connected. If you win Europe, like Dakota, you go to the world tournament. If you win, you'll see Saudi Arabia or in mid-east, you go to the global tournament. You win Africa. You go to the global tournament. So more and more fighters are signing with us, like a Paul Hughes instead of UFC, because there's a true path and a true path that they control for not only a belt, not only exposure, but more money. So that is a big focus of ours, is specifically on your second question.

more international leagues, more investment to own the top talent in those leagues, and more distribution, more engagement, and more investment everywhere outside the U.S. Thanks, Jed. I hear he's a go-getter with upper management written all over him. What else we got, Casey? Lazybed. Don, in your eyes, what is the biggest fight possible in PFL right now with your current roster, which and you must much success in 2025? P-S-O-H. I don't like that, Lazy.

I don't know what to tell you as a Nord-Dame fan, but what do you think is the biggest fight possible for PFL right now with the roster you have? Yeah, it's great. Now, so remember in the tournament, everybody will be seated one through eight, like March Madness and eight-weight classes, and they'll advance.

So there, it'll all be great, because maybe St. John's, surprises us. Maybe Duke loses, so to speak, right? So there, there's not matchmaking to answer your question in the tournament. Where your question will come into play is in the Champions series, you know, which we're going to announce a little bit later. The first Champions event will be in May. But that's where your question will come into play. The fight, and I'll be, you know, you guys know me by now, I'm transparent and direct. Sometimes you guys get, I don't know, bummed out, throw shit at me from the screen, but I'm always transparent.

I'm going to give you three real answers to your question. But I'm going to start with one. We offered Pitbull the Pitbull Pico fight. Pitbull had one fight left on his contract. And we said, we want you to fight Pico because he's an up-and-coming star. He is fantastic. And we want you to fight for the title. And then we'll let you leave.

That's all we ask of you. He said, no, not doing it. That's the fight. Or if you asked me, I'm asking your question, what was the fight I was most excited about in our company? That's the fight that we wanted to put on. And that's the fight we tried to put together. So that's why the last two weeks when he said, I want to go, we said, we don't want you to go. What's your fight, Pico?

Hey, let's do this, right? So I would have loved Pitbull Pico. Awesome, number one. Number two, so I'm giving you a fight I can't do. That's why I'm giving you three things. I'm really being thoughtful and fair with your question. Number two, I'm going to give you a rematch. I want to see Pachanko Cyborg again.

I loved that fight. It reminded me I was at the Jake Paul Tyson fight to see Serrano. It reminded me of the MMA equivalent of the Serrano boxing fight. It was a great back and forth war. I loved it. and Chris was too experienced and too smart for Larissa in that fight. Larissa was so tough in round one and round two, and Chris said, I'm going to adjust,

and I'm so smart and experience, and she won that fight. I'd love to see with a little bit more experience and smarts and readiness from Larissa, what happens again. So I'd love to see that. It's number two. And then I'll give you a new fight. Number three, I want to see Ferreira Nemcoff. and Nemcoff is so tough, good on the ground, Frere is so tough, obviously good on the ground,

although Francis didn't make it look like it, but an unbelievable striker. I'd like to see that for the heavyweight championship. I'd like to see that. Nemcoff technically did not win the Bellator belt, right, because he was a light heavyweight champ, then he moved up to heavyweight. But for all practical purposes, Nemcoff is the heavyweight Bellator belt owner. La Problemo is the PFL world champion belt holder. I'd like to see that fight.

So those are my three answers in three different categories. I'm surprised Francis didn't come up there. Well, you said fight we could make. We could make. You know, you'll ask me a Francis question later. I'll answer that. But you're saying, in our full control, I'm answering that question, right? There's things I'd like to do with Francis that are not quite yet in our full control.

But those three, full control, and those somehow got to happen this year, and we're going to make those happen. A couple of follows from what you just said. One, how are you determining the seedings for these tournaments? Do you know? Well, we have some criteria. We're going to announce that a little bit later. But the champ, I'm going to just give you a few things, the champ, if they're coming back or seeded one. So you've earned it.

So we have, I don't want to release the roster, that's to be done in February, but we have returning champs in some of these categories. So they'll be seated one. Obviously, if your record is and your world ranking is relatively low, and it's fairly obvious, you would be seated seven or eight. So there'll be obvious seedings. The only difficulty, and call it the art form, will be call it who's four, who's five. Right. Oh, that guy could have been, and then fans can all argue on that. Well, what are we going to do about that? TBD. We'll talk about that later. But who's one, who's two, who's seven, who's eight, that stuff's easy. Nobody's going to, that stuff's easy. It's the stuff in the middle that everybody says on the college football or the March Madden's, come on, the committee got it wrong.

What are we going to do about that? Stay tuned. Stay tuned. And the last thing to follow up, Aaron Pico's got nobody to fight for a belt now. So does that mean he is going to fight somebody else for that vacant belt? We're working with Aaron on what he would like to do. Nothing I could talk about right now. Fair enough.

Okay. Thank you, lazy bed. Next question, Casey. Tampa Made. Is Francis and Ganoo's contract going to be renegotiated? And could he fight this year in your Super Fight League? There's your Francis question. Francis, it doesn't need to be renegotiated.

You know, he's still under his same contract with us. We're happy. He's happy. And number two is we work very partner-like with Francis. We plan what does he want to do? Why does he want to do that? What are the full options? We sit down with him like you would with any real partner. I think he'll box once and I think he'll do MMA once.

What's the order? Don't know yet. What's the timing? Don't know yet. I had to guess. I would think boxing would be first given the opportunities he has. I don't want to say anything about that. That's his business for him to announce. But he has unbelievable boxing opportunities. So I think that's more likely to come first. And MMA is likely to come second. But what I believe you'll see from Francis this year is one MMA in PFL and one boxing from Francis. So I think fans of Francis will see. them do one of each this year. Thank you, Tampa Made. Next question. What a year of Francis had last year. Holy smokes. Terrence. Any plans to have atom weights in PFL?

New Year's Eve with Ryzen, perhaps. But have you guys, that's one of the things that I've been saying is, you don't be a good shot to the UFC without actually saying anything about the UFC. You start a division that Dana White's talking about starting and just do it before they do. So any thoughts about adding an atomweight division? I follow my man Mike Heck. He suggested this Adam White thing last fall. It just shows you that I follow everything. Look, I think it's a good idea. No, I'm being serious. I think it's a good idea. The question is, you know, timing and talent. We had such an abundance of existing fighters from Bellator that we wanted to make happy that we didn't think that was fair. right there are no adam weight and bellator um it's no secret from fans on this show that bellator fighters have said i would like more fights we did everything we could to get at the most fights we could the last thing we wanted to do was work on some

adam weight stuff and distract ourselves until we did everything we could on the existing fighters we had all right thank you terence it's a good question people love the adam weights they really do I love it. I love it. I'm nothing but positive on that. It's just a matter of timing and a matter of really trying to serve the fighters we had in the best way we could. Lazybed asked, can we expect more crossover with PFL and Riyadh season? I think you'll see more in Saudi Arabia. You know, that's more a broad answer than Riyadh season, right?

Read season is a specific part of Saudi Arabia. that's done with General Entertainment Authority. There's several other groups in Saudi Arabia. There's Jeddah season. There's the Minister of Sport. So there's different groups that put on different events in Saudi Arabia. So, for example, last year, we did champs v. champs with Riyadh's season. We did Battle of the Giants, Francis Nagano, with the Minister of Sport.

In addition, we put on four PFL MENA events. in region with other partners. So more in Saudi Arabia, yes, but I think you'll see PFL continue to put together a tapestry of partners and work with a wide variety of partners, not just in Saudi Arabia, but the region. As you know, next Saturday on the 25th, we're the first MMA company of import, of major import, to come to Dubai. That's with the minister of sport, the Dubai Sports Authority, and the Council of Dubai, Big new three-year partnership in Dubai.

So we're working, call it pan-regionally now, beyond Saudi, to call it B with PFL Mid-East and with the champion series to bring more events to the region, even outside of Saudi. Thank you, Lazybed, my man. What else we got? He'd watch Pacheco Cyborg again. I think we all would watch that fight again. That was a great point. Can't wait. Jed Mishu, as Minister of Fun, would raise so much awareness.

So Jed's trying to get a job here as the Minister of Fun for the professional fighters. I don't know if you have an opening for that. Hired. Hired. You don't have that job. Let's put this way. Certainly not my job. That ain't my job.

I don't have the Minister of Fun. Nobody wants my job this week. Nobody wants that. So Jed could be the Minister of Fun. Hired. Speaking of, JD, I have great respect to Don for doing this once again. Thank you, sir. So speaking of fun, you know what's fun in sports, Don?

Trades. Trades are fun. And Dakota Ditchova, who you mentioned earlier, she's a rising star, recently was on a serious XM program, MMA today. And she heard some rumor and innuendo that the UFC had asked for a trade to bring Dakota to the UFC. Don, this is the trust circle. We're among friends.

It's just you and I. Is there any truth to this or is this just rumor and innuendo? Yeah, look, part of what I said earlier is, you know, if that had happened, I wouldn't say that it happened. I want to have a great working relationship with every partner in the entire world. And I would never share what discussions we did or didn't have with them because I'd want to have more of them. So I wouldn't tell you. If it had happened, we would have said no. But I wouldn't tell you if it had happened or not.

Okay. I had to ask. All right, Casey. Back to the peeps. AZ-Rave videos. Can we get a stat website similar to UFC stats or fight metric for PFL that the public can have access to? That way, analysts can have more information on fighters and their skills. You like this question. No, this is a smart question and a good question.

You know, I love when fans are also smart about the business. we, PFL need to do better job on our website and on our app in many ways. We will launch by April 15th a new app and a new website that includes what Superchat is asking for and more. We have a version 0.5, I like to say. I don't want to give us credit for 1.0. and I believe we'll have a version of 2.0. Sonic will go from 0.5 to 2.0 mid-April. And it will have this and more.

Stay tuned, look for it. All right. Thank you, Azey Raychats. Good question. What else we got? Jose, any plans for PFL events in Brazil? Hey, good question. Not this year.

So not 2025, but Brazil, great market. Chris Cyborg, a legend. PFL Latin America coming. So in the future, yes. This year, no. All right. Thank you, Jose. And I will add this year for Jose, 30 events this year, 22 are outside the United States. 22 are outside the United States. So we are really super serving those who are not served by UFC. So are we going places we are? We will be in Nigeria this year, for example. So we are not just in Dubai, but Nigeria.

We will also be in some other new places. So Brazil, we will get there. We want to be where the fans are, just not this year for Brazil. What is PFL doing between January 24th card and April, which I assume is the start of the World Tournament season. I'm not on vacation. I have had three days off, unfortunately in 2024. You know, I honestly just in two ways because the fans want to know about fights

and then want to know what the heck do you guys do? You know, like, what are you doing? So one, the first season fight is April 3rd. That's the tournament fight. The other fight schedule will be announcing includes the champion series that will start in May. PFL Europe, that will start in April. PFL Africa, that will start in May. PFL Mid-East, that will start in April.

So call it the 30 events really hit heavy between April and December of this year. So in terms of events, February and March, we'll be light. That's just how this year worked out. And that was because what I'm going to say number two is we were making a lot of changes. You heard that I said, look for new things, look for new learnings, look for new innovations, look for improvements. So when we finished up, call it a day after Thanksgiving, I spent Thanksgiving dinner in Saudi Arabia. we started work. And the work was everything you're now seeing us roll out.

That work was with fighters. That work was with product. That work was with technology. That work was with production. That work was in terms of scheduling. So that's all the stuff we were doing in order to get ready for everything that you're now seeing from us. So one thing I was kind of confused about and maybe we get some clarity here is, you know,

in all the releases and all the different things. And I've kind of like joked about it from time to time saying like, well, now we let's just happen. Did I freeze? I'm back. Okay. Sorry about that. Mike's back. We're back.

Yes, I froze. I don't know how that happened. But I have a joke about it like, oh, we have PFL Road to Dubai champion series starring Bellator champion Usman or Magamatov. And then I saw in the release like we want to preserve the Bellator history by keeping the belator name when it comes to title fights essentially, something to that. effect. Why? Why? Why do that? Why, why not just make them PFL world champions? Yeah, no, going forward, they'll be PFL world champions, but people hold bellets. People hold belts. Johnny,

Johnny holds it a belt. These belts are legitimate. Those belts don't go away. And until somebody beats them, they hold that belt. Right. And so over time, there will be people. PFL world champions and only PFL world champions. That's correct. But until we get there, there's many battles to be had, many scores to be settled in a fair way. And so you're right. If there is a vacant Bellator title, we're not going to crown that. But if you are a current Bellator title holder, that's yours.

You're in line. So until you face a BFL title holder, you've got that. You've got that. And we have to respect that and that's going to be respected. And then number two, there's a ton of history here. I know other companies have bought other companies and thrown that history overboard. Whitewashed it. We're not going to do that.

We're launching a new fast channel. And Bellator is front and center equal to PFL on the fast channel. You're going to be able to search and find and all the fighters and all the history and all the content and great fights you want to see just like you would be a foul. So there's a lot of what has to happen out of respect for a company to put on. 301 events and have some of the greatest fighters in history. And we're going to continue to do that. Okay. All right.

Next question. Matt, Don, not every promotion is perfect. What is something that you do not like about PFL that you would change, that you've gotten pushback on? I know you've touched on some of those things, but anything else you want to share.

So I'm hesitant to swim in this pond because when I do, boy, people go, ah, Man, look, there, you guys, man, it's hard. You guys, look, we're doing something that there's no other premium MMA company left in the world. UFC's worth $15, $20 billion, right? People, this is hard.

So every week there's something that we want to do better and different. UFC's been around 30 years and there's no other company that has distribution in 190 countries. We have 82 fighters now in the top 300 in the world. UFC has 192. All other companies added together have eight. So do we take ground every week? Yes. Do we make mistakes every week?

Yes. So I'm being serious. We're relentless. We work our ass off. Nobody sits around. And, you know, I don't even, last year I only got to go to, I missed five of our events because I had to do other work. It sucks. You know, and people then are going to go on Reddit and say, Don didn't even go to five of us.

It's events because he doesn't like MMA. No, you know, I missed five of our events because I had so much freaking work that had to get done to build the company. Remember, Dana doesn't have to do all the stuff. He's owned by Endeavor. Endeavor has a head of sponsorship, ahead of sales. They don't raise money. They don't. Dana gets to promote and make fights.

A lot of stuff we got to do in our company that we and the fans don't. It's not just about the fights. So I love our fights. But even then, I missed five of our fights last year. I'd be other parts of the world doing stuff to build the company so that fighters can fight, fans can watch. commercial partners, you know, had success. But that's simply, what would I change?

You know, I would just change, I would just change that fans and fighters said, man, those guys are flipping working their ass off for us. And maybe I'll cut them a break. I'm being honest, right? That's the one thing. Now, what would I change about the work we do? There's a hundred things. We never say we're good here.

We always say, what can we do better? We don't ever get complacent. So that's what we do internally. Now, if we go on social media or we do press, we talk about things we're proud of. But when we're sitting around internally, we always say, what can we do better? Every day.

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Conditions and exclusions apply. So, I mean, you've mentioned about the changes this year has brought. You guys are very busy. You're doing a million things. Things are ramping up heading in 2025. We've obviously had conversations with managers about different things. So has, is there talk at least, has there been restructuring of fighter contracts that have been going on here? We've heard some things.

And who's to know what's true or what's not? You brought it up earlier. It's not black and white. It's gray. You might hear one side of the story, but that may not be the whole truth. So, and it's part of business, right? Has there had to, have you had to put yourselves in a position where you have to restructure some of these deals? Because, and I guess to add to that, rumored innuendo, before you guys absorb Bellator,

some of these fighters were signed to bigger contracts. So I don't know what you can talk about and what you can't. but have you had to restructure some things in order to make this work, I guess, is the fair way to ask it? Yeah, I think the only thing that would be appropriate for me to say, because I want to be, because I hope people would come to know me to be is transparent when I answer things. So I can tell you two things. One, the overall money that we are spending on fighters this year is more than last year. And last year was more than the year before.

So if you want to say, is PFL the company reducing fighters overall? No. Are some individual fighters perhaps having the option of do you want your economically and where you are, not where you need to be? And do you want to stay here or do you want to leave? And do you want to go somewhere else? Yes. But overall, there's a lot of money being spent. by PFL this year.

But individually, are there some people who are going to say, if you do better elsewhere, okay. But this is what we can do here. And that's happening in some places. Okay. All right. Next question. We got about eight minutes.

So let's fire away here. Tanvir, hi, Don. Will the PFL champion series keep airing on max past 125? Also, will PFL Europe be available to watch in the United States? Wow. get deeper in the hour. People are now, man, now you guys are getting into my job. Now these are now, right? We're going from fan questions to company questions. I'll come back every quarter, guys. All right. Now we're rolling. Let's get into the PFL together. Two really smart

questions. Okay, number one, no. There will be new distribution, new distribution for the PFL champion series. And it's better. That's number one. Number two, will PFL Europe be available to watch in the U.S.? That also applies to PFL Africa and PFL Mid-East, although Europe obviously are sexier, bigger cards right now, Cedric Dumbay, et cetera. We are working on that. And by the way, we've been working on that for six months. I hope that is a yes. But that I cannot tell you when, Well, first of all, it's going to happen. It's definitively going to happen, but I can't tell you when the second thing is going to happen. It will happen in 2025, but I can't tell you my hope is it happens before the debut of the season,

but I can't definitively tell you that yet. Okay. What are we going to know when the distribution for the upcoming events outside of this next week's? Before they happen. What an answer. Unbelievable. All right. Next question.

Oh, I get a good one. When you have to tell yourself that, you must. Don, could we possibly see no more uniform fight kits and fighters be allowed to wear sponsors once again? Okay. So this is a really good question. Now, remember, in the tournament, because it's a tournament, we do have quality uniform. The tournament will still have a form of a uniform. They do have sponsors, though.

just to dispel that. They have a spot on their tournament uniform that they sell a sponsorship patch, and they get to keep all that money. So just, that's always been true for us. Number two, outside of the tournament is a different system. And there'll be, you know, different opportunities, and it's not quite, as you call it as uniform as it was before. As I've always said, one-off fights, whether they're super fights or champion series fights, those are all different. the tournament behaves more like the league, like a Premier League or the NBA League so that the kid will be different.

That was a good one, Lazy Ben. You were right. Nailed it. All right, take a couple more. Let's fire these away. Izzy, any plans for a Jake Paul fight in 2025? I figured this is coming at some point. So get this, guys. I talked to Nikisa an hour ago.

Oh. The point is, yeah, I talked to Nikisa an hour ago. Two things are happening. Jake is super successful in boxing. Whether you love Jake or hate Jake, We can all agree that guy's the man when it comes to generating attention and revenue and viewership with his boxing career. And it's more successful when we signed him on the boxing side. That has delayed MMA.

That's delayed MMA because he's killing it on the boxing side. So will MMA happen with PFL? Yes, it will. Has it been delayed? Yes, it has. My guess is fall of this year. but I don't think it's going to be before then. He's got so many things going on in boxing.

Yeah, it's kind of what they told us as well. We did a little roundtable with him last month and Nekisa and Amanda in Orlando. And he's basically like, listen to there. I got a box. I got a box. So it could be maybe later this year, maybe 2026, but he's planning on doing it.

He's going to do it. And by the way, every time you've asked me or Nikisa or Jake, we've probably given similar answers without coordinating. We thought for sure it was 2024 fall. Like when we were at the end of 2023, nobody saw this Tyson thing happening. He didn't see it.

We didn't see it. So you know what I'm saying? There's certain things that you just don't see comment. And that's what delayed everything. They had said something like, it seemed like they want it's Nate Diaz or bust at this point. And maybe that changes. We'll see who kind of shines.

but do you kind of share that perspective right now or do you think that the name really doesn't matter at the end of the day he just wants to get in there and do MMA? No, no. No and no. I don't think it's an ATS robust. I think there's other opportunities. But it matters. The opponent matters, right?

The opponent always matters. Jake is brilliant at picking opponents. So, of course, it matters who the name. name and the opponent is. But I think there's a broader set than Nate DS. How big is that set? Four, maybe three. Not a lot, but it's broader than Nate. Okay. All right. We got like three minutes left. Casey, fire away. John, what is the current situation with Aaron Pico? We touched on this earlier. You wanted to schedule a title fight, Patricia Pitbull versus Aaron Pico. Patricia Pitbull is obviously no longer with the organization leaves Aaron Pico kind of in limbo.

You said you were working on some stuff. There was talks about him being a free agent, but you want to keep him, all this stuff. So what is, what can you tell us about what's going on with Aaron Pico right now? Yeah, I think Aaron is one guy who is currently not yet a free agent, but is in an exclusive period. You know, I hope I'm not giving anything incorrect. Or other words, I don't believe he has fights left on his contract with us. I know we're working on new opportunities with him. I know we'd like him to stay, but I do not believe he has fights.

I think he's in a negotiation window with us. That's what I believe the status is. Do we want him to stay obviously? Would we like a new contract with him, obviously? He's an up-and-coming star. Is he a big name to all of us on this call? Yeah. Do broader fans know him yet?

No, probably not. but he's fantastic, so we'd like him to stay. I don't know if that's going to be possible, right? You know, given pit bull and some other stuff, you know, taking a few opportunities off the board. But we're going to work really hard on it. Aaron Pekyll's a damn good fighter. He's very, very good.

Awesome. And a great person. Yeah, enjoy speaking with him. All right, one more, Casey. Last one. Oscar Willis. Don looks like Mike's dad, but with hair. Well, hey, is that good or bad?

You guys, is I good or bad? I don't know. Oscar, you're a man. My dad is also bald. So I have three brothers. They all have hair. I made one too many dad your bald jokes and lost the battle. And I've just kind of accepted it.

So yeah, my dad is, my dad is me. But just, you know, 30 years old. So I have to ask the fans, what do you guys think about heck wearing a real tie? Not a fake tie, but a real tie. He's trying really hard here. Pretty legit. Okay. And then for everybody out there, I hope I answer your questions.

I'm trying to let you know how hard we're working for you. I know you'll go out there and say this Don doesn't watch enough MMA. You know, you'll find something jack me on again. And I love you all. And believe me, I watch a shitload of MMA. But 25th, you've got to watch Kabeeb Connor's protege. You have to watch it. It's going to be fantastic.

And if you're not yet a diehard fan, give us another shot. We're here for you. Yeah, that's going to be a great fight that is coming down the pipe next weekend. It's just going to come real quick. January 25th. Well, there's Paul Hughes. All you guys who are curious, this Paul Hughes, no moment is too big in his mind. It's all you know, it's one thing to be a great fighter.

It's another thing to have the mindset that you don't think anybody or any moment. moment is too big for you. And that's very rare. That is very, very rare. He told me, I can take AJ. Our matchmakers weren't sure. They said, Don, we're going to ruin Paul Hughes. It's too much too soon. Don, the UFC wouldn't do this. Don, they'd give him two or three fights. Paul Hughes told me, Don, no problem. Now, did I think he was going to beat AJ? I don't know. But I thought it was going to be close because Paul Hughes said no problem. This guy, no moment, no fighter, he believes is too big for him. That is so rare and cannot be taught. Fighting skills, yes. Experience, yes. Those can be taught. But that thing is great about him. So do not miss big news, January 25th. Wow. Great fight. Real quick,

Vadim Nemcoff fighting Tim Johnson on this car. He's not fighting Corey Anderson. We've heard Corey's side. We've heard Vadeem side. We've heard Vadeem side. somewhat. I don't think we released that yet, but what happened with that from your perspective? You know, kind of everything that everybody said was going to happen. You know, just what they said, we wanted the fight to happen. Nemcoff said, no, I don't, you know, I don't believe I have enough time to train. You know, some fighters, you know, and he said, no, I'm not going to do it. I'm not going to do it.

But he said yes to Tim Johnson. Well, now we offer my, you know what I'm saying? He goes, I'm not going to do it. So do I think he should have done it? Of course. Do I think he had enough time to train? Of course. But I'm not the one fighting.

So have I seen fighters take opponents on shorter notice? Of course. Have I seen a title? If I seen big time, bigger fights than that on shorter notice? Of course, we all have. We can't force him to do anything. He didn't want to do it. So, you know, Corey's now mad at us.

you know, back to, you know, we don't go out there and say, I mean, Corey's bad at us. We're not booking him a fight, you know, what do you all me do? You know, we sat there for three weeks. We offered people more money. We offered consent. What do you? What do you do?

What am I going to fight you? Says no. And everybody says, how can you're not putting out a new fight? Well, because we're working for three weeks to try to get Nemcoff to fight you, right? So to me, I am bummed out. I'm bummed out. It's not good for fans. It's not good for business to not have Corey Anderson, Nemcoff fighting.

Couldn't do anything about it. Huge bummer. So everything you guys are all thinking, I'm thinking. So everything you would be doing, that you're a tweet now and writing on Reddit? Yeah, I'm doing it. You know, just don't want to, you know, talk about it all the time. So I'm super bummed.

So do I love Nemcoff as a fighter? Yes. Am I going to love Nemcov for Air Sunday? Yes. Do I like him denying the fight? No. That is what it is. It's the fight game.

It is what it is. And Don, uh, thank you for coming back and doing this. I hope we can, you said quarterly, I, I'm going to take you at your word, or at least as many of these as we can. I think people really appreciate this. And, you know, whether people are tough on you or not, I think it shows a lot. That's life, man. That's life, man.

I'll be, I'll be back here. All they got to know is we are doing everything we can to get better. And this world tournament is going to be a plus plus. I really think we've got it in terms of something different. something exciting and something that just puts the fighter in control, right? Once we set the roster, man, it is go. And that is going to be a powerful five months. I cannot wait and I hope you guys love it.

All right. There is Don Davis. Airy, PFL founder and chairman joining us for town hall number two. We do have another town hall coming up on Monday, believe it or not, with founder of an organization we talked about earlier. So stay tuned for that. I know there's going to be a million questions there, but no one can replace Don Davis.

That's all I can say. So thank you all very much. You appreciate that. Stick with us at M.AFighting.com for all the craziness this week. And on the road to Dubai, pun completely intended with Uso and Ramaga made off taking on Paul Hughes. I am Mike Hack. Thank you so much.

We're out of here. Listening to the Vox Media Podcast Network.