UFC up for sale?

[Nemesis21]

http://espn.go.com/mma/story/_/id/15503004/ufc-owners-advanced-talks-sell-promotion

[REDDzone]

This talk comes up about once a year or so. Not sure I've ever seen anything this seemingly credible though.

Who knows how this could go? UFC makes so many unprofessional decisions imo but then again they have been head and shoulders above the rest for years and years.

[REDDzone]

100% credible if Ariel is re-tweeting and tweeting about it:

[tweet]https://twitter.com/arielhelwani/status/730186345096851458[/tweet]

[Headliner]

I'd have to imagine they would keep some sort of share of the company, maybe a 5-10% stack, but at 3 billion who knows.
That's insane money, but I sort of hope for it to go down in a way because you know fighter pay will increase afterward,

[REDDzone]

See I'd think the opposite. The buyer would want the Fertittas gone, for sure. I have to imagine that Dana's inclusion/departure would be a huge part of the negotiations, for transitional purposes. Probably stay on for a set amount of time.

[Jasen777]

you know fighter pay will increase afterward,

Would not take that as a given.

[Headliner]

you know fighter pay will increase afterward,

Would not take that as a given.

Maybe not, but I would certainly hope so.
I'd have to imagine they'd be smart enough to realize increasing fighters salaries will lead to better fights (people won't have to work side jobs ) and less competition. Basically running anyone else into the ground, but who knows.

[CPT]

If you're buying something for $3-4 billion dollars, you're probably trying to squeeze as much out of it as you can to make that money back. It's being purchased by some corporate entity, and being evaluated as an asset.

Increasing salaries in order to attract talent in order to create better fights in order to attract more fans is a very slow burn.

The UFC has basically been playing with house money for years and they still nickel and dime everything.

Maybe someone more well versed in economics can set it straight, but I think it's just as, if not more, likely that the new owners will be even more tight-fisted than Dana & the Fertittas, who I truly believe started out as fans, like being friends with fighters, etc.

All speculation at this point, but I could see this being bad for fans and fighters just as easily as it could be good.

[REDDzone]

Anything is obviously speculation, but the HW title challenger of this weekend's main event on ppv literally works a fulltime job that has nothing to do with fighting (last I checked), its hard to imagine that it could get worse.

[Wo1verine]

Chinese corporation, really? Would have thought someone like Fox or Comcast etc

Dana White potentially leaving would makes things a little more boring in my opinion.

[cowboyronnie]

They have seen some sort of gap between what is payed-out versus what can be brought in, no? They're looking to increase revenue or decrease expenses, if this is anything other than a really long-term investment?

[lilfishi22]

It's hard to see a scenario where the salary would go up fairly. If it's true the UFC are looking to sell, they would've provided forecast figures to prospective buyers. Those forecast would look more attractive in the long run if they keep the projected salary increases (and other expenses) as low as possible. If a buyer buys into this then they will have an expectation on profit which means they will keep salary increases at a low level for the forseeable future.

As much as we harp on about how much Dana and the Ferttitas nickel and dime everything, including fighter salary, those guys are genuinely passionate about the sport. An indifferent buyer looking at the the UFC purely as an investment would not be a good outcome for fighter pay in my opinion.

[NO-KG-AI]

you know fighter pay will increase afterward,

Would not take that as a given.

Maybe not, but I would certainly hope so.
I'd have to imagine they'd be smart enough to realize increasing fighters salaries will lead to better fights (people won't have to work side jobs ) and less competition. Basically running anyone else into the ground, but who knows.

Also I think if pay becomes really high, you start to see stud athletes wanting to fight a lot more often, and just more and more capable people become involved with the sport at earlier ages.

I'd hope if it were sold it would go to someone with the forward thinking to realize the more well taken care of the fighters are, the better off the sport becomes because of it.


Sent from my iPhone using RealGM Forums

[Headliner]

It's hard to see a scenario where the salary would go up fairly. If it's true the UFC are looking to sell, they would've provided forecast figures to prospective buyers. Those forecast would look more attractive in the long run if they keep the projected salary increases (and other expenses) as low as possible. If a buyer buys into this then they will have an expectation on profit which means they will keep salary increases at a low level for the forseeable future.

As much as we harp on about how much Dana and the Ferttitas nickel and dime everything, including fighter salary, those guys are genuinely passionate about the sport. An indifferent buyer looking at the the UFC purely as an investment would not be a good outcome for fighter pay in my opinion.

People said the same thing about Ted Turner when he purchased WCW. Vince...the guy who grew up with the fighters and was genuinely passionate about the sport, paid his wrestlers nothing, nickle and dimed them for decades. Ted Turner came in with billionaire pockets, no real love or understanding of the sport, and paid ridiculous prices to make guys happy, and try and cripple the competition by out pricing the market. The wrestlers were happy, and the talent went there.

Billionaires, even corporations, will understand that sometimes you need to pay more to get more. In this case, the quality of fights will improve if you pay guys more money.

Even if they wanted to balance the books a little, cut the number of fights. I went to a fight night here in Halifax, and it started at like 4 o'clock and went to like midnight. It was ridiculous. Instead of having 16 guys on the card making 8k, just have 8 guys making 16k.

Even if they min salaried a fight at 20k, they really would change the entire sport and it would minimally effect their bottom line over the course of a whole year. Those new fighters making 20k, if they fought twice a year would make more than they would doing hard labour jobs, so they could really devote themselves for one year to training. If they flub, go back to laying brick.

[Cammo101]

Ted Turner ran WCW into the ground with those large contracts.

[spykelee]

I would think most prospective buyers would want to keep the Fertitas and Dana in place. These guys have built this business up to what it is today and have an intricate understanding of how it works. I bet you probably see somebody buy a stake in the company but be largely behind the curtain owners.

Outside of the group from Asia who could and probably do have asian expansion on the mind, I don't see a lot of interest from folks who would look to run the business, day to day.

[Headliner]

Ted Turner ran WCW into the ground with those large contracts.

No he didn't. You just made something up out of no where.

Ted Turner was ousted by the board during the merger of Aol and Time Warner, because he didn't want to sell. Steve Case was furious that Turner tried to block the merger, and when he was put in charge, he sold off the entities which Ted loved, WCW, the braves, the Hawks, the Falcons etc.
Plus wrestling was still pretty crude at that time, ECW was huge, they were having thumb tack and flaming table matches. Many of the big wigs didn't want to be associated with them, and said they weren't going to have them on TBS anymore..despite nitro being one of the top shows on television. They then sold it for pennies after Bischoff, the jarretts and others tried to buy it.

Ted Turner was a beast.

[cowboyronnie]

Will Cammo amend his stupid, reactive position on fighter pay in light of clarified evidence? Not a **** chance.

Do you.

[Cammo101]

Will Cammo amend his stupid, reactive position on fighter pay in light of clarified evidence? Not a **** chance.

Do you.

First of all, I took no side here on fighter pay. I'm very much in favor of fighters being paid better.

Second of all, it was 100% those bloated bad contracts Turner and his people gave to aging stars that was the reason the suits called it quits. Turner bought WCW, paid a bunch of washed up old guys way too much in an attempt to compete, and that was ultimately their demise. Turner tried to turn a Strikeforce into a UFC by overpaying, and it ended the same way in both situations. By the suits cutting bait.

The merger did kill WCW, that is true, because when mergers happen, the new people come in and look at the books and see what is and is not making money.

[Headliner]

Will Cammo amend his stupid, reactive position on fighter pay in light of clarified evidence? Not a **** chance.

Do you.

First of all, I took no side here on fighter pay. I'm very much in favor of fighters being paid better.

Second of all, it was 100% those bloated bad contracts Turner and his people gave to aging stars that was the reason the suits called it quits. Turner bought WCW, paid a bunch of washed up old guys way too much in an attempt to compete, and that was ultimately their demise. Turner tried to turn a Strikeforce into a UFC by overpaying, and it ended the same way in both situations. By the suits cutting bait.

The merger did kill WCW, that is true, because when mergers happen, the new people come in and look at the books and see what is and is not making money.

Like the Braves, Hawks and Thrashers? The Braves were 5 seasons removed from a world series win and still a playoff team that year.

WCW was sold because after the merger the new brass at the top did not want to be in the sports game. They told the brass at WCW that they were cutting them from TBS, which meant WCW, which was still getting ratings of 2.7 million viewers, with a huge grasp on a really important demographic of teen/young adult males, was going to be off TV. Which essentially would kill the company.

For clarity. WCW, had about an average of 2.6 in ratings in its final 4 months. The headline this week was "Wednesday cable ratings: NBA Playoffs continue to dominate". The ratings were 2.6 and 1.6. (GS/Por game, Mia/Raps game). WCW in it's prime, when they went out and spent all that money, had ratings of 5.7...which is insane at that time.

WCW's money problems were more managerial. They would fly the entire roster out for shows, that's 100 people, when only 20-40 people are ever used, max. That's managerial problems, not contractual issues. When Vince Russo came in he was trying to fix a lot of that stuff because he knew a lot of the behind the curtain stuff the WWE did. The other reason was bad storylines that didn't intrigue the audience. WWE was running Stone Cold, The Rock and Foley. They were on fire.

The only reason WCW is even mentioned in the history books is because they had big pocket books. They gained relevance by stealing all of the talent of WWF.

It's why salaries need to go up for the UFC. All it will take is one Billionaire that loves MMA to come in at the right time, and poach some really big names and the UFC is in trouble.