From the moment I first heard about the Global Fight League, it screamed ‘Ponzi scheme,’ more a get-rich-quick play than a legitimate attempt to create a sustainable business.
History has shown that most major MMA leagues, aside from the UFC, have failed due to unrealistic expectations and poor business practices. They paid too much in salaries and brought in too little revenue — an issue the GFL is already showing signs of repeating.
Here’s a quick look at the history:
• Pride Fighting Championship: Founded in 1997, purchased by the UFC in 2007, and shut down shortly after.
• Strikeforce: Started as a kickboxing promotion in 1985, transitioned to MMA in 2006, was acquired by UFC in 2011, and folded in 2013.
• World Extreme Cagefighting: Founded in 2001, bought by UFC in 2006, and shut down by 2010.
• Affliction Entertainment: Launched in 2008 with massive ambitions and high-profile investors, including Donald Trump and Michael Cohen. After just two events, it folded in early 2009.
• Bellator: Had a 15-year run starting in 2008, then its assets were acquired by the PFL in 2023, effectively ending the brand.
• International Fight League: Lasted only from 2006-2008.
• Elite XC: Ran from 2006-2008 before its parent company filed for bankruptcy.
• The PFL: Founded in 2012 as the World Series of Fighting, it’s one of the rare exceptions that has managed to survive.
While the PFL is MMA's No. 2 promotion, it’s also far from a success story. Founded in 2012 as the World Series of Fighting, it has failed to build anything close to the UFC’s fan base or financial power.
The PFL’s seasonal format is unique, but it has struggled to generate the kind of mainstream attention that the UFC consistently pulls. Despite its efforts to stand out, the PFL remains a distant second, lacking the global reach and cultural impact that UFC has established over the years.
The PFL’s acquisition of Bellator in 2023 was seen as a way to strengthen its position, but it hasn’t done much to boost its popularity. Just like every other MMA league before it, the PFL has encountered the brutal reality that UFC is the gold standard, and fighting for scraps at its feet is a losing battle.
Unlike the others, the WEC never tried to directly compete with the UFC. Instead, it carved out a niche promoting the lighter weight classes the UFC didn’t use, avoiding the pitfalls of others who tried to go toe-to-toe with the market leader.
Joe Camporeale/Imagn Images
Tony Ferguson was once one of the most popular MMA fighters in the world, but at 41 and on a long losing streak, is he really a ticket seller?
Yet, the majority of promotions, aside from the UFC and the PFL, have followed the same path: large-scale ambition, bad business decisions, and ultimate collapse.
At the UFC 314 post-fight news conference, UFC president/CEO Dana White was asked about the Global Fight League. His response? “I don’t know enough about the GFL to really speak on it, but this is a lot harder than it looks.”
The GFL recently announced that its first two events, scheduled for May 24-25, had been canceled due to lack of funding. Shocking, right? (Insert eye-roll emoji here.) This isn’t exactly a great first impression for an organization that claims to be different from the others.
The GFL’s plan was to lure older UFC veterans, mostly fighters over 35 who had already retired, with high salaries and guaranteed 50 percent of the revenue from each event. They also promised health insurance, injury insurance, and retirement benefits. In theory, it sounds like a good deal.
In reality, it was always destined to fail, not only because the UFC has become the 800-pound gorilla of the industry, but because the business model is inherently unsustainable.
Individual sports like fighting, golf and tennis have never worked in a team format. The Ryder Cup is one of golf’s greatest events, but it’s bi-annual.
LIV Golf has a team format and major champions like Brooks Koepka, Bryson Dechambeau, Phil Mickelson, Jon Rahm, Cam Smith and Dustin Johnson on its roster, but its TV ratings are minuscule.
World Team Tennis never met anyone forget the Australian Open, the French Open, Wimbledon or the U.S. Open.
It’s not impossible to create an MMA league that can challenge the UFC and be successful in the current environment, but it’s as unlikely as Tiger Woods overtaking Jack Nicklaus in major championship victories.
The UFC is a juggernaut that’s perfectly formatted for television, much like the NFL or the NBA. Individual sports like golf have never worked well in a team format. The Ryder Cup is a celebrated exception, but it is biannual and interest builds throughout the PGA Tour season.
And LIV Golf, despite its high-profile players, has struggled to generate meaningful fan interest and garners pitifully low TV ratings.
The UFC’s dominance is unquestioned, and the GFL’s attempts to mirror its success by offering high salaries, revenue sharing and lucrative pers like retirement and insurance benefits to aging veterans seems to ignore MMA’s sordid business history.
Those are extraordinarily costly and they’ve derailed almost every would-be major MMA promotion but the UFC.
GFL organizers have tried to use recognizable names such as Tony Ferguson and Anthony Pettis to attract attention, but ask yourself a serious question:
Are UFC fans begging to see either of them fight? Or, for that matter, Sage Northcutt, Chad Mendes or Uriah Hall?
Who is going to sell tickets? What are the fights that TV networks want to buy?
Without a solid business model, the GFL is building a house on sand.
The nostalgia that the GFL was relying on — the fans cared about mid-level UFC fighters 10 or more past their primes competing each other — is also inherently flawed.
It’s not just dangerous for these fighters to keep continuing at advanced ages, when their reflexes have diminished, it also misses the point of what fans want: Action-filled fights with meaning between the best in the world.
The Global Fight League has a lot of ambitious promises, but history shows that simply throwing money at fighters and offering unrealistic benefits does not a successful league make.
Whether it’s over-saturating the market or failing to bring in the necessary revenue, the GFL is following the same path that so many other organizations have walked before it. It’s a cycle the MMA world has seen too many times.
Unfortunately for the GFL, this time doesn’t look any different.
Will the Global Fight League ever put on a single event? I wouldn’t bet on it, and if it does, it’ll fold faster than Urban Meyer’s stint with the Jacksonville Jaguars.