Best current KB promotions?

A smaller promotion like Superkombat is on tv in their home country in Romanian language, but they make a successful effort to get on tv in North America and elsewhere. It would be nice for the rest of us if Kunlun or K-1 made the minimal effort and marginal expense to also do so, even if the cards were tape delayed and in HD rather than just ignoring the rest of the world.
 
JimGunn said:
I can't quibble with most of this except I can't help but grade promotions like Kunlun and K-1 on a curve in terms of them as an entertainment product- as good as their roster and fights are- by penalizing them at least a letter grade for not catering to the international audience at all in terms of intelligible commentary or tv broadcast or streaming availability around the world. And Bellator Kickboxing, I think D is a little harsh. They only have four cards per year, so it's not a really busy promotion, and the tape delays suck, but they do have some good fighters, especially the most recent card. And at least I can watch it in tv here in the U.S.. I'd upgrade them to a C perhaps.
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So in other words, they should start doing what has tanked many promotions in the past.
 
I rather listen to japanese commentary than to Todd Grisham.
 
Kunlun and K-1 both do some dumb shit when it comes to the international accessibility but they're still both better than Bellator is for most? Don't think I have any legitimate way of watching BellaKB whereas the K promotions are both delayed on youtube at least. +if you really want to, you can watch them both live whilst Bellator buries their videos in the woods for 2 weeks.
 
Yodsanan said:
I rather listen to japanese commentary than to Todd Grisham.
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yeah me too no doubt.

the point about grading a promotion based on having english commentary doesn't make sense to me. like I said in another thread IMO it's best to mute the fight and put on some good music in the background than listening to misinformation and biased commentary.
 
Snubnoze707 said:
So in other words, they should start doing what has tanked many promotions in the past.
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No, that's a silly comment. They should keep doing exactly what they are doing in their home countries and native language and keep being successful at it, and also make the tinniest of efforts to make business deals to license their broadcasts for television internationally or set up a stream for fans outside their home countries on iPPV or Fight Pass whatever. It's not an either/or proposition and it would be easy and inexpensive to do this. If you're in the content creation business you would think that the leadership would take advantage of every opportunity for additional revenue since it takes nothing away from the core audience.
 
Shadess said:
Kunlun and K-1 both do some dumb shit when it comes to the international accessibility but they're still both better than Bellator is for most? Don't think I have any legitimate way of watching BellaKB whereas the K promotions are both delayed on youtube at least. +if you really want to, you can watch them both live whilst Bellator buries their videos in the woods for 2 weeks.
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Bellator Kickboxing 7 that happened two weekends ago is on Spike TV tonight in the U.S. and I suppose one could find a stream for that if outside the U.S.. I believe the fights will end up on Bellator's YouTube pretty soon as well. I agree that the long tape delay is completely unnecessary, but Bellator only does four cards per year so it is what it is.
 
Kunlun could use a better website, one that had the same content their app has. No real reason the streams couldn't be watched through the website with the same account...and add paypal or similar as a payment option on desktop.

They also do English commentary but think usually delayed and maybe they don't own it but Fox Sports does. Still one would imagine they could get their hands on that audio track with a little negotiating.
 
JimGunn said:
I can't quibble with most of this except I can't help but grade promotions like Kunlun and K-1 on a curve in terms of them as an entertainment product- as good as their roster and fights are- by penalizing them at least a letter grade for not catering to the international audience at all in terms of intelligible commentary or tv broadcast or streaming availability around the world. And Bellator Kickboxing, I think D is a little harsh. They only have four cards per year, so it's not a really busy promotion, and the tape delays suck, but they do have some good fighters, especially the most recent card. And at least I can watch it in tv here in the U.S.. I'd upgrade them to a C perhaps.
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I don't get this idea behind degrading Chinese and Japanese promotions for not doing English broadcasts when Glory has practically no Chinese or Japanese coverage. Last I checked, there are millions of Chinese and Japanese kickboxing fans and maybe 200 American ones.

Heck, forget the fact that there's effectively no way of legally watching live Glory in Japan and the fact that Glory locks half its library up behind a paywall. Glory doesn't even get press coverage here. The biggest fighting news site here has done maybe 3 articles about Glory in the past year.
 
Shadess said:
Kunlun could use a better website, one that had the same content their app has. No real reason the streams couldn't be watched through the website with the same account...and add paypal or similar as a payment option on desktop.

They also do English commentary but think usually delayed and maybe they don't own it but Fox Sports does. Still one would imagine they could get their hands on that audio track with a little negotiating.
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Really? Is that Fox Sports in Asia you are referring to? Who is watching Kunlun in English in Asia- people in Singapore or something like that?
 
Karaev fan said:
I don't get this idea behind degrading Chinese and Japanese promotions for not doing English broadcasts when Glory has practically no Chinese or Japanese coverage. Last I checked, there are millions of Chinese and Japanese kickboxing fans and maybe 200 American ones.

Heck, forget the fact that there's effectively no way of legally watching live Glory in Japan and the fact that Glory locks half its library up behind a paywall. Glory doesn't even get press coverage here. The biggest fighting news site here has done maybe 3 articles about Glory in the past year.
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Well, the smart-ass answer to your question would be that I consider myself to be the center of the universe and that I selfishly want everything I am interested in to cater to me. But, beyond that, surely you recognize that English as an additional language is in effect the lingua franca of the modern world and would allow many, many millions of people around the world other than the home audience to enjoy their product, just like there are people from many different countries communicating in this forum on Sherdog whose native language isn't English.

I think a good example to monetize this would be Rizin FF, a Japanese MMA promotion, which is based in Japan and broadcasts in Japanese and relies on Japanese television ratings, yet they know that they have a cult following around the world for their few times per year cards, so they made a deal with Fite.tv to stream their cards live in English as a iPPV for like $20 per show and hired Heath Herring and some other people to do commentary for them. That, or make a deal with a secondary North American sports network like CBS SN like Superkombat did to broadcast their cards on tape delay for whatever additional revenue that brings.
 
Karaev fan said:
Heck, forget the fact that there's effectively no way of legally watching live Glory in Japan and the fact that Glory locks half its library up behind a paywall.
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Pretty sure you can watch glory over DAZN in japan.
 
Shadess said:
Think so yea.
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Time to post a gig offer on Craigslist Singapore or the equivalent to see if i can get someone to record those for me and put them on my Dropbox.
 
JimGunn said:
Well, the smart-ass answer to your question would be that I consider myself to be the center of the universe and that I selfishly want everything I am interested in to cater to me. But, beyond that, surely you recognize that English as an additional language is in effect the lingua franca of the modern world and would allow many, many millions of people around the world other than the home audience to enjoy their product, just like there are people from many different countries communicating in this forum on Sherdog whose native language isn't English.

I think a good example to monetize this would be Rizin FF, a Japanese MMA promotion, which is based in Japan and broadcasts in Japanese and relies on Japanese television ratings, yet they know that they have a cult following around the world for their few times per year cards, so they made a deal with Fite.tv to stream their cards live in English as a iPPV for like $20 per show and hired Heath Herring and some other people to do commentary for them. That, or make a deal with a secondary North American sports network like CBS SN like Superkombat did to broadcast their cards on tape delay for whatever additional revenue that brings.
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SuperKombat and RIZIN? These are the benchmarks you bring up?

The sad fact is that the healthier a promotion is, the less they are interested in expanding overseas. When PRIDE's business model collapsed with their TV termination, they pivoted towards the overseas market and selling PPVs. That failed. When FEG started to go down the drain, they set up the HDNet deal, started showing a lot more stuff on Youtube with English subtitles. That failed. The more the home market collapses, the more dedicated these promotions start deluding themselves that they actually might have a huge potential overseas and if they can just crack the US like the UFC did with TUF, they can get that hail mary that saves their promotion.

SK lost its talent to Respect. RIZIN has been bombing in the ratings since day 1. Their overseas effort isn't an earnest investment in growing the market abroad or a sound monetization strategy. Its the flailings of a drowning man.
 
Karaev fan said:
SuperKombat and RIZIN? These are the benchmarks you bring up?

The sad fact is that the healthier a promotion is, the less they are interested in expanding overseas. When PRIDE's business model collapsed with their TV termination, they pivoted towards the overseas market and selling PPVs. That failed. When FEG started to go down the drain, they set up the HDNet deal, started showing a lot more stuff on Youtube with English subtitles. That failed. The more the home market collapses, the more dedicated these promotions start deluding themselves that they actually might have a huge potential overseas and if they can just crack the US like the UFC did with TUF, they can get that hail mary that saves their promotion.

SK lost its talent to Respect. RIZIN has been bombing in the ratings since day 1. Their overseas effort isn't an earnest investment in growing the market abroad or a sound monetization strategy. Its the flailings of a drowning man.
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You keep talking like it's one or the other. Focusing on your home country OR overseas is a false dichotomy. When you're in the content production and licensing business you should be selling your content everywhere possible for additional and incremental revenue. Doesn't matter if it's a kickboxing promotion, a big budget Hollywood movie production company, a low budget horror movie, a political documentary, or a porn movie parody. You've already done the work and spent the money for the up-front and sunk costs, why would you not try to sell or license it in every territory overseas and every country possible around the world in addition to your primary home market?

Each additional license sold to a terrestrial tv station, a cable tv station, or online platform is nearly pure profit. The UFC license their content to many different countries around the world. Glory CEO Jon Franklin was talking in a recent interview I posted about how they managed to license recent Glory cards like Collision to terrestrial tv stations even in smaller markets like Morroco and North Africa, plus they have deals in South America and Europe and all kinds of countries. It all adds up to make up a greater whole. These Asian promotions are run by bad business men or are xenophobic perhaps. There is no business explanation for ignoring the incremental revenue they could earn from international tv or online licensing.
 
Mafanofe said:
The promotions classification IMO

A Class: Kunlun,Glory,K-1

B+ Class: KRUSH,W5,ACB-KB,WFL,Enfusion

B Class: GoH,A1,FFC,Mix Fight Gala,Wu Lin Feng,Fight League,Fight Night Saint Tropez,Superkombat,HERO LEGENDS,RISE

C+ Class: Emei Legend,Fight League,WGP Kickboxing,KOK

D Class: Bellator kickboxing
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Is Bellator kickboxing really that bad? lol
 
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