What changes should be made to make Bellator give UFC a real run for the top spot?

[JGood456]

I started to think after BMMA 151 that Bellator could make some minor changes to their business practices and they could overcome the Ultimate Juggarnaught.

1. They had to offer some type of Performance Bonus, it would make those prelim fight that much better. Why you think UFC prelim even FP prelim fighter give it their all.

2 Televise the prelims, I'm sure they can find a network to broadcast the prelims, i.e. ESPN, CBSSports, etc.

I really think a performance bonus would Changee the quality of the fights. IMO fighters would go all out for $25K, especially hen you only making $800 - $1500 Show / $1000 - $2000 Win.

I got a few other ideas, but I'm curious to see what other think Bellator can do to change their business model. At the moment, I fell like it should be called Bellator MMA Entertainment or BMMA Sports Entertainment.

 

[Meathead Jock]

I like the business model at hand. They need to do a better job of getting their future big prospects on the freakshow fight cards though; also they just have to cross their fingers that 2 of the following 3 Ruth, Pico, Fortune live up to their potential.

 

[JGood456]

I like the business model at hand. They need to do a better job of getting their future big prospects on the freakshow fight cards though; also they just have to cross their fingers that 2 of the following 3 Ruth, Pico, Fortune live up to their potential.

I think they have plenty of talent, if they gave their fighters a little more incentive, i promise you Bellator would be much more exciting. Just watched the latest Victory FC an d they give fighters a bonus is the y finish them in the 1st or something like that. but little things like that make dudes wanna get after it to make that extra money.

 

[skylolow]

I believe it will take Spike funneling much more money into the talent. Talent is truly the only way you become competitive.

Start with like a 10-15 million a year budget to strictly secure new talent. Target top 15 UFC stars and pay them. Do this for about three years and have a good 6 to 8 bigger cards a year with about 6 lesser cards. Then start holding two PPV's a year when your ready, each one stacked. Pay the main event and Co-main event fighters PPV buys, maybe even the rest of the main card and release those numbers. Sell it as this is the way fans can support the fighters.

Spike has proving that if you get named value fighters on a card they can pull ratings in and put butts in the seats. When they don't they sink right back to the ho-hum weekly average in ratings and so-so attendance. Talent/Stars sell and if you aren't becoming a star there shouldn't be much room for you long term on the roster.

 

[I Am Legion]

That last card was insulting it was so bad. You have to be really careful with circus matches, because if they suck, you are sunk.

 

[NHB7]

They are using a model similar to Pride. Originally UFC was the only game in town. Then Pride came about and pulled in former UFC stars (Oleg Taktarov, Gary Goodridge etc), toward the perceived latter half of their careers. They put on Freakshow fights (A prowrestler on Nobuhiko Takada vs Rickson Gracie) that had mass appeal. And while this brought in eyes, they built stars in their ranks, particularly at HW, but also hometown heroes like Sakuraba.

 

[websurfer]

Promo, promo promo. Preflight interviews, conference calls, press conferences etc. Ufc does this better hands down. When Helwani has to go there and bring the fans what the fighters are thinking you know bellator aren't doing their job.

When Nick Diaz was fighting in bellator there was never any hyping the fight. Bums would come in. Nick would do his job. Then the fight as well as the card would be over.

Promo, promo, promo. Ufc just takes it one step further every time.

 

[JayPettryMMA]

That last card was insulting it was so bad. You have to be really careful with circus matches, because if they suck, you are sunk.

Well there have been two Bellator cards since that disaster, don't know if you watched either of them.

If anything, they need more money. Yes, blah blah they're owned by Viacom, but just because they're owned by a billion dollar company, it doesn't mean that they have access to that money. When fighters are getting paid 1/1 as a minimum salary (latest numbers I've seen are from Bellator 148, where more than one fighter has a 1/1 deal), they need to pay their other fighters more. They need to stop frontloading their fighter contracts, too. The Bendo deal was good for him and maybe for Bellator because they were able to score him, but it more than likely means that he will make substantially more than the rest of the card. Thomson still makes 10k with no win bonus, last I read, and non-champ Chandler only makes 25/25. That's tough, especially when they pay Tito 300k for his performance and McGeary made only 50k for that fight.

People complain about UFC fighter pay, but their fighter minimum is ten times that of Bellator, and even more than ten times higher than WSOF's minimum (which is like 600 or 800).

 

[Mikedh]

A 1000 times increase in operating budget, a leash to lose millions upon millions of dollars every year for a large number of years while trying to get a piece of UFCs money and only that. They are not going to compete with the UFC anytime soon with 5% of the roster depth even if they incorporated every weird idea that will be suggested here.

Giving Coker a bunch of money to play around with hasn't exactly worked in the past though.

 

[FrodoFraggins]

They need to keep grabbing the best available free agents and be better at getting up and coming prospects before the UFC does. They still have no chance of really competing with the UFC but they could become the next Strikeforce.

 

[Mavadorov]

Promo, promo promo. Preflight interviews, conference calls, press conferences etc. Ufc does this better hands down. When Helwani has to go there and bring the fans what the fighters are thinking you know bellator aren't doing their job.

When Nick Diaz was fighting in bellator there was never any hyping the fight. Bums would come in. Nick would do his job. Then the fight as well as the card would be over.

Promo, promo, promo. Ufc just takes it one step further every time.

When was Nick Diaz in Bellator? Do you mean Strikeforce or EliteXC?

 

[HUGHPHUG]

Quite easy, more cards like last Saturday, like they always used to have.

 

[Max Normal]

Competing with the UFC for the top spot is a fool's errand, what they need to do is establish themselves as a viable alternative to the UFC's version of mma. Even if Viacom pumped a billion dollars into Bellator, which allowed them to acquire all the top non-ZUFFA talent currently available and put on big budget shows that make PRIDE look like backyard wrestling, why would people stop watching the UFC? Only a very small portion of the hardcore MMA fanbase are anti-ZUFFA, and by that I mean to the extent that they outright refuse to watch anything associated with the ZUFFA brand. Only a minority of the so called hardcore mma fanbase see any benefit to bringing down ZUFFA and the UFC. In reality it just means that one more venue to watch mma, right now the largest and most easily accessible venue, will be closed off. Most fans don't really have a problem with watching multiple orgs, often they just don't see any incentive to do so. over watching the UFC. Still, if there is something that catches their interest they will tune in to the less established brand.

Given the recent success of the Kimbo cards we have seen that even people that mostly watch the UFC will tune in to a Bellator card if there is something that catches their interest. See, most people don't view mma as a binary, either you watch the UFC or you don't. The reality is that despite the petty org rivalries that fans on Sherdog and other forums like to create, there is no reason you can't watch UFC and Bellator, and KSW, and RIZIN, etc. Very rarely are any of these orgs competing head to head with UFC programming. The content is out there for those who want to watch, and the main issue is usually just a lack of interest; for one reason or another. There is competition for talent, but most of the moderate to big mma orgs aren't directly competing with each for ratings and buys most of the time. Some MMA fans like to create this false dichotomy, where you have to pick one org or the other, either because it adds gravitas to their perceived struggle against a dominant power, or because they want to see the smaller underdog crushed beneath the heel of a superior entity. It's all a bit crap though.

Even if Bellator managed to achieve parity with the UFC, in terms of ratings at the very least, there is no incentive for mma fans to stop watching the UFC product outright in favour of watching Bellator. In reality, Bellator is in a unique position, since they do not compete with the UFC for PPVs, they aren't on the same networks, and their cards are not consistently competing against each other on a week to week basis. They are relatively free to build their brand, and experiment to find out what works best in their given situation. Even if they continue to pick up cast-off UFC talent, and build up younger fighters from outside the ZUFFA orbit, they are so far away from actually competing with the UFC that it almost isn't worth it to even try. Thankfully though, they don't have to compete with the UFC outright.

While I am not a fan of Bellator's recent moves, they are providing an alternative to the ZUFFA formula for MMA. In Bellator you get to see spectacles you would not typically see in the UFC, and that provides an incentive to watch. No mma fan is going to pass up a legitimate UFC PPV with a title fight, for a free fight between Kimbo and Dada. But if it is on, and free, and not directly competing with a better UFC card, why not watch it? A spectacle can be entertaining, and if you are honestly getting something from Bellator you won't find in other American orgs, that gives them a pretty solid niche to work with. If you are in a position to take advantage of an untapped market, why not give it a shot?

Bellator should keep doing what they are doing, and finding a way to set themselves apart as a viable alternative to the UFC. They aren't in direct competition right now, and overpaying for UFC talent and getting into bidding wars won't do them much good. Let them snag the occasional big name, but directly competing with the UFC for talent is the wrong way to go, and they aren't going to be persuading UFC fans to stop watching en mass at any rate. Bellator needs to set themselves apart, be innovative, and really provide a viable alternative to what the UFC is offering, in order to attract a larger segment of the mma fanbase.

At the end of the day, getting more people to watch their programming is more important for Bellator than trying to steal fans away form the UFC or overcoming the Ultimate juggarnaught, as you put it TS.

 

[PIT FIGHTER]

Absolutely nothing OP mentioned would "make Bellator give UFC a real run for the top spot".

 

[AGEZ909]

From a business standpoint, Coker is doing things right. It may not be appealing to the eye, but he is getting ratings. I mean look at some of the signings that he had made, leben? Wanderlei, kimbo, kos. It may look horrible to a hardcore, but you have to look at it through a different lense.

Most of those fighters were phased out of the UFC, yet they still hold some value. What is smarter than to go after fighters that'll bring u ratings, and fighter that u don't have to compete for.

The Coker game plan is simple. If there is a void, fill it. Some of the biggest number bellator has gotten were from fighters that Coker didn't even have to bid up. Kimbo, ken, Royce. It may be ugly, but it's working.


People who are saying promoting aren't looking at the bigger picture. If you don't have the platform to support certain fighters at the moment, why build them up so they can outgrow you? The UFC could easily outbid bellator on most all fighters that the UFC truly want.


Coker is playing it smart. Use these freakshows, get ratings, build connections, get more tv deals, broaden your platform, increase cash flow, get more sponsors, then start promoting your real talent.

Coker might come at spike/Viacom with his tentpole ratings and say, I got the # on this budget. I could get much better numbers if you increased my budget.

It's a slow process, but Coker seems to be getting it done. He is doing alt of things right, if people were to just look at things with business sense.


I mean look at the cards that are coming up. Look at the fighters Coker has signed. I feel like if they don't fuck the match making up, they are in for another record breaking year.

 

[CC27]

They need to copy everything the UFC does only do it bigger, better and spend more money.

If they wont/cant do that they will never overcome the UFC, simple as that.

They need to be the one doing 7 mill PPV buys a year, 600 mill revenue, building stars like Ronda and McGregor.

I dont see that day every happening, they are a distant number 2 and will continue to be that for as long as they exist.

 

[Max Normal]

From a business standpoint, Coker is doing things right. It may not be appealing to the eye, but he is getting ratings. I mean look at some of the signings that he had made, leben? Wanderlei, kimbo, kos. It may look horrible to a hardcore, but you have to look at it through a different lense.

Most of those fighters were phased out of the UFC, yet they still hold some value. What is smarter than to go after fighters that'll bring u ratings, and fighter that u don't have to compete for.

The Coker game plan is simple. If there is a void, fill it. Some of the biggest number bellator has gotten were from fighters that Coker didn't even have to bid up. Kimbo, ken, Royce. It may be ugly, but it's working.


People who are saying promoting aren't looking at the bigger picture. If you don't have the platform to support certain fighters at the moment, why build them up so they can outgrow you? The UFC could easily outbid bellator on most all fighters that the UFC truly want.


Coker is playing it smart. Use these freakshows, get ratings, build connections, get more tv deals, broaden your platform, increase cash flow, get more sponsors, then start promoting your real talent.

Coker might come at spike/Viacom with his tentpole ratings and say, I got the # on this budget. I could get much better numbers if you increased my budget.

It's a slow process, but Coker seems to be getting it done. He is doing alt of things right, if people were to just look at things with business sense.


I mean look at the cards that are coming up. Look at the fighters Coker has signed. I feel like if they don't fuck the match making up, they are in for another record breaking year.

Coker is doing the right thing, like it or not. Bellator shouldn't be too worried about competing with the UFC, they don't need to compete with them at this point. As long as they keep growing, and providing free mma, they are succeeding. I would rather see another North America mma org consistently putting on shows, which I may or may not watch, than to see them put all their resources and then some into trying to be the next UFC and watching them go bust in a few years.

 

[websurfer]

When was Nick Diaz in Bellator? Do you mean Strikeforce or EliteXC?

I meant strikeforce. But it applies to bellator as well. Costs nothing to host a press conference, and the return is bigger viewership.

When Tito talked about bringing in viewers for Viacom for his fight against McGeary that just says it all. Bellator not promoting. Similar to Pride FC, another org that did no promoting.

Ufc is just on a whole another level.

 

[AGEZ909]

Coker is doing the right thing, like it or not. Bellator shouldn't be too worried about competing with the UFC, they don't need to compete with them at this point. As long as they keep growing, and providing free mma, they are succeeding. I would rather see another North America mma org consistently putting on shows, which I may or may not watch, than to see them put all their resources and then some into trying to be the next UFC and watching them go bust in a few years.

Definitely agree with you here guy. I fully agree with what you posted earlier as well.

What most of these guys need to understand is simple; the world is a business, through and through.

If it don't make dollars it don't make sense.

The people on here who are begging bellator to just spend on every fighter out there are probably the ones who bad mouth affiliation for trying to compete with the UFC.

Coker did the right thing in repositioning bellator. Throw the fun fights out there. Get ratings. Get your 2.7m rating and your 1.2m gate with kimbo. Get your 140plus tv deals world wide, make connections with oktagon, road, and rizin. Bring fighters in that u don't have to bid up. Increase profit margins. Present your portfolio to your superiors. Hope that they give u a much bigger budget. Then do bigger things next year.


Who knows? he might start taking more jabs at the UFCs talent in 3 or 4 years. He might just want to be getting his footing with bellator.

As of right now, what Coker is doing makes business sense.

 

[WouldNotBang]

They need a big star. They need to figure out who their best knockout artist is and then get him an acting coach and turn him into a WWE heel on the microphone. Get him to say the most disrespectful shit and the whole world will know more about him than they do about fighters like Robbie Lawler and Jon Jones.