Issue 064

July 2010

In the cutthroat world of sports entertainment, athletes have always been told to be wary of agents who promise big things. Many of them are glorified hustlers, but a few shine out as examples of how a real manager should be: Professional, ambitious and dependable. 

Jervis Cole of Cole Entertainment, LLC is among the leading agents in MMA. Currently responsible for the careers of men such as Rashad Evans and Nate Marquardt, he is a rarity in the world of business and promotions: a manager who has a bond with his athletes, and who acts with integrity in everything that he does. 

“My goals have always been lofty,” he says. “When I started Cole Blooded Management I wanted to be the best manager out there – not just in terms of how much money I could make, but how many people I could gain the respect of. To be number one isn’t about money; it’s about integrity and being that guy everyone wants to work with.” 

Cole’s career in MMA came after successful personal ventures into the worlds of sport and business. A life-long athlete, Cole was an international basketball player and played in over 15 countries worldwide. “You name it, I’ve been there,” he jokes. “Even Russia, when it was still behind the Iron Curtain.” His experience of dealing with his own contract negotiations saw him enter corporate America when his athletic career came to a close. Upon returning to his native California he found himself working for CBS Radio. “I absolutely hated it but I stuck with it for a couple of years,” he recounts. “Then I became a district manager for Anderson Merchandiser’s, handling DVDs and books in numerous Walmarts around the country – these were $50–60 million accounts. I feel that I was able to learn, and I really got to do what I wanted to do in business.” 

It was Dewayne Zinkin of Zinkin Entertainment and Sports Management – the agency that represents Chuck Liddell, Forrest Griffin and the American Kickboxing Academy fighters – that first exposed Jervis to the behind-the-scenes world of MMA. The two became good friends, and Zinkin asked Jervis to draw upon his knowledge and experience to help negotiate a new sponsorship deal for Liddell. “After that initial meeting for Chuck on behalf of Zinkin, I started taking calls for them and setting up appointments for them. My introduction to the sport was at a very high level, with the most high-profile fighter at the time,” says Jervis. 

“My first event was when Chuck won the title. After watching that event live, being part of that event, being in the back rooms, walking out with Chuck, I was basically hooked on MMA from that point on.” As Cole’s skills proved ever more useful in helping the athletes at Zinkin, he became the vice president of entertainment and began working with Forrest Griffin and co. “I jumped in with both feet and ended up leaving a career to work in MMA,” he says. 

Cole took a risk to enter the world of MMA, but it was a gamble that paid off. His business acumen and strong network of connections across many different industries put him in prime position to negotiate deals when he decided to leave Zinkin and form his own agency. One of the first athletes he signed upon going it alone was Rashad Evans, who he had worked with previously. “Rashad had signed with Zinkin after TUF 2. I met him early on in his career – I was able to see he had a lot of talent. He only stayed with Zinkin for a year and a half, but we stayed in contact just as friends,” he says. Once I ended up leaving Zinkin and starting my own company, he was one of the guys that I talked to.” 

Though Cole and Evans share a very professional relationship, they are rare in that they enjoy a very personal bond also. “I try to keep business and personal separated, I really do, but we were friends in the beginning and we’re so alike in many ways – we’re different to a lot of client–managers. When it comes down to business we’re able to turn off everything and just concentrate on business. It’s an interesting relationship – we laugh at everything, we talk all the time and we hang out. If there’s something that’s bothering him or bothering me, we get to rectify it pretty quickly.” 

Since founding Cole Blooded Management, Jervis has signed talent such as fighters Nate Marquardt, James McSweeney, Jon Jones, Karo Parisyan and even the singer Mina Chang. His most visible triumph though, was securing a landmark sponsorship deal for Evans with Microsoft. “When the deal came about I had just started out on my own, and it was hard to find 100% new sponsors. They were looking for someone to do a fight scene in the Microsoft TV commercial – it came because of our relationships with people in entertainment such as Matt Meyerson. We have a lot of connections that people don’t have.” 

Cole feels that the future will see many more blue chip companies sponsor MMA fighters, and he is among the vanguard of agents making this happen. “You can make money in the ring,” says Jervis, “but you can make so much more outside. Our goal is to do what we have to do to build their brand outside of the ring – the fighters can be as popular as any other mainstream athlete.” 

For info go to www.colebloodedmgmt.com