Issue 036

April 2008

By Andrew Garvey

The North American mixed martial arts (MMA) marketplace is a crowded one, with everyone involved fighting for attention and a slice of whatever action hasn’t already been taken by the all-conquering Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC).  

Over the last couple of years there have been alliances, takeovers, petty squabbles, grandiose claims and outright insanity aplenty. Bodog paid a low-rated TV network to air their show late at night and their only 2007 pay per view was atrociously advertised, pulling in a pitiful 13,000 buys across North America. The International Fight League’s (IFL) team structure was a costly failure; they booked major arenas with astronomical rents and gave away countless free tickets along the way to losing gigantic amounts of money.  

With a business plan that seems to consist only of buying up every smaller promotion they could find, EliteXC’s share price has plummeted and money has flowed outwards in a torrent of debt. Even UFC owners Zuffa, acclaimed for their enormous success in pushing the sport forwards, threw some $17 million away on propping up Xyience, one of their own sponsors.

But even at their most ridiculous, none may have gone as far as newcomers YAMMA. Impressive really, when you consider their first ever event is scheduled for April of this year. The brainchild of former UFC owner Bob Meyrowitz, YAMMA are determined to do things their own way. It’s unclear where Meyrowitz has been since he sold the UFC, but wherever it was, he’s seemingly had no access to the Internet, mainstream newspapers, pay per view or Spike TV.

YAMMA’s ideas are directly lifted from the mid-1990s. The promotion has no television outlet and is relying on fans to watch the pay per view on the strength of familiar names and novelty value. Well, the novelty value of any old MMA on pay per view has long since disappeared and the chances of running a successful pay-per-view without strong promotion on TV these days are microscopic. It’s no longer 1995, when ‘no holds barred’ fighting was a dangerously alluring new ‘bloodsport’, outraging politicians and the media. In 2008, MMA is an established, regulated sport and the market is saturated with a UFC pay per view at least every month, plentiful Spike TV programming and regular televised events by EliteXC, Strikeforce, the IFL and plenty more.  

To be fair, YAMMA’s top secret new fighting surface may provoke some curiosity. Variously and vaguely described as some kind of pen or pit, this begs plenty of questions. If the fighting area isn’t a radical departure from those currently used, then what’s the point? Is it purely to get people talking or is fighter safety a consideration? How will the live audience be able to see what’s going on in a recessed pit? And finally, why solve a problem that isn’t there in the first place? The ‘dreaded cage’ that spawned a media frenzy in Meyrowtiz’s day didn’t stop over one million people ordering UFC 66, nor has it stopped the sport being regulated in ever more states and receiving previously unthinkably widespread and favourable press coverage.

So, if MMA isn’t a novelty anymore, the marketplace is over-saturated, others have lost countless millions of dollars in this sport and YAMMA has no TV deal in place to promote their pay per view what, apart from this ‘fighting surface’ (which won’t be a novelty after the first show anyway), can they offer? The one-night tournament?! Yes, again, we’re back to the mid-1990s. The concept originally worked because it was new, but too many UFC events ended up with an alternate making it to the final. Also, there are very real dangers of fighting three times in one night. Tournaments have recently been revived, but only in truncated versions where a fighter competes twice, and in shorter fights or in places without regulation. YAMMA’s solution is shorter fights of one round then two rounds; and three rounds in the final. Will modern fans really get behind the idea? They might but YAMMA aren’t aiming this show at modern fans. They’re aiming this promotion at the fanbase of 1995. Need more evidence? Look at the final piece of their puzzle: the ‘Masters’ division.

YAMMA’s first event in April will feature a heavyweight tournament, and that mid-90s favourite, the ‘Superfight’ between two name fighters. Don Frye will face Oleg Taktarov. Leaving aside the debate on whether Frye, in his 40s, having undergone some real beatings, painkiller addiction and neck fusion surgery, belongs in a ring, cage or an oversized frying pan, is that really a quality main event in 2008? The IFL went down the ‘legends’ route and it failed.  

Not only are the ‘legends’ of the sport mostly legends only to the hardcore fanbase and the insiders, with no resonance for newer, more casual fans, but putting two 40+, over the hill fighters against each other could be a recipe for slow-moving disaster. Those unfortunate enough to have witnessed the 2007 rematch between Maurice Smith and Marco Ruas will shudder at the very idea.

Perhaps YAMMA can somehow make this mish-mash of outdated ideas, strange assumptions and plain weirdness work. Perhaps they can fly in the face of all common sense, promotional logic, economic reality and the lessons learned in the past decade. And perhaps the skies will be full of winged pigs and Satan will be ice skating to work. Good luck Mr Meyrowitz. You’re going to need it.