Last week, The Global Fight League (GFL) announced they will launch in 2025.
It is said to be a team-based league with the selection of fighters and their teams beginning as soon as January 24, and their opening event in April. Team-based MMA is not a new idea for the sport, it’s been done before and is going on today but not at the scale the GFL is looking to do. So, what makes them different from what has been done before and what’s different about the sport now?
Before we answer that, let’s take a look at team-based MMA promotions that have emerged with the growth of MMA:
The first time team-based MMA was presented to fight fans was with the International Fight League (IFL) in 2006. Wizard magazine founder Gareb Shamus and real-estate developer Kurt Otto started the promotion and the teams were basically fight camps coached by prominent fighters and coaches. Events had fighters from two camps face one another that would fill a fight card.
They ceased operations in 2008 due to financial difficulties.
The MMA Pro League began in 2018.
When it started, Mark Taffet, formerly Senior Vice President at HBO, partnered with League CEO Hani Darwish to create the team-based promotion. The website does not list Taffet as involved with the promotion anymore, but that does not mean it has ceased operations.
They are still active, holding their fifth event most recently in Carteret, New Jersey.
The card featured four bouts and had “Team New York” coached by David Branch against “Team New Jersey,” coached by Andy Main.
Jim Miller went to it for a meet and greet.
RIZE looks like they’re going all-in on team-based MMA in 2025.
What they have done to think now is the time to start doing team competitions would have to be answered by them. I reached out to RIZE for comment and more details on how their team-based events will go but got no response. It seems they have teams from different countries, and most events look like they will be held in Florida.
The website’s team standings are all currently blank and will probably fill them in once they get going.
Check it out here.
Now, let’s look at the GFL.
It’s easy to say something is not going to work before it starts, but that’s a common reaction to many new things.
However, what they aim to do seems to benefit fighters, so let’s start there. The GFL, headed by Darren Owen says they want to share “50% of event revenue with fighters and prioritize their health, wellness, and retirement.” Fighter pay gets brought up a lot, especially when looking at the UFC’s history and if this is something that can fix that, fans should want them to succeed enough to give them a chance.
Their current roster features many fighters that have been fighting for a while. Not all fighters can walk away from the sport comfortably and some of the names on the roster might be concerning, but if they still want to fight, who is going to stop them outside of the sanctioning organizations that can?
To follow the league format, on top of the 50% revenue share the GFL says they will contribute eight percent of each fighter’s purse into a retirement fund with two percent going towards insurance. That is the claim made on their website, so despite what contracts say fighters seem to have some sort of planning for their future if they fight for the GFL.
Time will tell if the money is handled properly.
Time tells a lot, and the timing of this in MMA could finally be right.
MMA has never been bigger, when the IFL tried team-based MMA the sport was still young and not legal in every state. MMA fandom is at its peak and niches within the sport seem to be growing from influencer based to the amount of podcasts covering the sport.
The fight business is definitely a gamble.
Even Dana White said, “There’s no barrier to entry for this sport” when asked about the GFL after the final UFC event of the year in Tampa. So, if the GFL is ready to jump into the fray of MMA with this format, now could be as good a time as any.
