Yahoo Sports<\/a>.<\/p>\n\u201c\u2026 Since we\u2019ve announced it, we\u2019ve had inquiries with everybody. Keep in mind, when you talk about combat sports, there\u2019s going to be revenue streams from all over the world for this product, not just here, because we\u2019re going to travel and do fight all over the world. So, we\u2019ve already had inquiries from some of my past partners in Bellator that were probably our biggest paying license holders, have reached out and said, \u2018Hey, we want to have a conversation.\u2019<\/p>\n
\u201cSo, we\u2019re talking to everybody, and now the ball begins. Because now we have our infrastructure \u2014 at least our top six, seven employees, executives on board, so now the growth begins.\u201d<\/p>\n
Coker is one of the most successful promoters in MMA history, founding Strikeforce and growing it into a significant brand before selling the promotion to the UFC in 2011. He then took over Bellator in 2014 and helmed that promotion for a decade before it ultimately sold to PFL in 2024. And Coker said he intends to use similar principles of how he ran those promotions in the leadership of this new one.<\/p>\n
\u201cWho are the next stars of the sport?\u201d Coker said. \u201cWhen I was promoting Strikeforce, I knew who the next stars were going to be. Bellator even. Because we always built from the ground up, and then we bought from the top down. I\u2019ve used that formula for my whole fight career. So, we\u2019re going to apply that same philosophy here. We\u2019re going to build. We\u2019re going to go mining for the next stars.\u201d<\/p>\n
While finer details about the new promotion are still lacking, Coker did reveal they intend to hold 12 events in 2027, with each event featuring a mix of tournaments and superfights.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re going to have something for everyone,\u201d Coker said. \u201cJust keep an open mind. \u2026 We\u2019re not going to be a tournament only. We\u2019re going to put on great superfights.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mostly, though, what Coker is focused on is bringing some new energy to an MMA landscape that he believes has gone a bit stale.<\/p>\n
\u201cAbout a year and a half ago, I hired a business development guy to start writing out the plan,\u201d Coker said. \u201cAnd the plan really was, let\u2019s just see if I want to do this? Can we get to a point where I think that this is something the community would like, that the community needs it? \u2026<\/p>\n
\u201cI feel like there\u2019s a little bit of a funk in the MMA space right now, and I don\u2019t know what it is. It\u2019s not like I can say, \u2018This is what it is.\u2019 But I just feel it\u2019s got a funk to it right now. So, let\u2019s go stir it up. The thing with MVP, their show, hey, they\u2019re stirring the pot. It gets people excited, it gets people to root for somebody. We\u2019re going to do the same, and people are going to root for us, too. We\u2019re gonna go stir it up. So, to me, I think the sport needs a little bit of shaking the cage. And it\u2019s something we\u2019re really good at.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Scott Coker is back to stir things up. Last month, the long-time MMA promoter who once helmed Strikeforce…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":711094,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[444],"tags":[1857,42717,49,48,641,701,638,82],"class_list":["post-711093","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mma","tag-bellator","tag-bellator-news","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-fighting","tag-latest-news","tag-mma","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/711093","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=711093"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/711093\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/711094"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=711093"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=711093"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=711093"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}