At the end of 2023, the PFL acquired Bellator in a move that really seemed like it solidified their spot near the top of the MMA world. Of course, they were not the UFC, but this move legitimized them in that second spot.
There was so much positive momentum and for the first time in years, it truly felt like there was another major landing spot for fighters that wasn’t just the UFC. PFL had made big signings that same year including bringing in Francis Ngannou who left the UFC as the heavyweight champion of the world.
In the acquisition, they acquired major talent like Usman Nurmagomedov, Aaron Pico, Patricio Pitbull, Patchy Mix, Cris Cyborg and others. The stove was hot for the Professional Fighters League and then the clock turned to 2024. The promotion had planned a champions event featuring PFL champions and Bellator champions.
The event really fell flat as did pretty much everything last year. The Bellator Champions Series was launched with the idea of running two separate brands under one PFL banner. While the traditional Professional Fighters League season format would run on one side, the Bellator Champions Series would run on the other.
I absolutely hated the idea at the time as it just didn’t make sense to me. It made way more sense to just combine the rosters and put on the best fights possible. However, Donn Davis’ vision and desire to be different from the UFC led them down this path and it didn’t work at all.
Davis announced changes ahead of 2025 which included ending the Bellator Champions Series and then having world tournaments instead of the traditional season format. The tournaments would run throughout the first half of the year with the winners winning $500,000 and getting a future world title shot.
Again, it felt like the tournament didn’t garner the attention they were looking for. Most of the top stars in the promotion didn’t fight in the tournament. It just felt like PFL was getting in their own way. Then, they made an announcement in July that has seemingly reversed their course.
PFL CEO John Martin
Donn Davis announced the hiring of former Turner executive John Martin as the new CEO. Martin had a ton of experience as a media executive, but he was also a life-long martial artist and more importantly, he was a fan.
No disrespect to Donn Davis, but he never came across as someone who truly understood the sport as a fan. Love or hate him, Dana White is the gold standard when it comes to being a promoter and one of the reasons he and his team have been so successful is the fact that they love the sport and are true fans at heart.
Hiring someone like Martin was giving the keys to someone who understands the sport and really has a better understanding of the thinking of an MMA fan. Martin was recently on The Brian Campbell Experience and he said something that was incredibly refreshing. He talked about how fans just want to see the best fights and talked about simplifying the model.
Being a fight fan since I was five-years-old, there’s a tried and true method in that there’s beauty in it’s simplicity. Everyone knows who the champ is, everyone knows who the contenders are, there’s matchmaking, there’s story telling, there’s grudge matches and you can build energy and momentum. In some of the formats (PFL had been using), it was tough to do that. The formats were not bad, there was real rationale for them and we still might use some tournament formats in certain areas, particularly in the international leagues where I think it will make more sense. But, people want to see the best fights. They want to see the best fighters fighting the best opponents and that’s what I want to bring to the PFL.
John Martin on the Brian Campbell Experience
That quote right there is what we’ve wanted to hear from the PFL for the last couple of years. Fighting is a very simple game and where we’ve seen promotions fail over and over again is in their desire to be different. While it can garner some initial market share, eventually, that flame will burn out.
If you want the world to watch, you have to build stars and you have to promote those stars. You have to pair your top contenders against each other and build their stories to draw interest from the general MMA fan. John Martin understands that because at his core, he’s a fan.
If you stick to tournaments and season formats, you cannot build to something exciting and fans get confused because they won’t stay locked in. Upsets will happen and amazing opportunities will close because you aren’t giving the fans the guaranteed fights that they want to see.
Ahead of his interview with Campbell, Martin tweeted out that the PFL was simplifying their championship system.
When 2023 was coming to an end, I was incredibly excited to see what the PFL could do with the influx of talent that they were getting from the Bellator acquisition. They completely fumbled that opportunity and it was a monumental failure. I wish more than anything that Martin was leading the charge during that time because I think we’d see such a different promotion than we see today.
Right now, I’m back to being excited about the future of the Professional Fighters League. While there is a lot of work to do, I truly believe that they finally have the right guy leading the ship and it’ll be exciting to see where Martin takes this in 2026 and beyond.
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