
The GFL hosted their first draft this past weekend on Friday night and boy was it interesting. There’s been a lot of skeptics about this league (including myself) given the wide range of signings that they’ve had, bold claims, and no real clear information about who is financially backing this promotion.
Nevertheless, I’m optimistic and hopeful that everything will work out because in theory, this is great for fighters. The GFL Draft night started bumpy with the broadcast accidentally leaking the draft results before they even began. While it was clear that the promotion switched the order of some fighters, the leak was real and that was a major blunder right out of the gate.
GFL Draft Results
The desk crew featured Caroline Pearce, Mike Goldberg, Brendan Schaub, and Robin Black. Let’s call a spade a spade here, the desk work was not great at all. There were blunders throughout the night and some really outlandish claims about some of the fighters like Mike Goldberg saying that Aspen Ladd (12-5) was one of the most decorated fighters in history.
Tyron Woodley (19-7-1) was the first overall draft pick by Team Dubai and the draft was underway. There were definitely some surprises throughout the night such as former UFC champions Holly Holm (15-7, 1 NC) and Chris Weidman (16-8) being selected. Holm just left the UFC and Weidman seemingly announced his retirement a week ago. However, he ultimately signed with the GFL and he will still be fighting.
Former WEC champ and legend Urijah Faber (35-11) is coming back and he was drafted by Team Los Angelas. Faber hasn’t fought in over four years. Former UFC champ Benson Henderson (30-12) is also coming back after retiring and he was drafted by Team London.
It was interesting to see so many big names that were retired or we thought were retired come back for the GFL. Now let’s be clear that rosters are not completely made up of fighters who are way beyond their primes. There are some solid fighters that are on these rosters, but they aren’t the big names. The big names are the former UFC champions and the reality is that some of them shouldn’t be fighting anymore. Nevertheless, let’s watch this unfold and see what happens. The full rosters can be viewed in the links below.