Jake Paul’s Most Valuable Promotions rolled into Los Angeles on Tuesday afternoon to promote their first MMA event ever, Ronda Rousey vs. Gina Carano. But honestly, the event seemed more like an opportunity to bash UFC than sell Ronda vs. Gina.
Paul built his entire career off of trash talking Dana White and beating up the UFC’s discarded aging stars. That said, it was Ronda Rousey who really stripped the paint off the top MMA promotion during the press conference, accusing the company of losing their way, refusing to pay fighters a living wage, and sidelining White to maximize shareholder value.
“MMA is in a weird position right now,” Paul said. “It’s the wild west and I believe we have a massive opportunity here to disrupt the whole space and to put fighters first, get them the pay that they deserve, the platform that they deserve, because I believe the UFC is dying and MVP is here to take over.”
During a scrum following the presser, Paul was asked about the ‘watered down’ UFC product.
“I think it’s been tough for them to create stars and the fights that they want for how little they’re willing to spend,” he said. “So they’re kind of at a bottleneck and that’s why I think we’ve seen fights that people aren’t super, super excited about and the biggest stars in the sport like Jon Jones and Conor McGregor [not] fighting on a consistent basis. And that was what made them so great in the beginning of their business: just massive, amazing fights all the time. And now they’re just not willing to spend money.”
He also criticized Freedom 250, the UFC White House card that landed like wet trash on hot pavement. It features Ilia Topuria and Alex Pereira, but against consolation opponents. The undercard was a lazy hodgepodge of head-scratchers and ‘Dana White privilege’ guys.
“I think the White House itself will be the star,” Paul said of the event. “I was disappointed by the card. I think many fans were, just because there was such high expectations. I think if they weren’t hyping it for so long, maybe if they just announced it randomly, then people would be happy. But they just made it seem like it was gonna be the greatest card of all time. And it certainly isn’t.”
With MVP clearly interested in maintaining some sort of presence in MMA, an obvious question is if Jake Paul will eventually compete in the sport. To Paul, it wasn’t a question of if but of when … but as far as Francis Ngannou goes, Paul sounded more interested in a boxing bout.
“100% I’ll do MMA at some point,” Paul said. “For my first fight, it’ll probably have to be against someone my own weight.”
“But I think I’ve made it clear in the sport of boxing that I’m down to to fight anyone. I took on Anthony Joshua, Mike Tyson, [Julio Cesar] Chavez, just all these people, Anderson [Silva]. So I’m really down to run it with whoever in the sport of boxing. I think me versus Francis would be massive.”
With this garbage of a card might as well add Liz Carmouche vs Cat Zingano to the mix.
It’s going to be hard to unseat the UFC with all the time it’s been in existence.
It’s going to be hard when your first card is a bunch of has-beens and no-names.
We’ve heard that many times over the decades.. But now that TKO is in charge.. the chinks in the armor will be exploited.
Ngannou, Rhousey and Carano are much bigger names than anyone on the White House card
Francis might be a big name but he doesn’t bring big viewership with that name. His ppv numbers across all platforms haven’t been great and his boxing numbers were pretty terrible actually.
The other two might have big names but have spent a combined 27 years away from the sport, it’s not unreasonable to call them has-beens.
Perreria is bigger than all of them now.
Rousey was bigger in her day
Ronda is all in with this company for now. Will they offer her another big payday if she makes easy work of Gina?
The Hollywood facebutcher work Gina’s had done is thumbs down
Rousey vs Holly Holm in a who can punch the air harder rematch for the ages.
KiyaHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
Ngannou isn’t a really a draw though.
This has always bothered me about holly. If her fight goes to a decision thats even a bit close she starts screaming when she punches in the last round and most of them dont even land.
Those events are what would happen if adderall was a production.
Those caranos have gotten huge
He is right! When you own a 7 B dollar asset, you don’t play thrifty just to make more short term cashflow this quarter! You try to make the asset grow. And that involves paying money to draw stars.
Simple stuff that fucking corporations - and investors - don’t get, always looking at short term numbers. Again, this a 7 B asset. Don’t play dumb. Make it grow!
“There’s never been a better time to try and disrupt the MMA industry, according to MVP promoter Jake Paul”
Not sure I agree with this tbh. It feels like the UFC is VERY solidified in its no1 position now, more so than it was during the TUF boom. Interest peaked ages ago in North America and multiple other markets. MMA is not the young trendy new thing to get into anymore so the sport by itself doesnt hold inherent novelty appeal anymore, and there are fewer stars around than there used to be. It might be that there are certain markets where a promotion can get semi-big (KSW and Oktagon for instance) but the days of anyone realistically being able to challenge the UFC in America or globally seem long gone now.