With PFL joining the fight game and acquiring a slowly dying Bellator, there are some people out there that think that PFL is somehow going to be the LIV of the golfing world and honestly, I think that this is just a terrible idea that can only result in failure unless you find some Saudi princes who have limitless funds that they don't mind pissing into the wind.
I don't think that any promotion can possibly compete with UFC and to do so will only expedite their eventual failure.
src
Eddie Alvarez, who has fought in just about every single promotion in the world at one point or another said it perfectly when he stated
"almost every promoter I hear that gets in MMA promoting talks about how they're better than the UFC or they can compete. It's so silly. Stop that. It's nonsense. You're not going to be close and you should not talk like that. Just be your own thing. Be great at what you do. Try to differentiate yourself a little bit."
This is absolutely true. Nobody is going to be able to take on UFC directly as competition and if they try, they are going to burn through money like mad until the realize that very few, if any of the UFC fans are willing to jump ship and take on another brand.
Look, I am a big fan of MMA but I have my limits as to how much of it I am actually willing to consume. If it was on more than once a week I probably wouldn't watch it at all. Hell, I rarely watch "Fight Night" events and those are actually some pretty good cards. The fact of the matter is that while MMA appears to have wide appeal, it doesn't if we put too much of it out there for people to consume.
If PFL attempts to burn money by luring fighters away from the UFC or by trying to air their matches at the same time that UFC is on, they are going to only be hurting themselves. People might stray from UFC to see Francis Ngannou fight one time, but then when they realize that the promotion can't actually afford a lot of big name undercards as well, they are going to tune out. Pay per views? You can forget about that.
ONE championships is a good case in point. They never really tried to have a beef with UFC and did their own thing. When they have events the fights will be a bunch of different MMA disciplines in the same event. One might be Muay Thai, the next MMA, the next boxing, and the next Jiu Jitsu. It's not going to be for everyone but at least it has an audience. They have so many champions because of this and if someone does really well, they stand out and in a way that UFC can't possibly take away from them because UFC doesn't do this. UFC is ONLY MMA. Any organization that tries to take on UFC head on is going to fail.
src
Another thing that ONE and some other smaller promotions do well is that they keep their expenses low. You are not going to be able to lure top fighters away from UFC as well as keep your expenses low. The UFC fighters that are actually worth having are very aware of the fact that if they walk away from UFC, chances are that Dana White and the other executives are going to hold a grudge and never hire them again. This is why we don't see UFC stars doing just one fight with BKFC and then coming back, Dana won't allow it.
When Bellator had tournaments where a fighter would be pitted against multiple opponents in the same night this worked very well for them and people tuned it to see it by the hundreds of thousands.
src
Now you or just any other sports fan, might not even know who most or all of those people actually are and well, it isn't necessary that you do. You will know them by the end of the night. The fights were shorter and often the ability of the person to compete in the 2nd round was dependent upon how they or the person they were against did in the first round. Past tournaments were even longer.
They did something different than UFC and as it turns out it was wildly successful.
Too many promotions try to hype up their talent and spend loads of money building them to compete with UFC. Well, on the rare occasion that they are successful in doing this UFC simply buys that particular talent out. Ever heard of Michael Chandler?
I am sometimes annoyed by the fact that UFC is truly the "only game in town" when it comes to MMA but at the same time, they spent nearly 2 decades bleeding money in order to make that happen. I guess in a way they kind of deserve to reap the rewards now because had they not put the time in like they did, the world might not even have MMA available for mass consumption.
I don't see anyone, including and especially PFL, as ever being capable of directly competing with UFC. UFC are just too big to conquer. Anyone who tries will see themselves go down the same path that the XFL did when they decided to take on the NFL. They are going to burn billions and aside from the first couple of weeks people are simply going to lose interest. I guarantee it.