Joe Warren has 0 sponsors tonight, for the first time
The MMA sponsorship market used to be excellent. Fighters could sometimes equal or even exceed their official purses. Not any…
The MMA sponsorship market used to be excellent. Fighters could sometimes equal or even exceed their official purses.
Not any more.
While the UFC is expanding, as evidenced by three PPVs breaking 1,000,000 buys this year, and the sale of the company for over $4,000,000,000, mixed martial arts is not. The number of shows is down over the past couple of years.
In July of 2014, the UFC instituted an apparel policy, mandating Reebok during fight week, with fighters compensated $2,500 to $40,000 per event. There was a widespread hope that sponsors would shift from the UFC to other shows, like WSoF, Titan Fighting, and above all Bellator MMA.
That didn’t happen.
The UFC is popular, but that does not mean that MMA is popular. Further, the UFC paying fighters $2,500 for exclusively wearing one brand appears to have set a ceiling on sponsorship outside the league. Sponsors now think, “if the UFC is paying fighters $2,500 for an exclusive, why am I paying $1,000 for a patch not even in the UFC?”
For the record, the sponsorship market has dried up elsewhere as well, including websites.
Bellator’s Joe Warren is a highly exciting fighter and former world champion wrestler, with a popular Lineup MMA podcast with Sean Wheelock and Ben Askren.
In 2010 he won the Bellator season 2 featherweight tournament, and the league championship. In 2013 he won the Bellator season 9 bantamweight tournament. And in 2014 he won the interim bantamweight title, and then unified it. In 2015 he lost the belt to a scream-inducing Marcos Galvao kneebar, but bounced back with a win over L.C. Davis, who had been on a three-fight win streak in Bellator. In June he lost to Darrion Caldwell.
Friday night he fights Sweden’s Sirwan Kakai in the co-main event of Bellator 161 in Cedar Park, Texas. This is Warren’s 16th fight in Bellator. 13 were main event fights, and one co-main.
He has 0 sponsors now. For the first time, he will make no money from shorts or sponsors. Warren is married, with an eight-year-old son, and six-year-old daughter.
“I’m not used to losing and people turn and run when you lose,” said Warren to Marc Raimondi for MMA Fighting. “I know it’s only one loss, but they turn and run on you. So yeah, no sponsors for this fight.
“There’s fair-weather fans out there. I don’t believe getting sponsors is as easy as it used to be and it’s just kind of sad. What I’ve put into this game, what I’ve given into the MMA field, to not even get sponsors, it’s sad, man. It’s sad. But it’s the game. It is what it is. That’s not gonna hold me back from performing, it just would have sweetened the pot a little bit.”
“I take care of my family. I use MMA for a job. I lost and we’re strapped, man. Daddy has to get back in that cage and work. I’m just honored Viacom and Bellator are giving me the opportunity to get back in there, so I can take care of my family.”
“Fans think that every fighter makes $12 and $13 million a fight, ya know? That doesn’t happen. I’m fighting to get a paycheck, take care of my family. It’s terrible. I love Bellator. Those guys give me the opportunity to fight and win, but it’s almost to a point where I’ve gotta look for something else just to take care of my two little babies.”
Warren plans to fight just as hard vs. Kakai Friday night as if he had a purse worth of sponsors on his shorts and banner.
“He believes he can beat me,” said Warren. “He’s talking a little s***, so I plan on putting my hand in his mouth and shutting his mouth and getting a big win for myself in that Bellator cage.”
“I lost fights and sponsors dropped me right away. That’s not the case in Olympic level or other sports. Things happen. For us to be in a sport like mixed martial arts — the most unpredictable sport in the world — it’s kind of sad that’s how they do that. But that’s the game. That’s how it is. S*** happens. You’ll see me all sponsored up after I get these wins and I’ll laugh at them all and just take their money, because you never know what’s gonna happen.”