UFC matchmaking: Big Money and creative bankruptcy

Can buying off the UFC buy you political protection?

This week’s edition of The MMA Podcast takes a closer look at Meta's sponsorship deal with the UFC and whether or not buying Dana White’s loyalty can help persuade the inner circle around Donald Trump not to aggressively pursue new antitrust action against Mark Zuckerberg’s social media empire.

It this sounds like House of Cards, it’s because this is the new world that TKO has created in fight sport. When you’re a political mercenary, everything involving Wall Street and world governments influences and changes motives. This is why we had some eyebrow-raising questions to ask regarding Zack Snyder’s new UFC-themed movie backed by Dana White & Turki Alalshikh.

We’ve seen the impact of Big Money on UFC’s U Fight Cheap business model and how that train isn’t slowing down any time soon. But the bigger question is why such a monopolistic powerhouse is content and satisfied with a substandard product that receives increasingly negative reviews from their most loyal customers.

Is it simply the bean counters steering the wheel, or is there something else corrupting the matchmaking process?

The free portion of this week’s podcast is a pretty intense 20 minutes. Our paid portion is a full hour breakdown discussing what is happening behind the scenes right now in the global MMA industry and how others view the current UFC matchmaking process involving Sean Shelby & Mick Maynard.

The question is whether this bad matchmaking is intentional or based on mediocrity in judgment. One Twitter post from RIZIN matchmaker Shingo “Charlie” Kashiwagi summed up the current predicament:

On this week’s podcast, we analyze the work product from key talent developers like Ian Dean, Ed Soares, Shingo Kashiwagi, and André Pederneiras and explain what they’re doing right and what the UFC front office is doing wrong.

Here’s one perspective on why the UFC office is behind the curve and would rather spend their time booking rematches that had conclusive finishes the first time around:

There will eventually be a price to pay for this attitude. Q1 of 2025 was not great for UFC fight quality. Q2 is off to the same kind of start.

To close out this week’s podcast, Nate and Zach spend some time analyzing the volatility of TKO’s prospects following the much-anticipated new media rights deal. If oil is going to hover around $60 a barrel, what kind of impact will that have on potential UFC or WWE buyers in the Middle East? As the old proverb goes, “May you live in interesting times.”

If you want in-depth coverage over a wide variety of MMA business topics, The MMA Draw on Substack is the place to be. Paid subscribers get access to content you won’t see anywhere else. If we can make or save your money as a fan, we’ve done our job right.