Why Bare Knuckle is overshadowing PFL

How Dave Feldman bypassed the fight version of a Widowmaker.

7,100 spectators at the Peacock Theater in Los Angeles to watch Mike Perry in 2024. Nine months later, 17,762 spectators in Philadelphia on NFC Championship weekend to watch Eddie Alvarez fight in 2025.

Bare Knuckle is red hot and has found its stride in major markets when seemingly no one else can figure out a successful formula in combat sports. How is this possible? What has Dave Feldman figured out that no one else has?

Dave Feldman performed the combat sports equivalent of open heart bypass surgery and avoided the Widowmaker that has killed so many other fight promotions.

Yes, Bare Knuckle is the spirit animal and new generation of Art Dore’s 1990s Toughman exhibitions but at lightning speed pace with rip-roaring crowds. Mark Shapiro of TKO loves to use the buzzword experience economy.

With Bare Knuckle, they're focusing on the raw, visceral experience that The UFC has (kind of) moved away from. For veteran fans, Bare Knuckle viewership scratches some of that old school itch for the weird and gory. And like hockey, Bare Knuckle is an incredible live experience and even better than the television product.

But something else is at play here.

Case in point: the Donn Davis & Peter Murray-operated PFL ran a moderately successful event in Dubai Saturday at Coca-Cola Arena. The main event, featuring Usman Nurmagomedov successfully defending his now-defunct Bellator title against Paul Hughes, was exciting. It was the kind of fight that PFL needed. There will be a re-match. But its online attention cycle was snuffed out in about 8 hours when Knuckle Mania V featured knockout after knockout after knockout.

What Saturday’s BKFC and PFL events revealed is a stunning development in the promotional space for fight sports and why investors and media partners, are reanalyzing what fans want to see.