Bellator, one of the more notable challenger MMA brands of the past two decades, is dead.
PFL will no longer use Bellator as part of its branding, per an announcement made by Donn Davis on Tuesday. Ariel Helwani of Uncrowned reported the incoming change earlier in the week.
“Professional Fighters League acquired Bellator MMA one year ago primarily for its great fighter roster,” a statement on social media said. “Going forward all fight events and content will be PFL branded.”
Bellator was acquired by PFL in late 2023, with the promotion going up for sale around the same time that Showtime announced the closure of its sports division.
A major plus to the purchase was the ability to acquire many high-level MMA talents who could join the PFL’s year-long tournament format. However, they also intended to test out keeping Bellator alive as a sideshow instead of just closing down the show from the outset.
PFL launched the “Bellator: Champions Series” in 2024, an eight-event tour which would work alongside the promotion’s other projects. Unlike most of what PFL offers, Bellator’s events were not tied to a tournament format but were instead “Fight Nights” similar to what most MMA companies present.
Just five of the eight “Champions Series” shows they intended to hold took place last year, with the promotion cancelling a trio of shows and giving up in the final months of the year.
In October of last year, PFL’s Donn Davis floated the idea of dropping the usage of Bellator soon.
“The Bellator brand is not resonating,” Davis told MMA Fighting. “It’s not resonating with fans, with commercial partners. So we have to look at that … We think it’s likely we’re going to make a change and everything will be PFL branded. But, we haven’t determined that yet. We’re still evaluating that.”
Bellator’s death marks the end of an era in the sport. Bellator was one of the longest-standing U.S. major MMA brands aside from the UFC, first beginning in 2008 and remaining present in the industry for more than a decade-and-a-half.
Due to its long-standing TV deal with Spike in the 2010s, Bellator had the accessibility and budget that few non-UFC companies obtained in the sport’s history.
Bellator became a home for legends of the sport to keep fighting, many of whom had pasts in UFC or Pride FC. While some past-peak names became the biggest draws for the promotion, it also caused scrutiny from many viewers who saw the company as a place that would often capitalize on used goods.
Bellator is remembered by many for some of its less appetizing moments – like the highly infamous clash between Dada 5000 and Kimbo Slice – although it also became a proving ground for countless elite talents who either never found a way to the UFC or had yet to reach that point in their career.
High-level names like Patchy Mix, Patricio Pitbull, Johnny Eblen, Ben Askren, Yaroslav Amosov, Eddie Alvarez, Michael Chandler, A.J. McKee Jr., Ilima-Lei Macfarlane and Julia Budd all had performed at their peak while in the promotion, making it an important space to follow in the sport to see top talents compete.
Helwani reported that PFL plans to keep the “Champions Series” tour alive but without Bellator’s association with it. They plan to crown new champs for the tour, although it remains unclear what that means for those who currently hold Bellator belts.
A “Champions Series” event is currently scheduled to take place on January 25th in Dubai. While Usman Nurmagomedov is expected to defend his Bellator lightweight title against Paul Hughes in the main event, the show is otherwise solely marketed as a PFL card.
The latest development isn’t the only major changes that have been made in the PFL this year.
Last week, word got out that PFL was set to scrap its past year-long format, dropping a regular season to playoffs model for a more traditional grand prix style tournament. It was also announced that the grand prize for their annual brackets will now become a flat payout of $500,000, instead of a past system which rounded up a fighter’s annual earnings to a total of $1 million.
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