Mailbag: UFC on Paramount+ early takeaways, plus managing expectations for Zuffa Boxing's debut

4 days ago 2

UFC fights are officially available to watch on Paramount+, so what’s the early verdict on the look and feel of the new broadcast home for Octagon action? Plus, with Zuffa Boxing’s debut just a couple weeks away, why haven’t we heard more about it?

All that and more in this week’s mailbag. To ask a question of your own, hit up @BenFowlkesMMA on X or @Ben_Fowlkes on Threads.

@fistfulofbuddha: Have you checked out the new Paramount UFC interface? What do you think about it so far?

I’ve clicked around a little bit. It seems like you can find portions of past numbered events (though not the entire cards, at least from what I’ve seen) as well as some curated collections. But if you’re expecting it to be like UFC Fight Pass, with an easily searchable library of UFC fights going back decades, forget it. Right now, there don’t seem to be that many individual fights separated out in a way that’s easy to find.

The real test is going to be how it handles live events, since that’s the real promise here. I want to say nothing could be significantly worse than ESPN+, but that feels like tempting the gods just a bit too much.

Still, if Paramount+ can make the live events easy to find and can stream them at a reliable quality without constantly telling me to sign up for the account that I am already paying for and logged into (how is it that ESPN+ was never able to fix this issue), I’ll consider it well worth the $7.99 per month. I know price hikes are inevitable, but right now you can get a year of Paramount+ for less than the price of one single pay-per-view on ESPN+. That’s honestly a good deal.

@doyleman123: Does the sport really need Conor Mcgregor to come back?

Conor McGregor specifically? No. There is zero reason to think that, athletically, he’d be a relevant force in any UFC division at this point. But a McGregor-like figure to bring in new fans and invigorate existing ones? Yes, the sport desperately needs that right now.

The problem is, McGregor himself is not a McGregor-like figure anymore. The wattage on that star got turned way, way down in recent years. He still has some name recognition, but these days it’s not for anything very cheerful. The days of a McGregor fight feeling like the rare moment when the entire world stops and pays attention to MMA are over and done.

But we do need … somebody.

We’re in the middle of a star drought right now. Alex Pereira had a moment, but it never quite reached all the way outside the MMA bubble. Ilia Topuria seemed like he had all the ingredients, but now he’s taking time off to deal with stuff in his personal life. That leaves us lacking any one big name who can show up and instantly turn any UFC event into must-see TV. But, with the guaranteed money it’s making from Paramount, I’m not sure the UFC is at all worried about it.

@shadore66: The zuffa boxing thing is in 2 weeks and there is no announced boxers. This thing is slap league 2.0 right?

I’ve seen no announcements about specific fights, or even really any promotional push at all, but I did see that it’s going down at the UFC APEX. That tells us just about everything we need to know about what the plans are for Zuffa Boxing, at least to begin with. What we should expect here is boxing fight nights on a budget. Maybe it’ll grow from there if Zuffa can sign some big-name boxers, but I wouldn’t be surprised if the priority is keeping costs extremely low — at least for the near future.

@oxfordmarlboro: does it ever just hit you that it's all just cockfighting for wealthy people, but the cocks are poor minorities?

I mean, yes and no. If you asked me who makes up the UFC’s core demographic of fans, I’d tell you it’s mostly regular working people. That’s who’s down at Buffalo Wild Wings watching these events. And if those people got the casino comp tickets to big UFC shows in Las Vegas, you could bet they wouldn’t wait until the last few fights of the night to show up and fill those seats. It’s not the 1% who’s keeping up with Waldo Cortes-Acosta’s rise through the heavyweight ranks, I promise you.

Stuff like the planned event at the White House, though? Yeah, that’s going to be wealthy elites, most of whom do not really know or care much about MMA. I think that could create a really weird vibe for the fighters, not to mention the actual fans watching on TV.

But I’d also point out that it’s not as if fights sports haven’t ever experienced this dynamic before. In the days of the London Prize Ring, fighters routinely found some wealthy benefactor to subsidize their training and put up their side of the money for the fight purse. Those rich lords got much the same benefit out of the deal as today’s elites do. They want to be close to something that feels violent and edgy but without getting their own bones broken. Mark Zuckerberg getting fighters to pretend spar with him is really not that different from wealthy British aristocrats showing up to James Figg’s amphitheater and participating in a safe version of boxing that still made them feel tough and cool.

@colonialbeasts: Over/under months of Chama Cortez relationship

Hoping for the best for those two lovebirds. I’ve talked to fighters before about what it’s like to be in a relationship with someone else who knows the lifestyle. It’s tough, because pro fighting can be a very selfish business. You have to think of yourself and your career first. There are some obvious challenges in a relationship when both people are doing that.

But, as I’ve heard often from female fighters who date men, it’s also hard to find a non-fighter partner who understands why you can’t meet them for after-work drinks while you’re in training camp, or why you can’t allow any ice cream to be in the freezer when there’s a weight cut coming up. A fellow fighter is more likely to understand those peculiarities of the lifestyle, so there’s a comfort there.

And if it makes Tracy Cortez and Alex Pereira happy, then I'm happy for them.

@stormlandbrand: Do you believe that the luchador Hechicero is worthy of Big Homie status?

I’m only just now familiarizing myself with his work, but I do see some promising stuff here. That’s a potential Big Homie for sure.

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