The South Korean combat sports organization is most notable for its failure to pay fighters from their first and only event in 2017. But with new owners and debts settled, they’re restarting with some notable talent.
If at first you don’t succeed… The once-disgraced Battlefield FC appears to have gotten a second lease on life. The promotion became notable back in 2017, following their first – and only – show, but not for any reason that a business wants to be notable for.
Dubbed the ‘Great Beginning’ the event in Seoul, South Korea, featured a co-main event between Jessica-Rose Clark and Sarah Kaufman. Kaufman won the bout by unanimous decision. But it would take more than a year for either woman to be paid in full for their performance.
“The worst part of it is,” Clark wrote in an Instagram post shortly after the event, “my manager gave me enough money out of his own pocket to pay my half of my coaches and my rent and other bills because I put everything on hold for a month counting on that money coming in. So now not only am I out of a vehicle and the money to go home to see my family later in the year, I also owe my manager a tonne of cash cos he tried to help me out.”
Eventually, both women would get the money they had been promised. But it seemed like that was the inglorious end to Battlefield FC’s great beginning. However, it appears that two years later, the promotion is returning, reportedly with new ownership and a new business plan.
Battlefield FC has launched their own crypto-currency, and is apparently developing a PPV streaming/broadcasting platform. Seemingly with the hopes of creating a sort of self contained combat sports economy. And while they may have a poor track record for financial success, it appears their new direction has attracted at least two notable veteran fighters.
The Body Lock reports that Will Brooks vs. Abel Trujillo is in the works for the organization’s re-launch on July 27th in Macau. Brooks, a former Bellator lightweight champion, made a well-publicized jump to the UFC back in 2016, with a win over Ross Pearson.
His success there would be short lived however, and he was released on the back of three straight stoppage losses over the next year-and-a-half. Brooks then found a home in the newly re-branded Pro Fighters League (formerly the WSOF). He went 2-0 over the course of the 2018 season, getting eliminated from the playoffs on a draw to fellow UFC vet Rashid Magomedov.
His opponent, Trujillo, has been out of competition since a pair of 2017 losses to James Vick and John Makdessi. The former UFC lightweight went 6-4 (1 NC) in his five years with the promotion, including a KO of the Year contender over Roger Bowling. He also gained infamy as a notable exception to the UFC’s supposed ‘zero tolerance’ policy for domestic abusers, having twice pleaded guilty to charges.
Brooks vs. Trujillo will reportedly serve as the co-main event for the July event. No other bookings have yet to be announced.