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GLORY CEO Jon J. Franklin talks Spike departure, Bellator kickboxing, and future with ESPN and UFC Fight Pass
GLORY CEO Jon. J. Franklin gives his reaction to the launch of Bellator Kickboxing, and opens up about GLORY’s deal with UFC Fight Pass, and future plans with ESPN.
The more kickboxing airing on U.S. television, the merrier.
“More kickboxing on TV is great for the sport,” Franklin told MMAmania. It’s good for all of us and great that promoters see the value of kickboxing. It will help us sell more tickets wherever we go. The future of kickboxing is bright.”
GLORY is now far removed from its two-year tenure on Spike TV, which came to an end in October of 2015. Since then, the world’s leading kickboxing promotion has struck a deal with ESPN to broadcast their fight cards live on ESPN3 and on delay on ESPN2 and ESPN Deportes.
Most recently, GLORY reached a deal to broadcast their preliminary fight cards — the Superfight Series — exclusively on UFC Fight Pass.
Franklin had a great feeling about 2016 and the promotion’s first event of the year, GLORY 27, which takes place on Friday February 26, 2016) and was headlined by a Middleweight title bout between champion Artem Levin and No.3-ranked contender, Simon Marcus.
Spike TV senior vice president of sports, Jon Slusser told MMAmania after last Thursday’s (February 18, 2016) Bellator Kickboxing press conference that they was no issue with GLORY per se, they just felt confident that launching their own kickboxing promotion with Scott Coker at the helm and under the existing Viacom/Spike/Bellator umbrella was the best way to go.
“We still talk to the GLORY guys,” Slusser said. “It’s all good. We see an opportunity with the infrastructure and the platform we are already on. Here we are sitting on assets and great people and infrastructure that is really first class and why not take advantage of it to squeeze more efficiency out of it in a sport that we know has potential and we know has a future for the U.S. audience that it just doesn’t have today.”
“I don’t have any problem with them either,” Franklin said, when asked about Slusser’s comments. “I’m happy to say we had a great run at Spike. They were a great place for us to get going in the United States. I’m a combat sports fan and I watch fights on every network and I still watch fights on Spike,” he said.
“We talk to some of their fighters and we talk to some of their executives and I think the relationship is very cordial and certainly positive at things. Anyone that wants to make it out into some rivalry is just wrong. We are all measured and positive executives and we all want the best for the industry,” he added.
“Truly, I think getting more kickboxing on TV is just going to be better for everyone in the kickboxing industry. Like I said, we aren’t going to be in the same city at the same time trying to sell tickets against one another and people who watch kickboxing on TV are going to want to come to live fights and they are going to want to watch more kickboxing because they are going to be excited when kickboxing is on television. So, the more people that are exposed to our sport, the better it is going to be for everyone in the sport.”
It is accurate to say that GLORY was not heavily promoted on Spike and ratings often suffered due to that very fact and due to being placed on late time slots, or inconsistent ones like GLORY 22, which aired live from France at 4 p.m ET.
Franklin understands Viacom will most likely push their own product much harder than they did with GLORY. He touched on some of the hardships GLORY dealt with over the last year.
“Nobody wants to invest money building someone else’s brand,” he said. “You can see that they would want to, perhaps, take it a little further than they were with us. We were getting pushed around to odd time slots and they owned Bellator and PBC was paying them a lot to be on the air so they were times they were asking us to move and go later on night and do other things and it made it really tough to establish a consistent ratings driver for them. And with Scott (Coker) there they were interesting in having him help with our match making and changing some things around.”
“Frankly, we talked to them about doing some special events with guys like Kimbo Slice and they encouraged us to bring Mike Tyson to events, which we did, we had him in Virginia. All these things are great ratings drivers, but they’re not really the direction that we felt was proper. We were trying to put the best fighters in the world to fight for the belt. You don’t always get the most charismatic winners in those cases.”
Now that GLORY is with ESPN, Franklin feels the the mindsets of both parties are harmonious with one another as they head into their third fight card working with the worldwide leader in sports.
“With ESPN it’s totally different,” Franklin stated. “Their philosophy is 100 percent aligned with ours. They want to see the best fighters in the world go for the belt. The best competition. They don’t care if Roger Federer is winning the U.S. Open. I’m sure there is someone over there that would love to see an American win it, but if Roger Federer wins it, he’s the best guy. He deserves the trophy. Likewise, they haven’t ever said to us, ‘You need more Americans. Why don’t you match these guys up?’ They don’t tell the NCAA how to run their tournaments and they don’t tell us how to run ours. We feel like we are given a free hand to do what we do best.”
Does that mean that weren’t quite totally free while at Spike?
“They definitely were very involved in the process,” Franklin explained. “If you look at the ‘Dynamite’ event, they were pushing us in one direction. We were trying to come up with the best plan in conjunction with Spike to make the evening work properly and it wasn’t always easy.”
Moving forward, though, Franklin has no regrets with the promotion’s tenure at Spike and is ultimately looking forward to the future as the promotion heads into its twenty seventh event.
“We were happy over there for a time and I think they were happy to have us,” he said. “At the appropriate time we moved on to the worldwide leader in sports, ESPN, and we are getting run on three platforms of ESPN for each show. Now we are on UFC Fight Pass. We are partnering with the number one MMA promotion in the world. So, I mean, you can analyze that yourself, where we came from and where we’ve gotten to,” he added.
“Right now the relationship with UFC has started out all roses. We are happy to be with them. We are exclusive kickboxing on Fight Pass for a long time. We are looking forward to a great run with those guys.”
What could be difficult is the fact that GLORY stands a good chance to lose some of its roster to Bellator Kickboxing. No.1-ranked GLORY Middleweight, Joe Schilling and former GLORY Welterweight title contender Raymond Daniels have both signed on with Bellator Kickboxing. Schilling had two fights left on his contract, one of which he completed at the Superfight Series last Friday against Mike Lemaire, which he won via unanimous decision.
After his next bout is fulfilled, he said he intends to “fight for Bellator Kickboxing.”
One could get the impression that Coker will continue to raid the cupboard, so to speak, and poach some of the roster. Franklin said he is “never concerned,” about that, before adding, “We do what we do and they do what they do. Anything good for the athletes is ultimately good for the sport.”
As far as Schilling is concerned, Franklin said he “wishes Joe the best.” And stated he would like to see him “fight for a GLORY belt,” and would make that fight if “Stitch ’em Up” would accept it. “It’s up to him,” he said.
And with losing Daniels, Franklin didn’t seem too upset the high-flying fighter won’t be playing his trade in the GLORY ring any longer.
“He is certainly an extremely exciting fighter and he had a couple of knockouts in GLORY that have gone viral, but is he the up and coming guy for the next title?” Franklin asked. “I don’t know? GLORY is all about the best fighters in the world fighting for a belt. Does Raymond still fit in there? Maybe he does.”
“We’ve got a great roster of fighters,” he continued. “We are on one of the best networks in the world. We are partnering with the UFC on things. We have to worry about doing our business. For us, the future is bright. We’ve got a lot of great stuff going on. We are signing more and more international broadcasts around the world. We are looking good. We are very well positioned for 2016 from an athletic standpoint, from an exposure standpoint, from a television standpoint, from planning a calendar out in advance. We are really building from strength to strength going into 2016.”
Franklin mentioned that GLORY has been “looking at beefing up the Superfight Series for a very long time,” and now that it will be featured on Fight Pass, they will do so by making big matchups as well as title fights from now on.
“Looking at 2016, we want to make the Superfight Series into the premier property that it should be and it is now, with two title fights in Paris,” said Franklin, in reference to the next Superfight Series, which takes place on March 12, 2016, ahead of GLORY 28. “It’s all seeming to come together. We can put some title fights on the Superfight Series. We’ve got a lot of fighters that need to fight. We have 120 fighters under contract. We’ve got to keep them busy. That is one of the reasons we made the Superfight Series. It just seemed opportune and appropriate to put that series on Fight Pass.”
GLORY’s leading man also had some promising news about future events, saying “the plan going forward,” is for the U.S. events to be shown live on ESPN2 and ESPN3 simultaneously, and then the European events would be live on ESPN3 and replayed on delay on ESPN2, which would give GLORY much larger exposure. “We are really happy they chose us to put kickboxing on the network,” he said.
The rest of the 2016 GLORY schedule will being to roll out soon, Franklin said. The promotion is still finalizing details of future events with arenas, athletic commissions and international governing bodies. But once the i’s are dotted and the t’s are crossed, the upcoming events will be announced.
“The plan is a full schedule for 2016 and carry on great fights and build it and continue to expand our presence overseas. We signed a couple more international television contracts to fill in where we had holes in our distribution. We are going to announce shortly. It’s all good. The momentum is good. Great fights. Great TV networks. Everything is positive going into 2016.”
GLORY CEO Jon. J. Franklin gives his reaction to the launch of Bellator Kickboxing, and opens up about GLORY’s deal with UFC Fight Pass, and future plans with ESPN.
The more kickboxing airing on U.S. television, the merrier.
“More kickboxing on TV is great for the sport,” Franklin told MMAmania. It’s good for all of us and great that promoters see the value of kickboxing. It will help us sell more tickets wherever we go. The future of kickboxing is bright.”
GLORY is now far removed from its two-year tenure on Spike TV, which came to an end in October of 2015. Since then, the world’s leading kickboxing promotion has struck a deal with ESPN to broadcast their fight cards live on ESPN3 and on delay on ESPN2 and ESPN Deportes.
Most recently, GLORY reached a deal to broadcast their preliminary fight cards — the Superfight Series — exclusively on UFC Fight Pass.
Franklin had a great feeling about 2016 and the promotion’s first event of the year, GLORY 27, which takes place on Friday February 26, 2016) and was headlined by a Middleweight title bout between champion Artem Levin and No.3-ranked contender, Simon Marcus.
Spike TV senior vice president of sports, Jon Slusser told MMAmania after last Thursday’s (February 18, 2016) Bellator Kickboxing press conference that they was no issue with GLORY per se, they just felt confident that launching their own kickboxing promotion with Scott Coker at the helm and under the existing Viacom/Spike/Bellator umbrella was the best way to go.
“We still talk to the GLORY guys,” Slusser said. “It’s all good. We see an opportunity with the infrastructure and the platform we are already on. Here we are sitting on assets and great people and infrastructure that is really first class and why not take advantage of it to squeeze more efficiency out of it in a sport that we know has potential and we know has a future for the U.S. audience that it just doesn’t have today.”
“I don’t have any problem with them either,” Franklin said, when asked about Slusser’s comments. “I’m happy to say we had a great run at Spike. They were a great place for us to get going in the United States. I’m a combat sports fan and I watch fights on every network and I still watch fights on Spike,” he said.
“We talk to some of their fighters and we talk to some of their executives and I think the relationship is very cordial and certainly positive at things. Anyone that wants to make it out into some rivalry is just wrong. We are all measured and positive executives and we all want the best for the industry,” he added.
“Truly, I think getting more kickboxing on TV is just going to be better for everyone in the kickboxing industry. Like I said, we aren’t going to be in the same city at the same time trying to sell tickets against one another and people who watch kickboxing on TV are going to want to come to live fights and they are going to want to watch more kickboxing because they are going to be excited when kickboxing is on television. So, the more people that are exposed to our sport, the better it is going to be for everyone in the sport.”
It is accurate to say that GLORY was not heavily promoted on Spike and ratings often suffered due to that very fact and due to being placed on late time slots, or inconsistent ones like GLORY 22, which aired live from France at 4 p.m ET.
Franklin understands Viacom will most likely push their own product much harder than they did with GLORY. He touched on some of the hardships GLORY dealt with over the last year.
“Nobody wants to invest money building someone else’s brand,” he said. “You can see that they would want to, perhaps, take it a little further than they were with us. We were getting pushed around to odd time slots and they owned Bellator and PBC was paying them a lot to be on the air so they were times they were asking us to move and go later on night and do other things and it made it really tough to establish a consistent ratings driver for them. And with Scott (Coker) there they were interesting in having him help with our match making and changing some things around.”
“Frankly, we talked to them about doing some special events with guys like Kimbo Slice and they encouraged us to bring Mike Tyson to events, which we did, we had him in Virginia. All these things are great ratings drivers, but they’re not really the direction that we felt was proper. We were trying to put the best fighters in the world to fight for the belt. You don’t always get the most charismatic winners in those cases.”
Now that GLORY is with ESPN, Franklin feels the the mindsets of both parties are harmonious with one another as they head into their third fight card working with the worldwide leader in sports.
“With ESPN it’s totally different,” Franklin stated. “Their philosophy is 100 percent aligned with ours. They want to see the best fighters in the world go for the belt. The best competition. They don’t care if Roger Federer is winning the U.S. Open. I’m sure there is someone over there that would love to see an American win it, but if Roger Federer wins it, he’s the best guy. He deserves the trophy. Likewise, they haven’t ever said to us, ‘You need more Americans. Why don’t you match these guys up?’ They don’t tell the NCAA how to run their tournaments and they don’t tell us how to run ours. We feel like we are given a free hand to do what we do best.”
Does that mean that weren’t quite totally free while at Spike?
“They definitely were very involved in the process,” Franklin explained. “If you look at the ‘Dynamite’ event, they were pushing us in one direction. We were trying to come up with the best plan in conjunction with Spike to make the evening work properly and it wasn’t always easy.”
Moving forward, though, Franklin has no regrets with the promotion’s tenure at Spike and is ultimately looking forward to the future as the promotion heads into its twenty seventh event.
“We were happy over there for a time and I think they were happy to have us,” he said. “At the appropriate time we moved on to the worldwide leader in sports, ESPN, and we are getting run on three platforms of ESPN for each show. Now we are on UFC Fight Pass. We are partnering with the number one MMA promotion in the world. So, I mean, you can analyze that yourself, where we came from and where we’ve gotten to,” he added.
“Right now the relationship with UFC has started out all roses. We are happy to be with them. We are exclusive kickboxing on Fight Pass for a long time. We are looking forward to a great run with those guys.”
What could be difficult is the fact that GLORY stands a good chance to lose some of its roster to Bellator Kickboxing. No.1-ranked GLORY Middleweight, Joe Schilling and former GLORY Welterweight title contender Raymond Daniels have both signed on with Bellator Kickboxing. Schilling had two fights left on his contract, one of which he completed at the Superfight Series last Friday against Mike Lemaire, which he won via unanimous decision.
After his next bout is fulfilled, he said he intends to “fight for Bellator Kickboxing.”
One could get the impression that Coker will continue to raid the cupboard, so to speak, and poach some of the roster. Franklin said he is “never concerned,” about that, before adding, “We do what we do and they do what they do. Anything good for the athletes is ultimately good for the sport.”
As far as Schilling is concerned, Franklin said he “wishes Joe the best.” And stated he would like to see him “fight for a GLORY belt,” and would make that fight if “Stitch ’em Up” would accept it. “It’s up to him,” he said.
And with losing Daniels, Franklin didn’t seem too upset the high-flying fighter won’t be playing his trade in the GLORY ring any longer.
“He is certainly an extremely exciting fighter and he had a couple of knockouts in GLORY that have gone viral, but is he the up and coming guy for the next title?” Franklin asked. “I don’t know? GLORY is all about the best fighters in the world fighting for a belt. Does Raymond still fit in there? Maybe he does.”
“We’ve got a great roster of fighters,” he continued. “We are on one of the best networks in the world. We are partnering with the UFC on things. We have to worry about doing our business. For us, the future is bright. We’ve got a lot of great stuff going on. We are signing more and more international broadcasts around the world. We are looking good. We are very well positioned for 2016 from an athletic standpoint, from an exposure standpoint, from a television standpoint, from planning a calendar out in advance. We are really building from strength to strength going into 2016.”
Franklin mentioned that GLORY has been “looking at beefing up the Superfight Series for a very long time,” and now that it will be featured on Fight Pass, they will do so by making big matchups as well as title fights from now on.
“Looking at 2016, we want to make the Superfight Series into the premier property that it should be and it is now, with two title fights in Paris,” said Franklin, in reference to the next Superfight Series, which takes place on March 12, 2016, ahead of GLORY 28. “It’s all seeming to come together. We can put some title fights on the Superfight Series. We’ve got a lot of fighters that need to fight. We have 120 fighters under contract. We’ve got to keep them busy. That is one of the reasons we made the Superfight Series. It just seemed opportune and appropriate to put that series on Fight Pass.”
GLORY’s leading man also had some promising news about future events, saying “the plan going forward,” is for the U.S. events to be shown live on ESPN2 and ESPN3 simultaneously, and then the European events would be live on ESPN3 and replayed on delay on ESPN2, which would give GLORY much larger exposure. “We are really happy they chose us to put kickboxing on the network,” he said.
The rest of the 2016 GLORY schedule will being to roll out soon, Franklin said. The promotion is still finalizing details of future events with arenas, athletic commissions and international governing bodies. But once the i’s are dotted and the t’s are crossed, the upcoming events will be announced.
“The plan is a full schedule for 2016 and carry on great fights and build it and continue to expand our presence overseas. We signed a couple more international television contracts to fill in where we had holes in our distribution. We are going to announce shortly. It’s all good. The momentum is good. Great fights. Great TV networks. Everything is positive going into 2016.”
