After Years of Waiting, Dana White Finally Brings His UFC Machine to Boston

by Nick Costa

The long wait for MMA fans in Boston is finally over. Dana White proves that you really can go home again as he brings the Ultimate Fighting Championship to Boston for the first time, with “UFC 118: Edgar Vs. Penn 2” Saturday night from TD Garden. The event will air live at 10 P.M. ET on pay-per-view.

The UFC’s first trip to Boston has been a long-standing goal of White’s since the South Boston native first persuaded friends, and Las Vegas Casino moguls, Frank and Lorenzo Fertitta, to buy the Ultimate Fighting Championship from its creators, Rorion Gracie, whose family had run fights in Brazil, and entrepreneur Robert Meyrowitz, for $2 million in 2001.

White, whose humble beginnings included being an amateur boxer, hotel bellhop, and working for a road-paving company in the Boston area, knew he had quite a reclamation project on his hands. He was taking over an organization with virtually no rules since its inception in 1993. Despite those facts, White saw an opportunity for the UFC to grow.

The most violent acts–eye-gouging, biting, head-butting–were not encouraged, but couldn’t be stopped, because there was no judge or point system Referee “Big” John McCarthy, who started with the company from the beginning, recounted some of his earliest memories to Forbes.com in April 2008.

“The way those acts were stopped was by implementing a rule that said if you head-butt or bite someone, your opponent gets your paycheck that night,” explains McCarthy.

Although this form of fighting became an instant hit on pay-per-view and video, due to its ultra-violent content, the UFC faced many problems in its early days as Lawmakers soon stepped in and banned no-holds-barred fighting in nearly all 50 states and got cable operators to stop broadcasting the events.

The long-term viability of the UFC was in serious question until 2001 when the Fertitta brothers agreed to let White take control of their day-to-day operations as UFC President. In the first, three years the Fertitta brothers worked with Nevada State Athletic Commission to develop, rules.

There would be weight classes, judges, point systems and a limited number of rounds. The referee could also stop a bout when a fighter could no longer protect himself or lost consciousness. The Fertittas say it is this rule, and the fighter’s ability to quit at any time, which makes mixed martial arts safer than boxing because it limits the number of blows a fighter takes.

Despite all of the positive changes, the UFC was failing to make a profit. In fact, in 2005, the UFC was $34 million in debt, and about to go out of business.

Then, later that year, the Fertittas spent $10 million to produce a new reality television show called “The Ultimate Fighter.” The show, which was first picked up by Spike TV in 2005, would feature fighters from all over the world training, competing and living together in hopes of land a six-figure UFC contract.

The show, that now has 2.2 million viewers, will air its 13th season beginning in September, has been a consistent rating winner, and made rock stars out of White and his fighters. All while serving as a key cog in the master plan of the man who is the architect of the UFC.

White’s next mission was to find a way to get the UFC widely available on pay-per-view. He told Ron Borges of The Boston Herald,” They couldn’t get their fights on pay-per-view!” White hollers. “They were banned from pay-per-view by the cable companies. You could buy porn on pay-per-view but you couldn’t buy a UFC fight! Think about that, dude. That’s (expletive) ridiculous!”

Due to the success of “The Ultimate Fighter”, and an aggressive marketing and promotional strategy the UFC expanded its pay-per-view reach, with 14 such events per year, and was now ready to expand their list of possible locations to hold events.

White had this to say to Borges about his passion for fighting and the UFC. “Fighting is in our DNA. I truly believe in combat sports and what it does for people. Women would come in wanting to lose weight, take a kickboxing class and you could see the change. It’s EMPOWERING! Anybody who tries it, it changes your life.”

White continued by reaffirming his passion for MMA. ““I believe if you’re passionate about something an opportunity pops up,” White said. “I’m not a big sports guy. I’m a fight guy. But I tell people who still don’t get it, ‘You people are afraid of UFC? You should be terrified of football!’

White still had one major goal he had always wanted to accomplish: bringing the UFC to Boston, and “blow the (expletive) roof” off TD Garden. Before White could do that, he needed the help of UFC Vice President of Regulatory Affairs, Mark Ratner to convince Massachusetts lawmakers that bringing the UFC to Boston was a positive venture.

The first step in bringing UFC to the Bay State came in May 2008 when White and Ratner enlisted the Dewey Square Group, a Boston-based lobbying firm. Though it succeeded in getting an MMA regulation bill passed as an amendment to the 2008 budget, there was not enough time on the calendar for a full hearing, and the bill didn’t make it through the legislative process.

In 2009, State Sen. James E. Timilty, the Chairman of the Public Safety and Homeland Security Committee, made the bill a priority, by agreeing to sponsor the ammended MMA bill. Tilmilty said, “We should have some oversight just to make sure something doesn’t go wrong,” said Timilty (D-Walpole). “And secondly, there’s a significant economic benefit.”

Then, in April 2009, White, Ratner, and Boston area native, Kenny Florian, attended a hearing in front of the state safety committee, where the bill passed by 34-1 vote in the state senate, and 144-10 vote in the house. Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick signed the bill into law last November, making Massachusetts the 42 state in the country to legalize Mixed Martial Arts.

Now, White just had to figure out where to hold the first event, TD Garden or Fenway Park. For White and Garden officials, the decision was easy.

“We knew from seeing what was happening in other major markets that the UFC is breaking out and doing incredible numbers,” Garden president John Wentzell said. “The interest is skyrocketing, both live as well as on the pay-per-view side. We knew it was a very hot commodity and it hasn’t disappointed.”

As for White, the personal importance of staging this event cannot be overstated. “You know how much this means to me and how long I’ve wanted to come there and how much I love the city of Boston,” said White, who once lived in South Boston and ran a boxing gym in the Hub. “Boston has always been good to me. Believe me when I tell you, I’m going to put on a show that’s going to blow the (expletive) roof off that place.”

Get ready, Boston. Your long wait is over. The UFC is finally here, and Dana White was the man that made it happen.

Ron Borges is a pro football and Boxing Columnist for The Boston Herald. Dan Duggan is Mixed Martial Arts Writer for The Boston Herald. Matthew Miller is a business writer for Forbes Magazine and Forbes.com.

Tags: Dana White, UFC

Posted on Friday, August 27th, 2010 in Students of the Game.