In early 2015, Cage Warriors, the premier European regional MMA promotion for lack of a better term, ceased to exist when their CEO Graham Boylan resigned for greener pastures. Since then there has been a massive gap in the market for up and coming fighters, particularly in the UK and Ireland to showcase their talent. The recent visit of BAMMA to Ireland with their near sell out show at the Three Arena in Dublin and its stacked fightcard consisting of both fresh talent and veterans has proved there is an appetite for these smaller to medium regional promotions.
Looking to plug that gap in the market for amateurs and pro fighters in the UK is current UFC Bantamweight Contender and Londoner Brad ‘One Punch’ Pickett. I caught up with Brad to discuss his new promotion, The Rise of Champions and to reflect on his illustrious fight career which has spanned thirty five professional fights. I started off by speaking to Brad about his new promotion, Rise of Champions and why he is now looking to start promoting fights on top of participating in them. “I have been in the fight game myself for a very long time, I have been to a lot of shows, big shows, small shows, really well run shows and some terribly run shows, I have an idea how a nice successful, organised professional run event can be and thats what I am planning on doing. Also when I first started fighting, there wasn’t a career path for young athletes, you only fought because you wanted to compete, there wasn’t a real viable career path to follow, but nowadays, with the rise of MMA and the UFC, you can go on and earn life changing money that you can support your family with. For me I wanted to go on and have a small show, to be the starting level for guys to build themselves up and get up to the big shows”
The Rise of Champions will makes its debut on the seventeenth of October at the City Pavilion in London. The card will feature a professional main event and an amateur undercard.
For the Undercard, Brad is making sure that the fighters are all getting a tough test so these guys will know what to expect if they ever do decide to go down the professional route. When it comes to making the fights, Brad himself will be doing the matchmaking.“I am matching our guys up accordingly, good guys vs good guys, at amateur level you do need to be battle tested before you go professional, you don’t need easy fights, you need to be put in tough fights. At amateur it is really hard to tell someones skill level, If someone is 2-0, I will try and match them up with someone else who is 2-0 but I try and get them against a good gym, if you deal with a gym or a team, you know those guys are going to turn up because their coaches are going to be on them”
Going forward, I asked Brad would the cards always follow that format of a professional main cards and a amateur undercard, and would he introduce belts for the champions.“Yeah I don’t want to go too big and have a full pro card, for me, as I say, its called the Rise of Champions for a reason, it is the rise and the birth of young professionals, it will always have a pro main card but most of the fights will always be amateur, down the line I will probably introduce some belts, but even at that, they will be at amateur level to add some glitz and glam but not straight away”
Brad has made it very clear to both myself and also to Ariel Helwani on the MMA Hour that his show is not going to be looking to compete with the likes of the UFC. “I want it to be a feeder show, I want the guys to get onto my show, be looked after really well and be given good fights and then onto the bigger shows ready. I want to be able to nurture young talent into going onto the big shows, I have been around the UFC, It is really well organised and really well run, I want to do that on a smaller scale.”
For now, Brad only has one show organised, his plan is to see how the first fight goes and then go from there. On top of organising a new MMA Promotion, Pickett has to contend with being a full time UFC fighter himself and needs to take that into consideration. “I can’t do two things at once or half arse do things, I am looking to fight early next year and then focus on the next show.”
Brad’s last fight for the UFC was against undefeated Brazilian bantamweight prospect, Thomas Almeida for the opening bout of the main card for UFC 189, McGregor Vs Mendes back in July this year. ‘One Punch’ suffered a brutal knockout from a flying knee from the Brazilian in the second round. I asked Brad to reflect on international fight week and what was a tough night for him. “It was a little bit crazy, not just the whole Conor McGregor thing, the reebok deal and all that stuff, MMA went up a notch in the sporting world, the whole exposure the whole show would have got, and also how good the fights were on the main card really rose the sport a lot, for me the one positive was I felt like a lot better fighter at 135lbs than I did at 125lbs, I was doing really well in the fight but unfortunately I got caught, its one of those things, it is a very unforgiving sport, but the kids a rising talent, I believed until I got caught I was winning the fight but thats the fight game, I have been around it long enough to know”
On his opponent, Almeida, I questioned what Brad made of him and did he give him a chance at making a title run. “Yeah I think the kid is tough, skill level he is very talented and also in this sport you need to be tough, and he was tough, I hit him with a lot of heavy shots and put him in deep deep deep waters and for him to come back from that shows a lot of heart and grit, especially for a young kid, I think he has the heart, the passion and the talent to go all the way in the division”
I asked Brad how it felt being back at 135lbs and his experience in the 125lbs division. “I feel a lot better, 100%, dieting was tough, being at 125 was hard, it wasn’t just that, the fights down at that weight class didn’t suit me, people point scoring, running away, hitting and running, hitting and running, for me I felt like I was running out of time. The weight class did not suit me.
On what the future holds next for Brad, a homecoming fight at the 02 Arena in London on February 27th is the most logical next step. Brad recently appeared on the MMA Hour with Ariel Helwani and did allude to the fact that the end of his own fighting career might be happening sooner rather than later. I asked ‘One Punch’ if the 02 fight would be the perfect send off fight.
“I am going to fight in February in the 02, it may be my last one but I may feel great and am gonna want to continue, I do love this sport, I want to continue as long as I can but it is tough on my body so I have to gauge how I take each fight at the time, I don’t want to make any decisions now for something I may feel different on months down the line, see how I feel, see how I fight and how I perform.”
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