What Does Georges St. Pierre's Gatorade Deal Mean for Mixed Martial Arts?
by Luke Thomas on Mar 24, 2009 11:14 AM EDT
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Josh Gross opinesYou can take the news as one more sign of MMA's growth, especially in fight-crazy Canada. While Gatorade owns North American rights to run the spots, for now the company is scheduled to air them only north of the border. If the ads, which include some of the biggest icons in sport, get shown in the U.S., it'll certainly be a boost to the 27-year-old St. Pierre, the UFC and to MMA, in general.
Looking at the big picture, I take this to mean elite fighters can -- and are beginning to -- transcend the sport (including the UFC) to a place where they'll be recognizable to mainstream audiences. For purposes of negotiation, this can be incredibly powerful, and it will be interesting to see how, and if, sponsorships like this can propel fighter popularity and purses.
That said, St. Pierre won't capitalize any time soon. He signed an eight-fight extension with the UFC prior to stopping B.J. Penn at UFC 94.
There are potential liabilities, too: if the UFC continues to hold the most coveted and only meaningful outlet (as far as blue chip sponsors are concerned, though with Strikeforce to Showtime this potentially changes matters), will fighters with major sponsorships be compelled into working and staying with the UFC for exposure and promotion? A fighter with a Nike sponsorship (unlikely, I know) does have increased leverage at the negotiation table, but it does not necessarily insulate one from removal from the UFC should that fighter be forced out either by failed negotiations or by disciplinary removal. Yes, there are always commercials and sponsorship promotion, but the UFC machine's backing matters: how valuable is a blue chip sponsor if no one sees you hawk their product?
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A little of both. This post was written in real time, though.
by Luke Thomas on Mar 24, 2009 11:29 AM EDT up reply actions
Josh Gross has this fetish about fighters getting bigger then a promotion, and then the promotions not mattering anymore. He kind of eludes to that in this article…. And he talks about it every chance he can get.
The day that happens, is the day MMA becomes like boxing. Not a good thing. No baseball player is bigger then Major League Baseball. No football player is bigger then the National Football League. And no basketball player is bigger then the National Basketball Association.
Don’t get me wrong…. They all have huge stars. But at the end of the day, the league is what matters most. That is how it NEEDS to stay in MMA for the sport to not get out of hand.
by AlwaysRelaxing on Mar 24, 2009 11:31 AM EDT reply actions 2 recs
I think what Gross really wants is Zuffa to not be an all powerful entity with all the negotiating leverage. He’s thinking that if fighters like Georges St. Pierre get sponsorships like this, Zuffa can’t strong arm them at the negotiating table. If GSP and others can become popular with the mainstream the public outcry for situations like the Jon Fitch release would be tremendous.
That said, Luke’s probably right. For better or worse, the UFC is viewed as the big leagues here, so no MMA fighter in this country is much good to a major sponsor if the fighter isn’t in the UFC. . How many minor league baseball players do you see with national tv ads?
Nice post
Just wondering, which fighter do you guys think would be able to be the first to wear Nike for money?
Caol Uno
Caol Uno is actually a Nike Athlete and has a couple shoes and a clothing line out. Im a sneakerhead and I picked up his AM90 Frees and those are some great shoes btw. Let me look for a link
found the link to his clothing line!
It has slide shows of his nike line and the personal clothing line. The Nike one has pics of him training at Wild Card, Xtreme Couture, Laimon’s Corbra Kai and a bunch of other places I can’t place. I wonder if he is gonna have Nike on his sponsor banner… but he’s definately gonna be wearing the gear
simma
We are talking about Canadian markets here. Granted UFC puts shows on there, but they also do it in europe as well. In reality this is no different than if Fedor were to sign a Russian deal with a sports company for Russian only distribution. When you see it show up in SI or on ESPN for american distribution, then its mainstream.
MMA is such a dangerous sport for any big named sponsor to get behind.
Getting behind Derek Jeter isn’t hard to do. His teams wins only 60% of the time, and that is considered great. He gets a hit only 3 out of every 10 times he is at the plate.
And with these stats, he is a star.
For a MMA fighter, they have to basically be perfect, for an extended period of time. That is nearly impossible.
by AlwaysRelaxing on Mar 24, 2009 11:51 AM EDT reply actions
sorry but no.. 2 words: chuck liddell
he could hold/get a sponsorship now even if he lost 3 out of the past 4..
by Anton Tabuena on Mar 24, 2009 11:57 AM EDT up reply actions
Ever since Gatorade changed it’s name to G and started all of these really dumb commercials I have quit drinking the stuff. G man, its all like gangster and stuff. I can’t support that kind of stupidity in advertising. I refuse to drink it until its once again Gatorade.
It’s called Gatorade G and I’m not sure why that’s particularly “gangster”. They put Peyton Manning in one of the commercials. He’s the anti-gangster.
Watching Bill Parcells saying ‘the heart, hustle and soul of the game’ made my face hurt
by Derek Suboticki on Mar 24, 2009 2:57 PM EDT up reply actions
I thought they were just trying to distance themselves from the University of Florida.
Bolts from the Blue // "Game over." - Jamal Williams
Bloody Elbow // "Every normal man must be tempted at times to spit upon his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin slitting throats." - H.L. Mencken
by Richard Wade on Mar 24, 2009 4:05 PM EDT up reply actions
Eight fight extension? That’s an epic commitment to the UFC by GSP.
by Derek Suboticki on Mar 24, 2009 2:00 PM EDT reply actions
Precisely. And it probably has a clause that allows GSP some leverage/a grace period with respect to contract termination (not allowed in the first four fights, something like that). Also, likely a share of endorsements, plus we know he gets a PPV cut. Stuff like that will ultimately drop the price of an athlete overall while making the signing of the contract much more attractive to both parties. Only problem is that it only works if the athlete doesn’t wash out or get injured. We mostly remember these types of contracts for the bad ones given to either very young (unproven) talents, or for athletes just starting to decline getting retroactively rewarded for their peak performances. GSP, at his age, talent level, and increasingly better performances, is likely seen to warrant a gamble like this.
"I'm AJB and I endorse this nut-puncher."
Can’t strong arm the UFC when the leverage created for GSP is from the UFC itself. Think of Fedor right now, best heavy weight on Earth but no UFC promo machine behind him.
Brock will be the HUGE push into main stream company sponsorship. Nike, Reebok, or a company like Pepsi will throw him huge dollars and capitalize on his WWE/UFC popularity.
In my mind...
There is one sponsor/advertiser/etc that MMA in the US needs…Nike. Getting them involved with commercials, sponsorship and making gear, would be huge boon to the sport.
The Gatorade deal is one step closer.
If you're not submitting, you're just rolling around with another guy.
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