The Francis Ngannou Gamble

Maybe Ngannou and Dana White are both right

So Francis Ngannou has signed a historic deal with the PFL. It lets him box and continue pursuing MMA while giving him a chairman position of “PFL Africa” according to the New York Times piece that announced the deal a few weeks ago. Since, White, Ngannou, and even Jon Jones have been going back and forth on social media about accusations of being scared versus taking professional risks. I think this is just getting lost in the sour grapes of the UFC since, no matter how you look at it, they had a sitting champion walk away from the promotion for what they felt was in their best interest.

I know it’s cool to look at the UFC as the big evil corporate monopoly in MMA, and they are in a lot of ways. However, it is because of their growth the sport of MMA is now big enough that deals as this can happen for Ngannou. So, even in losing him the UFC can still take some credit for getting investors like those involved with the PFL to gamble on Ngannou, but without him fighting and producing numbers, it’s still a gamble.