One Fan's Fight to Save Combat Sports
Mike Fox is going all-in to lobby legislators and candidates to do the right thing
Sometimes, after twenty-plus years of covering combat sports, I despair that things are hopelessly going to shit; that all the wrong people are winning and running the fight sports I love into the ground.
A lot of times it seems like very few people care about the fighters, the fans, or the future of the sport.
Then I meet Mike Fox.
Mike Fox is a combat sports fan, MMA Draw subscriber, and an activist who’s putting his time, money, and mind into doing everything he can to make combat sports better for the fans and fighters.
When I recently met Mike, he told me about the effort he’s putting into lobbying against TKO’s Muhammad Ali American Boxing Revival Act (aka the Ari Emanuel Boxing Takeover Act) and I was so impressed I had to interview him about his efforts.
Here’s our discussion.
Nate Wilcox: What inspired you to become an activist for combat sports reform?
Mike Fox: I stumbled into it. I saw Saikat Chakrabarti, a US House candidate in my city, on Luke Thomas’s podcast. I went to a town hall Saikat had and asked him about combat sports reform. He said he was interested, but wanted to read more about it. I saw that there was a lot written on the topic, but nothing connecting it all.
So, I wrote a policy and a detailed explanation for every part of it, along with a complete media list. Once I made the materials, I figured this was a policy that would be effective in races all around the country, given the enormous popularity of MMA, Pro Wrestling, and Boxing. I started reaching out to several more campaigns.
Nate: Why do you care so much about combat sports?
Mike Fox: I’ve watched pro wrestling my whole life and started watching MMA, around when I was 11 or 12, around the time The Ultimate Fighter was on after WWE on Spike, or when Brock Lesnar debuted in UFC.
As a fan of these, the athletes involved are our heroes. MMA is my favorite sport. I’ve trained recreationally for over a decade and base a lot of my identity on my involvement with martial arts, and hope to always be engaged with it. Having said that, over time, I’ve gotten increasingly uncomfortable watching fighters put on genuinely inspiring performances in one instant, and moments later, reduced to begging for more money in their post-fight interviews. I hate the system where Dana White flouts his wealth at gambling tables while his fighters work second jobs, while fighting on PPV.
Downstream, the effects of monopoly power are obvious. We hardly ever get the top fights we want to see. And when we finally get those fights made, they’re often too late or when one or both athletes is out of their prime. We get endless rematches nobody wants. We get gouged by high ticket prices. Neither WWE, nor UFC creates any stars anymore. They don’t even market their events, and when they do, they’re using AI.
All of this is sucking the life out of once-vibrant industries. I don’t think combat sports will die out, but it’s not hard to imagine them being further financialized and then sold to the Saudis or private equity. I’m getting involved with combat sports reform because I don’t want to see something I love get destroyed by financialization and greed.
Nate: What tactical approaches are you taking to try to get politicians to pay attention to the issues?
Mike Fox: I contact them directly and try to get connected with internal campaign discords, Slack channels, Facebook groups, etc. From there, I offer a policy proposal with direct media connections, and that usually gets me directly in contact with a higher-up staff member or Press Secretary.
The policy is entirely written. I know how to pitch it. I have the media list complete with over 50 names. I try to make it as easy as possible for them to adopt the policy. I speak about the mainstream relevance of the UFC White House card, the fact that these industries have millions of fans, and the novelty of them supporting combat sports reform because it’s never been formally done before.
Nate: What do you think is at stake if the Muhammad Ali Boxing Reform Act passes the US Congress and is signed into law?
Mike Fox: If it passes, boxers will, over the next decade or so, gradually lose all the benefits they enjoy from the Ali Act. Zuffa Boxing will be the only promotion able to sidestep the Ali Act provisions, as a UBO, and will monopolize the sport. Fighters will lose their ability to advertise, negotiate for better deals, have objective rankings, avoid conflicts of interest, etc.
More than boxing, if this goes through, it’s a flashing green light for TKO to go even further to take over and control all of martial arts. If the history of pro wrestling and MMA shows us anything, it’s that Zuffa boxing will consolidate the industry, homogenize and make the product dull, eliminate jobs, and obliterate anyone that attempts to compete with them or threatens their interests.
Nate: Have you had any positive receptions from campaigns or elected officials you have approached?
Mike Fox: Yes. Every campaign I’ve contacted about this has been extremely positive and supportive. The only challenge is converting that initial enthusiasm into actual policy adoption.
I’m working on contacting fighters, pro wrestlers, and boxers now to try to garner potential endorsements to incentivize campaigns to take the final step of embracing combat sports reforms.
Nate: If the Act does pass, have you put any thought into what might be possible steps to overturn it?
Mike Fox: If the Act passes, then the next step is to start mobilizing fighters, fans, and other notable figures to speak to reform-minded 2028 Presidential candidates and by that, most likely, we’re talking about Ro Khanna. It’ll be very important to press them to consider taking antitrust action to break up TKO.
I also think it would be necessary to speak with anti-monopoly leading figures like Matt Stoller, Lina Khan, Cory Doctorow, Tim Wu, and Zephyr Teachout. We need to establish this as a major issue and hopefully influence a future FTC Commissioner to act.
Going forward, it would be helpful to start informing the public through a media campaign. It’s very obvious that Pro Wrestling, MMA, Boxing, and Combat Sports generally are all enormously threatened by TKO and monopoly power.
For whatever reason, though, these groups are almost completely siloed. It would be powerful to bring them together around this shared issue that all of these industries recognize. Outside of combat sports outlets, I think it would be very easy to get on left-wing media, independent/local media, and probably Libertarian media, as well.
Perhaps, most importantly, I think it’s essential that a citizens’ advocacy group be created that can directly lobby on behalf of combat sports reform, and that this group also publicly endorses candidates that back its recommended policies, similar to a Track AIPAC/Track Oil.
Otherwise, I think it’ll be quite difficult to take on TKO and its elite army of lobbyists and win.
Just thinking about this, there are at least seven different groups that would care about at least some portions of combat sports reform:
the MMA community,
the Boxing community,
the Pro Wrestling community,
the BJJ and grappling community,
Labor Rights,
Anti-Monopoly,
and Medical Professionals, neuroscientists, and concussion researchers who oppose Dana White’s Power Slap.
Together, that forms a potent and diverse coalition that can bring about real change.
Nate: Thanks, Mike. Keep up the great work.
Nate Wilcox founded Bloody Elbow in 2007 and sold it in 2024.