Bellator
Scott Coker says Bellator no longer running weekly events starting in 2015, scaling back to 16 total cards
Aug 19, 2014 - 10:35:54 AM Scott Coker says Bellator no longer running weekly events starting in 2015, scaling back to 16 total cards

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By: Jamie Penick, MMATorch Editor-in-Chief

Bellator's upcoming 11th season will be the last in their current format. There will be no tournaments, but weekly events are coming through the rest of the year.

That's all going to change in 2015, though.

In an interview with MMAJunkie.com this week, new Bellator President Scott Coker confirmed that they're scaling back in 2015, and instead of 26 events split mostly between two seasons, they'll be running a total of 16.

"That's going to be our season. We're going to do 16 instead of 26, but the fights will be much larger, and the venues will have time to promote and really make it an event and not just a weekly TV show," Coker said.

In addition to scaling back, Coker said they're also not going to be running on pay-per-view next year, backing off of the push from Bjorn Rebney to break into that space this year.

"To me, I think that we should be on Spike TV and building the next wave of stars in front of 100 million households," Coker said. "There will be a time probably in the future where we can definitely go back to the PPV business, but for the foreseeable future, I see us as a Spike property. We're going to put on the best fights we can put on, and we're going to put on fights that the fans want to see. I think you might see a tournament at some point in 2015, but right now, I'm not ready to commit to that. But we're going to see some big event and big fights, and fights that are going to move the needle."

"To me, one of the things we really have to focus on is, look, if you put on a bunch of fights that people don't want to watch, then you're going to have a very short business. And we have a good enough roster right now to make big fights in the future. I'm excited about the prospects coming up and the prospects we're signing. We're going back into the female fight division, and we might even start another female division in another weight class. We're going to start building this thing up. I think it's going to look a lot different in 18 months than it does today."

Penick's Analysis: This is precisely what Bellator needs to be doing, and Coker is starting off his time with the organization saying a lot of the right things. One of the biggest problems with the season format the last couple of years has been a number of events being put out there just to put on an event. They weren't of the quality of the best Bellator cards, and it didn't help the organization's image. Running less frequent cards, with more relevant and higher quality fights, is how they keep themselves relevant as the No. 2 organization in the sport, and how they build up further viewership on Spike.