Following the Ultimate Fighting Championship’s multi-million dollar deal with sports titan ESPN, it would appear that UFC President Dana White may be forced to work alongside boxing’s Bob Arum in the future.
The world’s most famous mixed martial arts promotion locked in a $1.5 billion, five-year deal with ESPN for their television broadcast rights. Of course, ESPN is also home to promoter Bob Arum’s Top Rank boxing. Dana White has voiced is dislike of Bob Arum on multiple occasions now.
Speaking to The Big Lead, ESPN executive vice president of scheduling and programming Burke Magnus offered his thoughts on the UFC and Top Rank teaming up for Saturday night broadcasts.
“I could easily see that,” He said. “What I’m fond of saying to people is if the genie came out of the bottle and granted me one wish it would be for 104 Saturday nights per year.
“I think there’s no doubt that we’ll look to pair the two. In both cases, because of the staging aspects to it, we could also use time zones to our advantage. Like we did this year with Top Rank coming out of an SEC football game on a Saturday night with a big lead-in, we can do that kind of scheduling as well thanks to the fact that these things can be scheduled accordingly.”
