Transparency in pay is a fundamental feature empowering fighters to better understand their value and have informed negotiations with promoters. Knowledge is power. A troubling trend, however, is an increasing number of jurisdictions cloaking prizefighting pay in secrecy keeping fighters in the dark as to what others are earning. Arizona appears to be the latest … More Arizona Latest State To Go Dark On Fighter Pay
While Jake Paul talking trash about Dana White and the UFC pay structure brings a lot of entertainment (and headlines) in the background the Mixed Martial Arts Fighters Association have been fighting legal and political battles for improvement for over a decade. These battles have quietly but surely yielded positive results. The MMAFA is the … More MMAFA Highlight Hard Fought Successes For Fighters
A paper was published in the latest edition of the journal The Physician and Sportsmedicine discussing recommended blood pressure thresholds for clearing combat sports athletes for competition. The full article, titled Pre-bout hypertension in the combat sports athlete: clearance recommendations, can be found here. After discussing the risks of athletes competing with elevated blood pressure … More Ringside Physicians Discuss Safe Pre Bout Blood Pressure Metrics for Fighters
The marathon Covid-19 pandemic has seen no shortage of government orders intruding on the liberties of normal life. The vast majority of these are lawful and within the power of government. That said governments can go too far and recent arbitrary rules for which athletes can and cannot go to the gym in Ontario may … More “Arbitrary” Ontario Gym Closures Vulnerable to Legal Challenge?
Adding to this site’s database of combat sports safety studies, a recent study was published in the Journal Neurology looking at the relationship between fighter brain health and weight class. In the recent study, titled Effect of Professional Fighters’ Weight Class on Regional Brain Volume, Cognition, and Other Neuropsychiatric Outcomes, the authors looked at data from … More Study Looks At Boxer and MMA Fighter Brain Health By Weight Class
In the latest data to come from the Professional Fighters Brain Health Study (PFBHS) findings were recently published in the Journal Neurology noting that there were “significant correlations” between adverse brain health based on how young fighters were when they began competing. In the recent study titled Earlier Age of First Exposure to Competitive Fighting … More Study Finds Earlier Exposure To Fighting Linked To Worse Long Term Brain Health
Reasons for judgement were recently published by the United States District Court in Nevada ordering Mark Hunt to pay the UFC $388,235 in attorney fees and costs in his ongoing doping lawsuit against the UFC. (note – the reasons were signed March 25, 2021. Since that time Hunt partially succeeded in reviving two of his … More Mark Hunt Ordered to Pay UFC $388,235 in Legal Costs
Fighting is objectively violent. In many ways athletes participating in full contact sports know what they are getting into. But in many other ways they do not as research has recently demonstrated. Some injuries, like concussions and the neurodegenerative disease CTE which is linked to repeated concussive and subconcussive blows, are subtle but could have … More Study – Less Than 6% of Combat Sports Coaches Showed Adequate Concussion Knowledge
CTE is linked to repetitive head hits. Not just concussive hits but routine subconcussive impacts. The brain simply is not designed to be rattled on a repeated basis. If you are a competitive full contact fighter getting hit in the head during a bout is inevitable. Its part of the trade. Sparring is an important … More Study Shows Fighters Taking 10x More Head Impacts in Training vs Competition
Several studies have previously been published detailing the effect that rapid extremes weight cuts (which are common in mixed martial arts and to a lesser extent boxing) can have on athletic performance. Over and above the many injuries and even deaths linked to these practices athletic commissions often hope to persuade athletes to avoided rapid … More Study – Fighter Who Gains Most Weight “Significantly Predicts” Bout Winner in MMA
Combat Sports Law 