The Bare Knuckle Fighting Championship (BKFC) has powered on as a dominant force in the bare-knuckle boxing world. To give back to the athletes, they’re now working on pension plans.
“It looks like BKFC has finally culminated and came together and is going to be able to launch its first-ever—ever in the history of the world—the first-ever combat sports fighting pension for the fighters,” BKFC President Dave Feldman said. “We’re gonna do a pension for the fighters, we’re gonna put a little bit of money away for them, [after] each and every one of their fights. We’re gonna hold it for them for about five years or so at least and then they can have some money to fall back on.
“Look, at the end of the day, these fights that we’re showing, these knockouts, everything that you’re showing, it’s the fighters. So you got to take care of them. Especially if they’re promoting for us, they’re fighting their asses off and making us – we are the most exciting combat sport in the world. We are the fastest growing combat sport company in the world and those are the fighters.”
Beginning in June 2018, the BKFC has enjoyed a run of 17 total events since and featured plenty of notable names from the MMA world. Most recently, BKFC 16 earlier this month saw Leonard “Bad Boy” Garcia get back in the win column with a unanimous decision against Joe Elmore.
Prior to that in February, BKFC’s big “Knucklemania” event saw the bare-knuckle boxing debut of Paige VanZant. Unfortunately for the former UFC star, she fell short against Britain Hart in their five-round affair.
Beginning to put pensions in place, Feldman added that he hopes promotions in MMA, as well as boxing, begin to follow his lead as he thinks fighters need to be better taken care of.
