Scott Coker reveals details of new MMA promotion with old-school two-fights-in-one-night format

Scott Coker is going old-school with his latest MMA venture.

The longtime combat sports promoter is launching a new MMA promotion backed by the likes of Tony Hawk, named Ki MMA, starting in early 2027.

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'Millions of dollars' will be up for grabs for athletes competing under the Ki MMA banner, which is set to launch with a 32-man featherweight Grand Prix in a ring — not a cage.

The Grand Prix will have representation from four continents: Europe, Asia, South America and North America, with eight fighters signed from one and approximately three events per continent.

That will help crown four continental champions, with the Grand Prix winners from each continent moving on to the 'big World Cup finals.'

Four men from each continent will then move on to the Grand Prix finale event to compete in a semi-final and final on the same night.

It is a throwback to the tournament formats used by most MMA promotions — UFC, Pride and K-1, to name a few — when the sport was being introduced to the world

Coker mentioned San Jose, Los Angeles and New York as destinations for events in America, while Spain, Italy, France, Dublin and Budapest are being explored for Europe.

On the day of his launch in New York on Monday, Coker, who founded Strikeforce and later ran Bellator, sat down with talkSPORT.com to reveal all on his new promotion.

Coker going old-school for Ki MMA

"Basically, you're gonna have a tournament champion in all four continents, right?" said Coker.

"So those athletes will fight each other in one night for the finals to crown the world champion.

"That's the one that will win the big prize money, and the fighters will win money along the way.

"But if you win the big World Cup finals, then you'll get the majority of the prize money.

"You'll be the world champ, and you'll be fighting two times in one night."

Coker, who has built stars like Ronda Rousey and Daniel Cormier, continued: "That's the way it used to be, right? So we're going back to the old-school way.

"And whoever is victorious, I promise you will have to dig deep — just like [UFC 1 tournament winner] Royce [Gracie] did.

"Just like all those guys: Fedor [Emelianenko], Wanderlei Silva, Mirko Cro Cop.

"The guys that fought all over the world, in Japan, at that time, they had to fight multiple fights in one night.

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"K-1 was three fights in one night. UFC was three fights in one night.

"So, for me, this is something we wanted to wrinkle into the tournament to make it really interesting for the fans.

"But also the fighters — they're going to have to dig deep to go win that fight."

Why Coker likes tournament format

Coker said when he led Strikeforce, his promotion 'put on some of the best tournaments in the history of the sport' and his work at K-1 helped to teach him that 'tournaments build stars' and quickly, too.

That is a big philosophy behind his new venture in terms of who they will sign, alongside targeting the best free agents.

“Put them in a single-elimination format where they can thrive and move forward, or they go home, and everybody understands that formula of if you lose it might be a bad day for you,” the 63-year-old added.

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“When you think about the history of martial arts fighting, whether it was in Pride or K-1 or even UFC — it was always a tournament.

“It's always been a tournament format, and I think when I look at my past as far as working in Japan when Pride and K-1 were going head-to-head, it was super amazing.

“I called it the golden era of martial arts... there's something about digging deep, tapping into your martial arts, your key energy, your key spirit.

“That's really what the genesis of the name was: these guys have to dig deep, and they have to go to a place that most people can't go.

“They're gonna have to really tap into that inner spirit to really be successful in these tournaments.”

Coker put using a ring down as being a 'better viewing' and an opportunity when everyone else right now is in a cage.

He is confident he can have success in an industry more saturated than ever, even with the likes of PFL and MVP MMA merging from next year.

"To me, it's just the same as it was before," Coker concluded.

"There are only two or three real players in the business, and we're gonna be added to that.

"We're gonna build new stars. We're gonna do our own thing, and this is not going to interfere with what everybody else is doing.

"When I look at the team and investor group we have, it's very impressive and probably the best team we've ever had.

"We're gonna run our business the way we know how, and I feel really good about the company moving forward."