There Might Be Blood | Profile of Mark Pavelich, Owner of Maximum Fighting Championship

Mark Pavelich, owner and president, Maximum Fighting Championship

by Paul Matwychuk

QUALITY CONTROL: Mark Pavelich is reinventing mixed martial arts in the hopes that next time his Maximum Fighting Championship hits the ring, you’ll bring the kids

Mark Pavelich comes from a hockey family – his father Matt was the first linesman inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame and his uncle Marty played 10 seasons for the Detroit Red Wings – and he says he grew up knowing greatness was expected of him. He’s found it, but with a different sport: as the owner of Edmonton-based Maximum Fighting Championship (MFC), he’s been a pioneer in promoting mixed martial arts in Canada. Since 2000, he’s staged 24 MFC events in Alberta, and deals with cable and satellite channels HDNet and The Fight Network have beamed them to fans all over North America and Great Britain. Pavelich concludes his “Message from the CEO” on the MFC website by addressing all the people who ever doubted him: “I told you so,” he writes. And he’s probably thinking of them as he prepares his 25th event, scheduled for this May. It’s called “Vindication.”

AV: When did you first fall in love with mixed martial arts?
MP: The second I saw it. Japanese Pancrase, it was called. I found something so noble about it, because when they were done fighting, they shook hands and showed respect for each other. There was no grudge. This was 12 or 13 years ago. I’d already owned a [variety show] entertainment business for many years and soon I also became a trainer for mixed martial arts fighters. So I put the two together.

How good a fighter were you?
Oh, I was never a sport fighter. It’s just not in my DNA. But I’m very combative in business. People saying, “It’ll never work,” that’s what gets me going. And I can guarantee you there is nobody in your magazine who keeps my kind of hours. You call me at seven o’clock in the morning, you call me at two o’clock in the morning, and I answer the phone the same way. I hear Donald Trump talk about how he keeps these hours and I have to laugh – he’d be asleep next to me by noon.

Especially when you got into it, this sport had an unwholesome reputation.

It did, but I’ve always treated it as a professional sports organization, not a mixed martial arts organization. That’s a humongous difference. When it first came out, it was sold as this “two men enter, one man exits, cage, cage, cage” kind of thing. I saw right away that the sport should never be sold in a cage. We stage the Maximum Fighting Championship in a proper ring, as a sport. I’ve never sold it as a blood sport. We sell season tickets – no other mixed martial arts organization sells season tickets. We’re moving towards a venue where children can attend with their parents, the way they would at an Oilers game.

Are you looking simply for good fighters or for personality as well?
I used to look just for straight talent, but now I’m more likely to say, “OK, he can fight, but can he speak well on the microphone? Does his image [and] name sell tickets? Do people want to watch him live on HDNet?” My broadcasting partner is [HDNet chairman and president and NBA Dallas Mavericks owner] Mark Cuban and that’s what he looks for as well. Someone who considers himself too busy to do autographs or speak with fans – we’re not interested in those kinds of fighters.

What other lessons did you learn from Mark Cuban?
The season ticket thing was his idea, hanging banners from the rafters with pictures of the fighters came from him – that’s what he does with the Mavericks.

What do you spend to market the fighters?
We do a 50 – 50 split: 50% on the fighters, 50% on the MFC brand.

And how much money are you willing to spend on the brand?
I’ll spend lots of money. I’m going to make money, but I’m going to look good while I’m making it. I’m fanatical about esthetics – posters, TV commercials. I proof every ticket that gets printed. And I hire everybody in this company, right down to the guy who cleans the mat, because I don’t want anybody who is going to embarrass us. We’re not building a business anymore. The business is already built. We’re building a legacy.

Current Issue