BKFC: the Beginning (the Bare Knuckle Fighting Championships' inaugural PPV), June 2nd

9pm EST live from Cheyenne, WY - billed as the first sanctioned bare knuckle pro boxing event in the USA since the late 19th century. They're going to have Antonio Tarver (who, by the way, has a comeback scheduled against Travis Kauffman eight days later and is apparently taking part in this event smack in the middle of his training camp) on commentary. The prerequisite for competitors is having previously had at least one match in any professional combat sport (boxing, MMA, K1, Muay Thai). Rules purport to mimic those of the 19th century, minus the legality of clinches, and only allowing strikes with the fist (ie no elbows). This is the brainchild of David Feldman, a small-fry 90's welterweight (4-1 record) turned small-fry promoter in rural Pennsylvania (biggest claim to fame is promoting Roy Jones Jr. vs. Bobby Gunn last year).

The main attraction is an 8-man heavyweight grand Prix tourney. Here is the quarterfinal draw:

• Eric "The American Soldier" Prindle (41yo, from MMA with an 11-9-0-1 record) vs. Sam "The Boxing Hillbilly" Shewmaker (33yo, pro boxer with a 3-0 record and allegedly 17yrs experience streetfighting)

• Arnold "Bomaye" Adams (32yo, from MMA with a 7-10 record) vs. D.J. "Da Protégé" Linderman (34yo, from MMA with a 21-14 record)

• Dale "???" Sope (unknown age, unknown nickname, unknown pro experience, if any - can only find evidence of a single amateur MMA fight, in Hawaii from 2011, won via UD ) vs. Maurice "The Gorilla" Jackson (37yo, from MMA with a 3-2-0-3 record)

• Ricco "Suave" Rodriguez (40yo, from MMA with a 54-26-0-1 record) vs. Lewis "The Beast" Rumsey (28yo, from MMA with a 13-15 record)

...with an undercard consisting of:

• Rebecca "Rowdy Bec" Rawlings (29yo, from MMA with a 7-8 record) vs. Alma "The Cherokee" García (25yo, pro boxer with a 2-6 record)

• Phil "The New York Bad Ass" Baroni (42yo, from MMA with a 16-18 record) vs. TBA

• Paul "The Pittsburgh Kid" Spadafora (42yo, pro boxer with a 49-1-1 record) vs. TBA

• Bobby "The Celtic Warrior" Gunn (44yo, pro boxer with a 23-7-1-1 record; allegedly 73-0 in street fights, 2-0 in BKB where he was billed as the first American heavyweight bare-knuckle champion since John L. Sullivan - and in which David Feldman was also involved) vs. TBA

• Nick "Garfield" Mamalis (31yo, from MMA with a 28-13-0-1 record) vs. TBA

Twelve fights in total (the four GP quarterfinals plus the pair of semis & finals on the same night - as well as the undercard listed above). I have to say, they picked a good date for this experiment. Fight junkies will be left starved for meaningful pugilistic action this Saturday night, with no major org MMA (nothing from the UFC after staging a Fight Night on Friday, and Bellator 201 isn't until the end of June) and just one televised North American pro boxing, and not a very interesting one: a Real Deal Promotions event on CBS Sports Network headlined by Toka Kahn Clary and featuring nobody else you've ever heard of. People are sure to catch wind of this and tune in for a cheap fix (although I do mean cheap, as I doubt many of those with train-wreck curiosity are going to want to actually pay for the PPV )

 

@UnleashtheFURY

 

I have no idea, man, the information you see in the OP took me like an hour to pull together, as the promotion for this event (debuting on PPV, mind you) has been abysmal to say the least. They don't even have a finalized undercard lineup yet, just a few days out, their website still advertises that "announcement is coming soon" on the running order.

 

I don't understand why they don't let Gunn into the Grand Prix; he'd probably wipe out all those guys on the same day. Maybe that is the point, though, refrain from having the big fish in the small pond gobble everyone up on the very first PPV and instead build up the GP champion as some kind of beast for beating out a field of seven other bums and then feed him to Gunn in some kind of puffed-up "BKB vs. BKFC tourney champ" unification deal.

 

Well in my sleuthing I did see a statement from Dave Feldman Sr. addressing that point on social media when somebody called him out for it, and he said that some American television networks had expressed tentative interest but didn't want to make a risky investment on something without first sampling a "little taste"; so he's putting this on PPV as more or less a trial run and pitch bible.

(I don't agree with his logic necessarily, just passing it along)

 

I'm kinda low-key rooting hard for Shewmaker partially on the basis of him being the lone dude repping our sport in a tourney with 7 MMA vets, but also (mostly) because of the nickname.