With the creation of the GAMMA Muay Thai Division, i have been thinking about the future. According to Mike, it is possible to run MT and MMA events at the same time and now have the depreciating returns for the events. This basically means i can run 2 events per week and not have any penalties. I still want to run some events to see how that goes, but i like the idea of eventually having 2 orgs under one banner.
At the moment we only have one openweight division for MT, but ideally it would be awesome to have multiple divisions, which brings me up to the next point. It is not possible to have 2 champs for the same division, so technically i cannot have MMA and MT fighters in the same division.
For all of you who do not know, GAMMA was one of the oldest orgs which took a long time to implement some of the lower weight classes. It took us years before we added 155, 145 and 135lbs and eventually we dropped the 135lbs division. We are also not fan's of having "shallow" divisions, with lack of real competition, which is why we made the 265lbs division defunct, merging it with 265lbs+.Â
Recently i have been talking with WVT owner Alfred Winterbottom, he has had some impressive results running an org with just 3 weight divisions. 155lbs, 185lbs and 265+ Essentially going to the roots of MMA, when there was fewer divisions, you can find his org here: https://www.mmatycoon.com/orgpublic.php?oid=6893
After discussing with him, he has said that he did not noticed serious "advantages" to lighter fighters. In fact, almost always the champs have been heavier fighters. I analyzed some of his earlier events when he had just one division and the weight differences were bigger and these are the results i got:Â
The heavier fighters won 11 and lost 2. So there is no evidence that lighter "faster" fighters have any clear advantage, at least that was the case when putting HW against MW or lower fighters.Â
There could be an advantage in the very low weights (135-155lbs), as KO power has less of an effect, but i suspect that starting with 170lbs, this effect is balanced out vs KO power.Â
Anyway, i want your opinion regarding the future. The idea being debated is that GAMMA could implement similar weight rules as WVT and have 3 divisions. 135-155lbs compete in one, 170-185lbs compete in the next and 205+ in the higher weight class. This will give us deeper divisions and more competition. Besides this, it also means we can have the same 3 weight categories for MT. So eventually we will have 2 PPV level orgs for both MT and MMA.
The downside is obviously the legacy factor. How will title fights be given points for future rating the greatest of all time? It will screw with the continuity of the belts and there could be cases where certain managers will be unwilling to compete in divisions, so recruiting could be more tricky. All these are legitimate concerns.Â
Either way, i will follow the path the majority of our core managers want. We could simply keep MT to one openweight division and leave it there. I see nothing wrong with that. Or we could go with the new path
I know "change" is not something most people like, but it could be an interesting idea. So what do you prefer (2 options).
#1 Do nothing, keep MT an overweight division and keep current MMA divisions as they are.
#2 Go the full WVT root with 3 separate divisions for both MMA and MT. Lightweight (155lbs and Under), Middleweight (205lbs to 155lbs), Heavyweight (205lbs and Over).
I am open to any of these ideas. It would be great to also hear the opinion of people who competed under the WVT rules to hear your view regarding the matchups and if you noticed any major differences in your results.Â
