Paige VanZant moving to bare-knuckle boxing

Paige VanZant got such a big push in UFC and it is pretty obvious why at least part of that reasoning was. She was never really a top-tier fighter but my goodness is she purty. I am sure that this definitely played into her contract which recently expired with UFC. After losing yet again last month it was pretty clear that "hot or not" she was not going to get re-signed. There were a lot of people in the MMA community and even other women in her weight category that were getting fed up with VanZant getting high-profile fights despite the fact that she was plagued with injuries and had a lackluster record of 5-4.

src

During her time with the UFC Paige also miraculously became more "top heavy" and later admitted to TMZ that she did get a "boob job" while under contract with the organization. This has actually proved problematic in the past for another woman fighter named Pearl Gonzalez who was briefly kept from fighting because it was considered a risk for a potentially ruptured implant. Not that punching people in the boobs is something that is common or anything. Eventually Gonzalez was allowed to fight and she lost, but it wasn't because of her implants.

Paige's career with the UFC was faltering not because of her boob job but because she is incapable (so it seems) of winning anymore. In this sport it isn't enough to be pretty, you gotta get some "W's" in the column as well. After losing 4 of her last 6 fights didn't help her contract negotiations and it seems as though UFC 251 was her last chance and she failed at that halfway in the first round getting submitted by armbar.

src

It seems as though VanZant wants to shed her pretty-girl that kinda knows how to fight persona and go to the fullest extreme that she possible can and what better way to do that than to sign up with Bare Knuckle Fighting Championship?

src

This will no doubt create a great deal of interest in the promotion, and they seem to be gambling pretty hard on PVZ doing wonders for their promotion as well. Her signing is featured prominantly on their homepage (Home Paige?)

Paige says that she was talking to an number of promotions including Bellator and ONE but in the end it was BKFC that offered her (I presume) the most money. She got a 4-fight, $1 million dollar offer and I suppose it remains to be seen if PVZ can make this investment worthwhile. It is already doing wonders because even though I follow MMA pretty closely, I had never even heard of this organization until Paige signed with them.

Could this bring them to the forefront? Probably not to be honest, Bellator is in a far distant 2nd place as far as viewership is concerned and they are AGES ahead of BKFC in the same ratings. It could be interesting though because who doesn't like seeing a woman who looks like a model getting bloodied up (joking.)

Personally, I would actually like to see Paige do well here and perhaps the step down to a lower division will allow her to shine. Regardless of how good-looking you are, or how much you can play the part, you actually need to know how to fight in order to get involved over at UFC and at the start of her career there it looked like she showed real promise.

Either way, it is going to be exciting and I will be watching. Bare Knuckle can probably think of a million reasons why they hope there are a lot of other people that are also going to tune in.