BYB Extreme Fighting Series President, MikeVazquez, announced today that the ten-plus-year-old combat sports organization that originated in South Florida, alongside Dhafir “Dada 5000” Harris, whose iconic back yard fighting videos went viral across the globe and transformed the modern landscape of professional fighting, will now be known as “BKB Bare Knuckle Boxing.”
BYB purchased the UK-based BKB, the world’s oldest professional bare knuckle boxing company in May 2024, and in doing so merged the organizations to create the largest bare knuckle boxing company in the world in terms of roster, library and distribution.
Said BKB CEO Greg Bloom, “Collectively, BYB in the US and BKB in the UK created the modern-day sport of bare knuckle boxing. Without visionaries like Mike Vazquez, Dada 5000, Jim Freeman and Joe Brown, bare knuckle boxing as we know it today would not exist. That’s an indisputable fact. It is only appropriate that the world’s largest, oldest, most widely watched and fastest growing bare knuckle boxing organization in the world is now known synonymously with the sport it re-established in modern mainstream times. We are Bare Knuckle Boxing.”
Said Bare Knuckle Boxing Hall of Fame President Scott Burt, “The forces behind the new BKB have been instrumental in bringing back this great sport from the shadows. Over the past two years, the former “BYB” has doubled the size of the sport internationally, ushered in ethical and legalized gambling to the sport, acquired the rights to the historic and prestigiousPolice Gazette Diamond Belt which now serves as the Bare Knuckle Boxing World Championship, brought bare knuckle boxing to lineal television on both sides of the Atlantic, including the recent deal with VICE TV, hosted the first show ever in the Middle East when they were the first bare knuckle promotion to goto Dubai back in March 2023, and quite frankly, it looks like they are just getting started.”
He added, “As a historian, I am proud to support these efforts as bare knuckle boxing’s resurgence primes itself to overtake the sporting public’s attention. Without BKB, that would be impossible.”
Said Bloom, “Business continues as usual. Coming off another sold-out and globally-televised show in Denver this past weekend, we return to Wolverhampton, UK on March 22, and will continue to host the most explosive shows in combat sports within the smallest surface in fighting, the patented Mighty Trigon.”
The first show under the new BKB name will beheld in Wolverhampton, West Midlands, England March 22, headlined by the long-awaited rematch for the BKB Super Middleweight Championship between LTNelson and James Connelly. The show will be broadcast in the US and Canada onVice TV, and internationally at bkbworld.tv. Visit bkbbareknuckle.com for all the latest news and information.
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