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Dana White: A Modern-Day Vince McMahon
By Kevin Wallace
Nov 15, 2009 - 3:15 PM

Did Vince McMahon hand Dana White a blueprint for success?  

This point isn't hard to argue when you compare the two. Their companies and how they got to where they are. In this column, I’m going to highlight  a couple points and compare the two.   Whether  we like Vincent Kennedy McMahon or not , he created Sports Entertainment, albeit at the cost of destroying what we once knew as wrestling.   Vince bought the WWE, then WWF, from his father, Vince Sr. in the early 1980’s, and had no intentions of keeping the business in “smoke filled arena’s” as he refers to it.   Wrestlers and promotions were Vince’s next step in creating what we now know as WWE.   One by one Vince raped and pillaged those who he considered opposition and one by one they fell.     Taking several big stars in each territory Vince had the “all-stars” of each working for him and many of these people came to WWE without giving proper notice of resignation or having put anyone else over in their previous promotion to have a suitable replacement ready to go as was customary in those days.   This made it impossible for promotions to still survive when the people   that used to make them money were now up north with Vince.   When these guys actually came to the WWE they were already well known in the television markets that they came from, and with viewers seeing these guys on television, they were easily convinced that this is where the “Superstars” are.   Fast forward 25 years and we are left with only one truly profitable, big name company in this business.  

Dana White purchased a dying MMA organization, UFC, in the early 2000s from SEG Sports.   With the help of Vegas bigwigs the Fertittas, Dana had the same intentions as Vince McMahon, to make it the only company worth watching.   MMA was little more than a conversation starter back in this time but Dana had his vision.   Light on “stars,” Dana began to resign the named people he did have such as Ken Shamrock, Chuck Liddell, Randy Couture and Tito Ortiz then looked to other things such as reality television shows , which lead to The Ultimate Fighter.   16 men in a house fighting weekly against one another until one or two, depending on which season, remain.   This gave Dana a chance to have some of his fighters coach the teams and get their names and personalities out there. Randy Couture and Chuck Liddell are two of the biggest names in MMA who owe much of their success to the first season of the Ultimate Fighter show, as it gave people a chance to see how these fighters really are   outside of the show.   The coaching choices of the first season were chosen very wisely by Dana.   The two were not chosen randomly as Randy is the calculated, calm, down to earth, fatherly type guy who you could see signing autographs for you if you were to run into him at a grocery store.   Chuck was a different story altogether, the go-out drinking, stand and bang, mohawked biker type.   Having both of these extremes on the show assured that we as viewers would be able to identify with one of them.   Were the early days a success?    Absolutely not.   Like Vince McMahon, when he created WrestleMania with the last bit of money he had to his name, the UFC did the same, banking almost everything they had on the finale of their first season.   That’s when Forrest Griffin and Stephan Bonnar walked into the cage as the finalists of the Lightheavyweights and put on arguably the most entertaining fight of all time and secured those household names that Dana wanted.   This fight alone MADE the UFC as it pulled in   millions of viewers and remains the highest finale in the shows 10 seasons.   Now that the UFC was getting popular and being aired on television regularly with free live fight nights, the reality show and Unleashed (a show where the best fights in the history of the organization are shown), Dana had MMA world domination on his mind.   The UFC began to purchase other companies within a few years such as WEC, WFC and eventually their closest competition in Pride.   Many of these were purchased for the sole reason of putting them out of business so there would be less and less competition.   Vince did the same with the GCF, ECW and eventually WCW.   Many fighters where then brought into the UFC, such as Quinton “Rampage” Jackson, Dan “Hendo” Henderson , “The Axe Murderer” Wanderlei Silva and Mirko “Cro Cop” Filipovic to name a few.   I would like to think that the sole reason for making this happen would be to have all the best fighters in the world under one roof, however seeming as how Fedor Emelianenko who is hands down the best fighter in the world is not in the UFC, I don’t think this was the reason.  

Dana has strategically monopolized the industry as we know it, much like what Vince did with the wrestling business.   Fewer places to fight, less money offered per fight and a   boss who lets his own opinions affect smart business decisions are now things that fighters who want to become the best in the world, have to deal with.   What happens when a fighter has a disagreement with Dana?   More often than not Dana will blog about that person being an asshole or this person being or hard to deal with, much like what Vince says when he has disagreements with his wrestlers, although Vince is often times more professional and politically correct in his wording.   Dana and Vince both know they are capable of creating stars.    Dana knows that when a bona fide star such as Rampage, walks out of the UFC, he can make another and that’s one of the reason we have the television show.   Case in point., Amir Sadollah, the winner of the seventh season had never had a pro MMA fight until he was on the show and ended up winning it.   Why was Dana so willing to take a chance with Amir having never seen him really fight?   Well if you’ve seen Amir he is one heck of a likeable, self deprecating individual who people could easily like and Dana was banking on people liking the individual for other reasons instead of how he fights which is the way we should be looking at it.   Ross Pointon from the third season, with a record of 4 wins and 6 losses and his most recent fight having been a loss, shouldn’t have even been on the show but was given the chance, beaten very easily in his first fight and was then given a second chance that he also lost this time even more convincingly. Again, why was Pointon on the show?   Much like Amir he was a personality that would make people watch the show.   What’s the point of this?   Much like what Vince does, when he finds someone like a Batista or the Great Khali he convinces the fans of the product through television shows and magazines, that these are the stars we should cheer for and like, despite that they have nothing to offer us or little to contribute to the sport itself.

Dana and Vince are much the same person.    Money and success are the only things that seem important to them and they both know what they have to do to be the best, even if it is tricking us into believing that the best in the world are under their banner.   For every Paul London and Fedor there are ten Phil Baronis and Great Khalis that Dana and Vince want you to believe are even better.   I’m interested to see where this goes as we are living in interesting days where history is writing itself.   Will we see Dana and Vince working one another at WrestleMania?   Will there be some crossover fights one day between the two organizations?   Will UFC become the MMA equivalent of the WWE in a third the time it took Vince to create the success that is WWE?   Whatever does happen with the continuing success of the UFC and MMA in general, I believe that Dana will continue to follow in Vince’s footsteps and learn from his mistakes, I mean it's doubtful Dana will start his own bodybuilding federation or football league... although stranger things have happened.  

This has been my first column and I hope everyone has enjoyed it.   Whether you agree with my opinions or not, thank you for reading.