Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) CEO, Dana White, and TKO Group Holdings, Inc. and Saudi’s General Minister for Entertainment, Turki Alalshikh, signed a massive deal earlier today (Wed., March 5, 2025) to form a new boxing league.

While details are still trickling in as to how exactly the new league will look like, White is adamant that his format to pump new life into boxing is no secret: “The best will fight the best.”

“There is zero speculation about the format. You know the format, everyone knows the format, the best will fight the best. You work your way up the rankings and once somebody breaks into the Top 5, there will be no question who the best five guys in the world are in each weight class and they fight it out,” he told Ring Magazine.

“Once somebody holds that belt, you don’t need three letters in front of the belt; whoever has that belt is the best in the world at that weight class. It’s a very simple model,” he added, before Alalshikh chimed by revealing it will be White’s show to run.

“I support him with everything. This is his call now and it is now his responsibility to deliver the people and the fans the best model of boxing.”

During an interview on ESPN’s First Take, White said one of his goals is to not complicate things the way it currently is in boxing, with so many titles across multiple divisions and organizations.

“You get rid of all the five different champions in five different sanctioning organizations. One, it will just be one,” he added.

As far is talent is concerned, White said he and his team have already begun the work to scour new talent across the globe.

“There is a lot of talent that we have been looking at right now that no one knows about. What I would love to do is build this thing from the ground up like we did UFC. When we bought the UFC, we had 12 contracts and nobody knew who anybody was.”

Aside from putting on great fights, the UFC boss said his plans are to also provide fans in attendance with a great experience, as well.

“My son just went to that show (Tank vs. Roach), and he said the live event was terrible and disorganized. We are going to clean that up and make events great again. The run of show will run faster, and it won’t take nine hours to see four fights.

“These guys have a fight, put on a podcast, then have another fight, then another podcast. The show will run like UFC does, fight after fight after fight,” he added before saying his team are currently looking to lock down broadcast deals.

“We will build the sport of boxing here in the United States again. To really grow the sport it has to be strong in the US for it to work anywhere.”

While White has a proven track record with mixed martial arts (MMA), it’s two completely different scenarios when it comes to boxing. White and the Fertitta brothers were able to mold the sport of MMA and UFC into the powerhouse it is today in their image because, let’s face it, it was a new sport on its last leg when they purchased it back in 2001.

Boxing, meanwhile, has been around since the 1920’s and is established. While White isn’t looking to re-invent the wheel, his goal is to put on fights that fans want to see. That said, there is a ton of competition out there with so many boxing promoters who have been doing this all their life such as Goldenboy, Matchroom Sport, Top Rank, Mayweather Promotions, Premier Boxing Championships and the list goes on and on.

And we don’t have to mention that they have all the big name talent at the moment.

So, unless White and Co. are open to co-promoting, something he is totally against in MMA, he has a very steep hill to climb if he ever wants to reach their level. Then again, if anyone can do it it’s White with the backing of Alalshikh’s deep pockets.

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