This feature interview with Bellator MMA president Scott Coker is a guest column written by Israel-based writer Ram Gilboa. Bellator 164: Koreshkov vs. Lima 2 airs on Spike TV on Friday, November 11th at 9 PM ET/PT, but the card itself will happen in Tel-Aviv, Israel on the evening of Thursday, November 10th.

Bellator MMA’s Chief, 54, is in a small TV studio – a redecorated office building basement, really – in a business and media suburb of Tel-Aviv. He knows his way around, has familiar conversations with the TV channel’s small staff, and hands out some touristic advice on Tel Aviv to the McCarthys, Elaine and Big John – for whom it is their first time around.

Iron Mike Tyson is on Bellator’s president dark T-shirt. ‘Lineal Heavyweight Champ 1988’, it says. It is 2016. The first MMA lineal heavyweight champ – Ken Shamrock or Royce Gracie, depends on when you start counting – still fight, and they do it for the guy in the Iron Mike T-shirt now. On the back of it it says, ‘W.B.C., I.B.F., W.B.A’. The three boxing bodies whose belts carried global weight in 1988. Well, there’s more than one belt in MMA too, in 2016, even though one of them still shines that so much more.

***

Scott Coker, Welcome to Israel. Thanks for bringing Bellator over.

Coker: I love it. Tel Aviv is a vibrant city, and there’s just a lot of great energy, great people, great food, great sea. I feel like I’m in San Diego.

And hopefully some great fighters.

Coker: That I’m not worried about. I think we’re going to see some good talent. I feel really confident there’s going to be some good fighters. And listen, this fight card, it could be in Dallas, New York, California, Vegas, London. We brought it here because we want to make a big statement.

This was Bellator’s first year out, with Italy, London, Tel-Aviv. How your first year of global expansion? Got any conclusions already?

Coker: The brand is definitely growing. I think we have a sold-out house here in Tel-Aviv on Thursday. I think we opened it up to almost 9,000, we just kept opening sections, you know, because it kept getting sold. we might even end up close to 10 by the time it’s over. We’ll see.

When we first came here, people said, ‘you know, don’t expect too much, people buy last minute’. You’re talking about 18 months ago, a total of five trips, and our producer coming over, and different members of our staff coming over. It was quite a journey to get to this point, so to have our whole fight team, and our fighters here at the week of the fight, this is exciting. It’s exciting. It’s such an exotic location.

You met Royce Gracie here almost by coincidence, and then he took you over.

Coker: Royce happened to be here when we first came to scout the venues and everything like that. So I met with Royce and he said, ‘Hey, do you want to go to the Israeli Navy Seals base?’ I said, ‘Absolutely I wanna go.’ So I give him my passport number and he sends it in to the commander, we got approval. So we went to the base, and I watch Royce train about 30 special forces from the Israeli Seals team. When I walked on the base, what you see is this old medieval castle first, and you go through this castle, and there’s bats in there, and it’s really really a surreal experience, and then they give us a tour of that. And then, I was watching the helicopters land, the soldiers rappelling. They even showed us four missions, that they ran on video. It was amazing. It was just forget it. It was just unbelievable. And believe me, it wasn’t for me, it’s because Royce is there, right? Royce has been there to teach them, so, they give them the red carpet. And he comes every year. And you know, to this day he does not take a dollar for his services.

He showed a certain technique.

Coker: Oh yeah. I’m watching – after we watch some of the military training – it’s time for Royce to do his seminar to the Seals. And we walk into this room and there’s like 30 of them, and six US army rangers, and Royce walks in, and everybody’s like, you know, ‘this is the guy’. I could feel the respect they had for him, and rightfully so. So, Royce teaches this one technique where you basically go shoot, bear-hug, turn, ground and pound, go for the arm-bar or go for the choke, right? And when about six or eight months ago he fought Ken Shamrock, it was that same technique he used to get Ken on the ground. I’ll never forget it because Ken charged at him, and I’m sitting right there cage-side, and he went down, and got him in a bear-hug, and turned, rotated him over, you know, got on top of him. It was the same technique he used back at the base. And I said ‘Royce, that’s unbelievable’. He says ‘Scott, that’s Gracie 101, this is the same technique I’ve been using for 30 years, right?’, and I said wow, that’s impressive. Because you know, he’s mastered those techniques over this all time, and it’s so instinctive now, and it should be, because he’s Royce Gracie. To see him teach it and then to see it in combat, was really impressive.

On the other side, UFC just kind of forfeited their global expansion, domination plan.

Coker: Sounds like it, I don’t know. I don’t know their business, but it sounds like they just got rid of a lot of a lot people that are international.

When they got sold, you commented that it’s probably good for everyone including Bellator, it’s going to trickle down, and now once they got such a high value, now your value goes up.

Coker: Yeah, that’s right, exactly.

So that’s also good for Bellator, that UFC opened the global court, and they receded from it?

Coker: You know, I’ll tell you. When I look at their expansion internationally, they’ve done a very good job. And Bellator will as well. We’ll definitely do our part. And here’s what I’m saying: when I wake up every day, we have so much work on our plate, I don’t really think about what they’re doing, I honestly don’t, I’m interested in what we’re doing.

And I understand you’re already coming back to Israel next year.

Coker: Yeah, we already have a date. Let’s make an annual thing, every year, we’re looking forward to it. And I’m talking about bringing big fights here. Like the fight between Koreshkov and Lima? That’s a mainstream fight we could take anywhere in the world. And it should be a great, great fight. I mean these guys are going to go at it. You’re talking about a guy that’s our current champion, against our former champion. It’s going to be an amazing fight. But getting to global expansion – you know, this company is owned by Viacom, Viacom has TV networks all over the world that we either deal with, or that we own. When we wanted to expand internationally - ‘could you go do a fight in London?’ I said of course, so we started working with Channel 5 which they own in London. They don’t every channel; like here, we have a partnership with Ananey Communication, Ego Total. They’re the distribution partner so we work very closely together. At the end of the day, the international expansion makes a lot of sense for Bellator, because it’s owned by Viacom, and Viacom is an international company, not just a domestic US company.

Viacom is also based out of New York.

Coker: New York City, 1515 Broadway.

And someone already out-ran you for the first big event in New York, but yours is coming up?

Coker: Here’s the thing, we already have a date in mind for New York, and we’ll probably bring the biggest fight in the history of Bellator, to New York.

You have a fight in mind?

Coker: I do, but I cant say.

Can I guess? Is Sonnen going to be half of it?

Coker: He could be. It’s possible. But here’s the thing, it’s not going to be just one fight that’s big, the whole card is going to be full of stars. We’re going to bring our biggest and best line-up to New York, because you know, when you go to New York you have to go big.

No more UFC comparisons, after this one. Following a coughing start, they have a very good subscription service. Do you watch and take note?

Coker: When you’re talking about the digital world today, no matter where you are in the world, I think everybody realize TV isn’t going to be the end all answer, and that you have to have a digital strategy and a digital platform, and that’s something that actually we’re talking about right now to the department inside Viacom to work on our own platform. But that’s not just for Bellator, we’re talking about any product out there. Look at what the NFL is doing, look at what the NBA is doing, You’re going to have to think digital in the future.

Are we looking at a Bellator subscription, or other stuff as well?

Coker: That’s what we’re working out, all the details. It could be a Bellator subscription, but it could also be tied to other Viacom properties, or some Spike platform, you know there’s many different opportunities to have distribution. It doesn’t have to be just like a fight channel.

Staying in the global idea. What market do you think are going to explode MMA wise? China is going to explode anything wide, but then what, Russia?

Coker: It’s already big in Russia. I think it’s huge in Russia. How many great fighters they have coming from there.

And that’s the other part of the question, where do you think all the great next fighters, where should one look?

Coker: You know what, I think you have to look everywhere. I don’t think you can look under one country’s flag any more. You know how many great wrestlers we signed recently from the US team? And probably four or five of them went to the Olympic trials, they didn’t make the Olympics, but we signed probably 5 of the top USA talent. And as you know, Randy Couture, Dan Henderson, Mark Coleman back in the day, they’re all wrestlers. So, we just started to find these guys, it’s really exciting. Because some of them are looking really good. And then, Brazil, believe me, there’s not going to be any lack of talent coming out of Brazil, eastern-bloc countries the same thing. There’s so many fights over there going on in Russia and different parts of the eastern-bloc.

In Italy we’re going to do a series that’s called ‘Road to Bellator.’ Our partner in Italy, Carlo DiBlasi, will throw a series of tournament events, where the winner will get a contract with Bellator. - Scott Coker

You got to Israel, you got to Italy, can you give us a clue as to where you’re looking at next for a big event?

Coker: I think that we’re going to go the UK and do more cities there, we’re going to go to Ireland, we’re going to go to Scotland, and there’s some good fighters in that region. Also, we’re going to go back to Italy. And here’s something we haven’t announced yet. In Italy we’re going to do a series that’s called ‘Road to Bellator.’ Our partner in Italy, Carlo DiBlasi, will throw a series of tournament events, where the winner will get a contract with Bellator. We might show the highlights in our online Bellator.com. Also, we’re going to do that in Spain with Pablo Sanchez, another friend of mine that we’ve doing business for many years. And so we’re going to look for fighters from all over the world, and that’s really what’s this journey is about. Why do all these fights around the world? Well I think it’s great to travel and to produce these events all over the world. But really we’re looking for the next guy, and he doesn’t have to be from America.

You’re promoting Tito versus Chael. Who do you think is going to win?

Coker: That’s a fight, I don’t know. I’m just going to sit back and enjoy, as a fan.

When Bellator receives criticism, it’s mostly for two things that I can remember: one is lesser undercards, and the other is promoting popular fighters with questioned combat-readiness. Kimbo at the time, Shamrock at the time, Dada 5000, even Royce Gracie that as you mentioned, a legend. Tito Ortiz, is he really in fight shape to face Chael Sonnen?

Coker: Oh yeah, for sure. Let me tell you, he fought Liam and he lost, a year ago, but he was doing extremely well up to that point that he got caught in a submission. He can still fight.

And let me answer your criticism here. I always said this: we’re going to do fights that the hardcore fight fans want to see. Look at last week we had Liam versus Phil Davis. Amazing fight card. This week we have the fight here with Koreshkov versus Lima. Next week in San Jose we have Chandler versus Benson Henderson. So three weeks in a row world title fights at the highest level, all respectable, top fighters in the world. And I would say 90% of our fights, are like that. So over a period of a year, we’ve done 24, 25 events, something like that. But we had one event when we said we’re going to make it a legends fight between Ken and royce, which was really interesting to watch, and then we had the Dada 5000. But here’s the thing, Kimbo Slice is the largest drawing audience for MMA in the history of the United States. When he fought on CBS he did 7.9 million viewers. No one else is even close, believe me. Those numbers are massive. When we did a CBS show one time with Fedor Emelianenko, he only did 6 or 5.5. So Kimbo is the biggest draw on TV in the history of the sport. So think about that, what does that tell you? It tells you that the sport is not just about the hardcore fight fans. The hardcore fight fans, I know what they want, they want the fights that we’re doing in the next few weeks.

But you know what? If we do something once a year like legends fight or fun fights like Kimbo and Dada was. You’re talking about a guy that was a street fighter against a guy that had two fights, and was fighting in his own shows, or whatever. We get criticisms for that because of what happened, and he went to the hospital. But at the end of the day was that an even match up? I think it was. I think it was evenly matched, it wasn’t like one guy was an extremely skilled martial artist, and the other guy was just some new guy. They both had combat experience and they weren’t world class fighters, so we thought that was a fun fight to put together.

Before 2016 when I think MMA made a little bit of resurgence, it was kind of down in 14. And you know, even my son said, ‘I don’t really wanna watch any fights any more.’ - Scott Coker

And a lot of people obviously thought so.

Coker: We had 3.2 million people. Now, listen, health and safety always comes first, that’s something we thrive on trying to keep a clean health and safety record. It was unfortunate that Dada had to go to a hospital, you know. It was a scary moment for me, I went to the hospital it doesn’t feel good to be there and he’s hurt. You know, he’s fine now, but it was a scary moment for all of us. But if you look at the overall picture of our company, 90% of our fights are all really for the hardcore fight fans. We do those fights maybe one a year. And the hardcore fight fans watch these fights as well. You know what, when Kimbo fought Ken Shamrock, I think it did like 2 and a half million views. It was the watercooler talk, so people in mainstream America were hearing about it and tuning in. Because I’ll tell you, before 2016 when I think MMA made a little bit of resurgence, it was kind of down in 14. And you know, even my son said, ‘I don’t really wanna watch any fights any more.’

It lost some of the fun.

Coker: It lost some of the fun of it, so we had to cast a bigger net. So what can we do to bring the casual fight fan back? And that’s where the fun fights come in, people love Royce, people love Tito, people love Chael. Are Tito and Chael two of the top prospects in the world today? Should they be fighting 21-year-old killers from Brazil? Probably not. But I can tell you there’ll be a tremendous amount of eyeballs on those two fighters when they fight, worldwide, and I think that people still want to see them.

I want to throw in two more names, very different on the quality scale. Welterweight looks like your best division. I think you have two or three of the top ten in the world, Koreshkov has good arguments for top five.

Coker: YES.

Douglas Lima, Benson Henderson who just went down to face Chandler, Michael Page, Rory MacDonald – very good names, star quality, and really good fighters as well. Is there a place over there for a GSP.

Coker: His situation is confusing because he’s saying he’s free, UFC saying he’s under contract. So, I don’t really know what’s going on. But, if there was a fighter like GSP, that was available, for sure we would like to talk to him, because he’s a great fighter. But, right now, it’s a confusing landscape.

You can’t talk to him right now.

Coker: It’s like, he’s saying we can, his lawyer is saying we can, his former employer, or maybe current employer is saying no, we have a contract. So, it’s a very grey area.

And the other name, CM Punk.

Coker: Yeah.

Would Bellator be interested in a CM Punk?

Coker: Yeah, I haven’t really thought about it but I’m not sure if he wants to fight again.

Let’s say he does and he’s looking for a new home.

Coker: You know, I would have to think about that, but if he’d continue to train, and he gets better over Duke Roufus’, yeah, I think that we would consider it. But I’m not sure, if he doesn’t want to train and get better, I don’t see a different outcome than last time.

How did you come up with going to Israel, and how did you make some of the connections here to start it all up?

Coker: Royce was just here, and we came just have a look and meet with our partners ‘Ego Total.’ So we just sat down talking, you know, ‘why don’t we do an event here?’ and they’re like, ‘That’ll be great!’ So we met with the venue, the PR people, ticketing companies, I think we know how to do this by now, who to work with, and so we reached out to different people, interviewed them, and then we came back over, brought our producers over, to make sure the production will be possible. We talked about the undercard, we talked about the main card, and so here we are 18 months later.

The undercard sold you a lot of tickets, because you had a lot of response for the local fighters coming.

Coker: Yeah, yeah. And I think that the event will sell out. I think it’s great. It’s going to be amazing.

You started out with a 5,000 people mark. I understand that if 5,000 people came, Bellator would have called it a success.

Coker: Of course.

And now it’s almost double that.

Coker: Now I feel like I want to sell out, just to sell out. Now I’m getting greedy.

The other big fight everybody’s talking about, except for Koreshkov-Lima, there’s another fight this weekend, Conor-Eddie.

Coker: Oh yeah.

Yeah. You’ve got a favorite for the win?

Coker: Oh you know what? I think that’s going to be a good question. I think that Conor is explosive, hits hard. I think he can get Eddie, I think he can. I’ve been going back and forth.

It’s better for the sport if he does, right?

Coker: For sure, for sure. But I think he can get him. Eddie would have to stay patient, take his time. Try to wrestle him a lot, try to dirty it up, ground and pound him, and just stay active. But I think if Conor can catch him – which I think he can – he might be able to pull it off.

Does Bellator have a secret that everybody else misses?

Coker: I think it goes back to our basic formula. If you look at our success in MMA, it started in ‘06 when it was legal in California, think about the fighters we developed from Strikeforce. Daniel Cormier, Luke Rockhold, Ronda Rousey.

Strikeforce never dies.

Coker: Never dies. But my point is we are very good stars identifiers, and builders of stars and fighters. So, as we travel, if we find somebody that fits our mold, we’re going to be interested in him.

You plan on coming early to this event here, the second it starts, to watch all the fighters.

Coker: That’s the gameplan, yeah.

You do some scouting for Bellator?

Coker: Absolutely, and let me tell you, matchmaking in Bellator is done by a committee. And I’m on that committee too, for sure. Rich Chou is our main matchmaker, but we have a couple of other people that have a say and input. We have a lot of good people that know MMA extremely well – obviously, because we’re in the fight business.

Heavyweight. You’ve had some problems – I don’t know if you’ll want to call them problems.

Coker: Yeah, yeah.

It was your less cared for division for a while, the champ Vitaly Minakov was in recess, and other problems. And you’ve got some nice names, you’ve got Lashley, Mitrione, King Mo. Where is this going, give us some news.

Coker: It’s going to be a fun year for heavyweights. 2017 will be the year of the heavyweights, in Bellator. But I can’t give you any specifics. I promise you, by the end of 2017, you’ll be like, this is the year of the heavyweights.

Would I be saying, this was a great tournament?

Coker: You might be.

Ram Gilboa is an Israeli writer working with many of the country's leading news publications, and does combat sports commentating on TV. He loves Jiu-Jitsu, Judo, Boxing, MMA, and long walks along the beach to watch a fight on sand. Find him on Twitter at @RamGilboa.