The UFC’s digital streaming service Fight Pass added another quality MMA event series to it’s archieve: Andre Pederneiras’ Shooto Brazil. Marshall Zelaznik, the UFC’s Chief Content Officer and Director of International Development, announced their newest asset on the latest episode of Ariel Helwani’s The MMA Hour.
“We closed Shooto Brazil which, they’ve been around for 13 years, 50 events, with Jose Aldo, Renan Barao…I mean, when these guys were just raw, just tough fighters,” he told Ariel Helwani. “So we’ve closed that. We’re getting that library in. And we’re working as hard as we can to see if we can do this weekend’s Shooto event live on Fight Pass.”
According to Zelaznik, issues in production and quality will decide whether we will not be able to see this weekend’s Shooto Brazil 54 event live on on their platform.
“We don’t know,” he said. “You wouldn’t normally hear us talking about this. But I’m excited about it. I know Lorenzo is [too]. We just have some production. They produce the event live for Brazilian television, so we know there’s a live signal, but it’s making sure we can get it, and that we can get it in the quality we need and ensure that we have a consistent stream for everybody.”
The Fight Pass archive hosts past events not only from the UFC, but from former rivals Pride FC and Strikeforce, WEC, WFA, and others, as well as live broadcasts from Invicta FC. Zelasznik says, if some production issues are solved, more organizations are going to be added to their live-streaming service over the next couple of weeks.
“We’re getting some operational production issues, but my guess is within the next 60 days you’ll see a lot of announcements. Probably the next 30 days, of more live inside Fight Pass.”
This weekend’s Shooto Brazil 54 card features a featherweight title fight between Felipe Froes and Paulo Dantas and a catchweight bout between lightweight titleholder and UFC veteran Ronys Torres and Benito Tavares.
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