MMA Athletes Association starts off with a powerful message – and some heavy baggage

There’s a new association for MMA fighters on the block. Yes, another one.

This one, announced on Wednesday, is called the Mixed Martial Arts Athletes Association, or the MMAAA for short. ( Free tip: Maybe don’t give your new organization an acronym that, when spoken out loud, sounds like the wail of a dying lamb.) It includes some big names on its board, like former UFC champs Georges St-Pierre, Cain Velasquez, and T.J. Dillashaw, as well as fan favorites and veteran fighters like Donald Cerrone and Tim Kennedy.

That’s a good start. That’s something that previous attempts at organizing fighters have lacked: the vocal, public support of active, popular UFC fighters.

When you see a guy like St-Pierre, who doesn’t need the money or the fame, standing up and encouraging fighters to put their fears aside in order to find strength in unity, you feel like, finally, here’s the leader this movement has been waiting for.

Then you look over and see former Bellator CEO Bjorn Rebney and you think, wait, what’s he doing here? Is he lost? Did someone need a ride and he was the only one with a working car? Did he sneak in while the fighters were busy comparing staph infection scars?

Workers associations and labor unions are tricky things. Like large water fowl, they cruise along easily enough once they’re up. It’s gaining enough speed and momentum to get airborne that’s the challenge. What they need is unity from the people they’re trying to organize, and the foundation for that unity is trust.

Bjorn Rebney, Georges St-Pierre, Tm Kennedy, Donald Cerrone, T.J. Dillashaw, Cain Velasquez

The fighters involved in the MMAAA so far? They’re a trustworthy bunch. They’ve all been around long enough and risen high enough in the UFC hierarchy to speak about the issues and the ills with a competent, authoritative voice. They may have their individual complaints, but they don’t come off as a bitter group with axes to grind. They’re right in that sweet spot between experienced and jaded.

If you’re a lower-level fighter who sees the potential benefits of collective bargaining, but feels far too expendable to speak up about it, you have reason to be encouraged when a guy like Cerrone tells you he’s scared too, but he’s going to do the right thing anyway and see where it leads. That’s exactly the messaging and the leadership this thing needs.

So why did we spend so much time during the announcement hearing from a former promoter who, if he hadn’t been forced out from the UFC’s biggest competitor, would probably still be doing exactly the kinds of things to his fighters that the current group accuses UFC ownership of doing to theirs?

Rebney said a lot of the right things on Wednesday. He told us he’s not in this for money, that he’s simply there in an advisory role. He told us that while the UFC pays out what the group estimates to be about eight percent of its revenue to fighters, he paid out 53 percent in his “most successful” year at Bellator. He didn’t provide any documentation to prove either figure, but he claimed to have the numbers ready and waiting that would make his case. It’s a shame he didn’t think to bring them with him.

In fact, a lot of important details seemed stuck off-stage somewhere, alluded to but never revealed. For instance, who’s financially backing this effort? Good people, according to Rebney. Great people. He’s just not going to tell us who they are, which makes it difficult for us to guess what their motives might be.

According to Rebney, this announcement was two years in the making. If true, that would mean that Rebney’s been working on it more or less ever since he was ousted from Bellator. How that experience instilled in him such a passion for ensuring that UFC fighters are treated fairly – and the MMAAA is, at this point, solely focused on the UFC – remains a mystery. The more cynical-minded among us might wonder if getting kicked away from the MMA trough didn’t simply inspire him to find another path back in.

The fighters seem to believe in him, though. At least, this group does. Maybe they know something we don’t. Maybe they only think they do. If they’re going to be successful in uniting their colleagues, they need to gain the trust of a bunch of people with reason to be skeptical of linking arms with an exiled fight promoter.

If Rebney is really only there to advise this group he cares so deeply about, here’s one piece of advice he should have considered giving them: Don’t begin your pitch to a wary public by aligning yourself with a controversial figure.

Don’t take on all that baggage when you’re still trying to gain the necessary momentum. Don’t make it harder to trust you by bringing on a man who’s trusted by so few.

If Rebney really only wants to help, with no hope of financial gain for himself, then thank him for his time and ask him to step away for the good of the association. If he’s there for the reasons he says he is, he’ll understand. If he’s not, at least then you’ll know.