Professional Fighters League was at the forefront of some
controversy last week when it
came to light that its PFL Challenger Series event on April 1 was
pre-recorded..
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As a result, the event was flagged for suspicious activity by U.S.
Integrity, a company that monitors betting markets, when odds moved
significantly in favor of the winning fighters ahead of that
Friday’s broadcast on FuboTV. There was some confusion regarding
the event, as all prior PFL Challenger Series events aired live,
and numerous sportsbooks received action on the event. That
ultimately resulted in some unsettled bets in relation to the
event, as well as an ongoing investigation by U.S. Integrity.
The PFL confirmed that the event was indeed taped, however,
promotion gambling personality Ian Parker was not present on the
broadcast nor were betting lines listed or discussed during the
card.
PFL CEO Peter Murray appeared on “The MMA Hour” to further address the controversy regarding the
April 1 event.
“It was a pre-recorded event. It was not promoted as a live event
by the league, but we were working with our broadcast partner in
FuboTV. And candidly, while we didn’t promote it as live betting or
integrate betting, odds or content into the broadcast, there was
confusion,” Murray said. “Confusion among fans, confusion among the
sportsbook community and we take it very serious. We have addressed
it directly with regulators and we have addressed it with
sportsbooks. While in our view we didn’t do anything wrong,
technically, we’re accountable.
“As a world class organization and as a media entity, we pride
ourselves on communication. We’ve addressed that internally to
ensure that will never happen again,” he continued. “It was our
only pre-recorded event ever. We have an impeccable record over
four years of executing live events with multiple sportsbooks,
taking bets in the U.S. and internationally. We don’t plan on
having any pre-recorded events going forward. A learning moment,
and it’ll be a blip. But we take it very, very seriously.”
The 2022 PFL season is set to begin on April 20. One of the
promotion’s marquee divisions is women’s lightweight, and that is
attributed almost entirely to the presence of two-time Olympic gold
medalist Kayla
Harrison. The two-time defending PFL champion tested the waters
of free agency before re-signing with the organization earlier this
year, and she’ll make her first appearance of 2022 against Marina
Mokhnatkina on May 6.
While many in the MMA community were interested in seeing Harrison
test her skills against top talents in other organizations rather
than returning to PFL, where she has dominated, Murray says the
promotion is willing to step outside the box to book the 155-pound
champ in interesting bouts. One matchup of particular intrigue
would be a showdown with Bellator featherweight queen Cristiane
Justino.
“Kayla wants that fight. We believe Cris wants that fight,” Murray
said. “If we couldn’t make it happen between the two organizations,
being the PFL and Bellator, as a cross promotion and a joint event
— which we’re still open to — we’ll take another path to see if we
can put that together.”
“Cyborg” is scheduled to defend her featherweight crown next in a
rematch against Arlene
Blencowe at Bellator 279 on April 23.