NEW YORK – Perhaps most combat sports fans didn’t have “Dana White enters the world of slap fighting” on their 2022 bingo board, but Power Slap is here.
Friday, White publicly launched the brand and revealed details at a news conference held prior to UFC 281 ceremonial weigh-ins at Radio City Music Hall.
Additionally, White announced a television deal with TBS for an eight-episode television series which will mark the promotion’s debut in 2023. Each episode will run one hour. Rankings will launch after the series concludes and champions will be crowned.
“I’m really into this,” White told MMA Junkie and reporters about why he got involved. “I like it. The other thing is, this stuff is going on. I know when we announced this, there were a lot of concerns about health and safety with some guys. Us getting involved guarantees that it’s going to be much safer.”
Heading Power Slap will be Frank Lamicella, who will be running the day-to-day operations with assistance from White.
The weight classes will be consistent with MMA. It is unclear if all MMA weight classes will be included in the launch.
Revealed rules include:
- Three or five rounds.
- Competitors will alternate slaps, or as the promotion calls them, “strikes.”
- Each fighter will get the same amount of “strikes,” unless one fighter is deemed unable to continue prior to completion.
- A coin toss determines which competitor goes first.
- Flinching, blocking, or delaying the match are considered fouls.
- Each fighter will disclose which hand they will use prior to the slap.
- Each fighter will disclose their “count,” the number of windups (similar to a golfer gauging distance to a golf ball on a drive) they will pump before their strike.
The person throwing the strike is called the “striker.” The person absorbing a blow is called the “defender,” though questions still remain about the health and safety of the competition.
Though the Nevada Athletic Commission (NAC) declared recognition of slap fighting as a combat sport in mid-October, physicians and health professionals has criticized the competition as a mechanism of unnecessary brain damage, including Association of Boxing Commissions (ABC) medical committee chair, Dr. Michael Schwartz.
“(There’s) no place for a senseless sport where the competitors are not permitted to defend themselves,” Schwartz recently wrote on Twitter.
White said Friday there will be advanced medical testing for athletes and drug testing. He thinks the public and commission perspectives will change after seeing the competition play out.
“A lot of these questions that you guys have, the media, fans, potential fans have, will be answered in this eight-part series that we’re doing. These guys who have been doing it for a long time, there actually is technique to it. You can actually roll with the slap. They know how to actually defend, brace, whatever you want to call it. There’s actually technique to this thing – believe it or not.”
After two dry-run events held behind closed doors, casting for the series has officially launched. White said they’re looking for personalities and people for television more than anything.
Slap fighting has been around for years, though more prevalent in Eastern Europe and Russia than in the United States. It’s made an impact on social media, however, with some knockout slap videos with views north of 1,000,000 views.
“Look at the numbers this stuff pulls,” White said. “It’s perfect for social media. You couldn’t have a more perfect product for social media. We believe it will be strong on television, too.”
