Ariel Helwani and ESPN Agree A Deal

Ariel Helwani and ESPN Agree A Deal:

By Dan McConnell

One of the world’s favourite mixed martial arts journalists is leaving the highly respected MMA Fighting team, to join one of the biggest sports brands in American in ESPN.

Ariel Helwani officially confirmed he will be leaving MMA Fighting on last night’s episode of The MMA Hour. The highly popular MMA journalist confirmed that he will be leaving the company to join ESPN as a reporter across their television networks and digital media platforms.

When you think of the world of MMA, there is no doubt Ariel has been at the forefront of any topic or debate, adding his own insight into the news and is often the first to break news and considered by many the best MMA journalist in the business. He has been there from the early days of the sport.

This comes at a timely stage as the UFC’s television broadcast deal is up and they have agreed to swap broadcast platforms from Fox to ESPN. Although Helwani said that he was in talks with ESPN well before the UFC’s TV deal was ever discussed and this was not a factor in his decision.

It’s not uncommon to hear Ariel talk about other sports on The MMA Hour or The MMA Beat programmes. It has always been a dream goal to join a huge sports broadcaster like ESPN and now he will fulfil that desire.

It has been confirmed he will form one half of a new weekly show on ESPN called ‘Ariel and The Bad Guy’ which he will co-host with former UFC Middleweight contender and current Bellator Heavyweight Tournament semi-finalist Chael Sonnen. Helwani’s popular The MMA Hour show will be rebranded ‘The Ariel Helwani Show’ on ESPN and will keep this fan-favourite programme going.

Helwani has been named MMA’s journalist of the Year on six occasions at the World MMA Awards and is nominated for this year’s award.

Right now it is unclear who and how MMA Fighting will fill the very big shoes of Helwani but in the mean time they will continue their production of MMA content. Helwani’s final edition of The MMA Hour will be Monday June 11th and his new show will be airing each Monday.