Game On: MMA finally coming to Ontario

TORONTO - The Ontario government has had a change of heart and will allow mixed martial arts as of 2011.

Premier Dalton McGuinty had previously dismissed the idea of allowing mixed martial arts, saying it just wasn't a priority.

However, the Liberal government announced Saturday it would take steps to allow events to be staged in the province, starting next year.

The province says it will adopt the same rules for professional MMA events that are widely used across North America. That means the sport will be regulated by the Ontario Athletic Commission, which already oversees boxing.

Money is apparently the motive for the reversal on MMA by cash-strapped Ontario, which is running a deficit of almost $20 billion.

A government news release says a major MMA event in Ontario could attract up to 30,000 fans and generate up to $6 million in economic activity.

That, apparently, is assuming the event is held in the Rogers Centre.

The move comes after successful UFC shows in Montreal and Vancouver, which both posted record sellouts for the MMA juggernaut. The UFC, the sport's biggest promoter, has long targeted Ontario but was frustrated by the government's reluctance to jump on board.

"It's been a long time coming and we're thrilled," Marc Ratner, the UFC vice-president of regulatory and government affairs, told The Canadian Press on Saturday.

"Ontario is a very, very important market to us," he added. "Canada is the mecca of the sport. Toronto is one of THE MMA cities in the world."

Ratner has said Toronto, on a per-capita basis, is the UFC's top market in terms of pay-per-view buys and viewers.

The UFC was so confident that Ontario would eventually open its door to the sport that it announced in May that it was opening a Canadian office in Toronto with former CFL commissioner Tom Wright at the helm.

At the time, UFC co-owner Lorenzo Fertitta said Canada was its second biggest market outside of the U.S., accounting for some 17 per cent of its overall business.

Saturday's announcement opens the door for Toronto to host a blockbuster card featuring UFC welterweight champion Georges St-Pierre of Montreal and trash-talking challenger Josh Koscheck.

The two are slated to meet in December but the UFC would no doubt hold it until the new year to stage it in Toronto.

Ratner said the UFC was looking at both the Air Canada Centre and Rogers Centre as possible venues for the first card in Toronto.

When the UFC does come, "we think we're going to sell more tickets here than we have anywhere. This is a very hot market,'' UFC president Dana White told a news conference at the Rogers Centre in May.

The UFC will also look at holding shows in other Ontario cities such as Hamilton, Ottawa and Windsor.

The UFC lobbied both the provincial and federal governments to accept the sport.

It engaged former Ontario premier David Peterson and his Cassells Brock & Blackwell law firm to help on the provincial front. In Ottawa, the UFC turned to the Capital Hill Group lobbyists.

Ratner said the push will continue to try to get the federal government to amend the Criminal Code to expand the section that permits boxing to include mixed martial arts.

The existing wording has not stopped shows from being staged from B.C. to Nova Scotia. Still, it made for a confusing patchwork quilt of regulation governing MMA in Canada, with the sport approved in some jurisdictions, but not in others.

Ratner said education on the sport's health and safety record and its economic impact were the driving force in getting Ontario to finally give the sport the green light.

The UFC executive credited Ontario Consumer Services Minister Sophia Aggelonitis for her work on the issue and said he looked forward to working with Ontario Athletics Commission Ken Hayashi.

In the '90s, before the UFC's current ownership was involved, the sport literally had almost no rules and found itself almost a pirate enterprise reduced to taking place in backwaters.

But Zuffa, which now owns the UFC, has worked hard to get the sport sanctioned by state athletic commissions under a unified set of rules with the kind of medical and drug tests that are standard in boxing.

The UFC has already won sanctioning for MMA in 44 U.S. states. It now turns its attention back to New York, where the issue of sanctioning MMA has been tangled in internal budget politics, plus West Virginia and Vermont.

Connecticut, Alaska and Wyoming don't have athletic commissions.

The sport combines a variety of fighting styles, from boxing to jiu-jitsu. Fights are three five-minute rounds, with the exception of championship bouts which last five rounds.

The UFC holds its fights in an octagon-shaped cage. Other promoters use a cage or ring.