Dana White: from fleeing the mob to selling the UFC for $4 billion

Transcript

This guy fled Boston when the mob came for $2,500. 21 years later, he sold the UFC for $4 billion. Meet Dana White. In 1995, Dana is teaching a boxing class in South Boston when two of the city's most feared gangsters walk in. They want $2,500, a fortune to him at the time. Then they call. He has until one o'clock tomorrow to pay. When he asks what happens if he doesn't, they tell him he'll find out. So he hangs up, books a flight to Las Vegas, and leaves everything behind. In Vegas, he opens boxing gyms, then starts managing two of the UFC's best fighters, fighting for their contracts, he learns the company's about to go under. So he talks his rich school friend Lorenzo into buying it for $2 million. All they get is the name and an old cage. They don't even own the website. Dana runs it, but it's been dropped from TV as two violin, and networks won't take his calls. So he chases executives down hallways until one puts them on pay-per-view. But by 2004, they're over $40 million in the hole, and Lorenzo wants out. The best offer is a few million. So they put their last $10 million into a reality show. If it flops, the UFC is finished. But it works. The show is a hit, and its final fight is so brutal, the network asks for a second season that night. Then in 2016, the UFC sells for $4 billion, and Dana's share is worth around $360 million.

Transcribed automatically from the video, so small errors are possible.