Local Promoter Is Fighting For Fans

BYLINE: Steve Hummer
DATE: November, 2007
PUBLICATION: Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The (GA)

Like a good shopkeeper who knows his customers’ appetites, David Oblas has come to feed the local fight crowd. And he ain’t bringing tea and finger sandwiches.

“They come to see knockouts. See people counted out. See blood. See a lot of hot girls in the crowd,” Oblas said, lest there be any confusion about the selling points of prize fighting, specifically mixed martial arts.

Armed with these truths is a 31-year-old promoter who would be the most visible broker of the fistic arts in Atlanta. Oblas’ every-other-month productions at the Gwinnett County dance hall Wild Bill’s are coming off a second successful season, and he’s booked for another beginning in January.

The crowds for seven mixed martial arts cards in 2007 averaged better than 3,000 a show, he said. Oblas added that rebroadcasts were consistently the fourth-highest-rated programs on Comcast cable’s on-demand package.

“No. 1 is adult programming — a big shocker there. No. 2 is a pet adoption services show; No. 3 is on-demand dating; No. 4 is the fights. I think adult programming has proven it’s going to stay up there. I’m hoping we can get to No. 2 or 3 eventually,” Oblas laughed.

He cut his teeth five years ago on the traditional, stand-upright-and-punch-the-other-guy-in-the-face boxing. That sport always will occupy a special chamber of his heart, it being the one he watched with his father growing up in Roswell. But it’s a loss leader these days, what with the rise of the boxing/wrestling/kitchen-sink hybrid known as mixed martial arts.

Metro Atlanta is a microcosm of what has happened to the fight scene around the country. While boxing has lost its connection with fans, mixed martial arts — MMA to its friends — has grabbed a wider, younger audience. And someone has to fill the need.

“It has a lot to do with American people in general,” Oblas said. “Everyone’s in a rush these days, everything has to be done quickly. The MMA title fights are five rounds; the average fight is three rounds. It’s a lot quicker, faster-paced action.

“It’s new, it’s electric, it’s energizing. On [the MMA] cage, they got cool sponsors. They got Rockstar, Monster energy drinks, video games. You turn on a boxing fight, they got the same Budweiser logo they’ve had for 40 years.”

The portrait of the matchmaker/fight promoter is mostly an unseemly caricature. In every movie, he is the exploiter of the poor pug, getting rich off another man’s sweat and blood. In every big fight, it is Don King in the background, spewing malaprops and nimbly staying one step ahead of the feds.

Oblas doesn’t fit easily into this mosaic. He is an easygoing child of the suburbs who stands 5-feet-3, weighs 155 pounds and has been inside the ring exactly once.

That happened before his first promotion five years ago, featuring a local fighter, a cruiserweight champion named O’Neil Bell whom Oblas first met when working as an inspector for the Georgia Athletic Commission. Bell agreed to let Oblas promote him only if he got into the ring and experienced what trading punches was really all about.

In the gym, Oblas was paired with a youngster just learning the craft. “I left there with a black eye and a bloody nose. A 14-year-old beat the crap out of me,” he said.

His father, Steve Oblas, had dabbled in Golden Gloves boxing. He said his son told him, “‘You did it, I can do it, too,’”

The elder Oblas replied: “I’m from the South Bronx, you’re from Roswell. There’s a difference.’”

At his level, fighters don’t get rich — the largest purse for a Wild Bill’s fight has been a $6,000 winner-take-all deal — but Oblas said he is mindful of trying to improve the reputation of the fight enabler.

“I’ve never stolen anything from this business. I’ve never cheated. I’ve probably lied a few times — but minor lies that I had to do,” he said.

James Thorpe, a part-time super-heavyweight MMA fighter from Kennesaw, has seen the ugly side of the matchmaker.

“I was with one promoter who twice changed who I was fighting after the weigh-in,” he said. “With [Oblas] everything is pretty much cut and dried. He’s the most active, most consistent guy around. He puts on a lot of competitive fights and there’s always butts in the seats.”

Oblas has lately been wrestling with state officials over what to do with Kyle Maynard, who wants to compete in MMA despite a condition known as congenital amputation, leaving him with no arms below the elbow and essentially no legs. Oblas has supported Maynard’s quest to compete under slightly safer amateur rules. The state athletic commission, however, has refused to license him.

For his support, Oblas has received a trickle of e-mail accusing him of exploiting Maynard. Oblas says it was Maynard who approached him wanting to fight, and that he never would agree to put him in a higher-risk professional fight.

Controversy is one sign that a fight guy has achieved some success. Here is another: Having lost money the first couple of years in promotion, Oblas did well enough this year to buy a Mercedes from the luxury dealership where his father has sold for years.

“I knew he made it then,” Oblas’ father said. “But I gave him a heck of a deal.”

Outlining his hopes for 2008, Oblas invokes a wide range of interests, from the symbol of Atlanta’s fading presence on the fight scene to an odd choice for a business model to his own raging self-interest. The perfect New Year’s wish list for a promoter at heart.

“Putting my goals in order,” he said, “it’s probably: Be a part of an Evander Holyfield fight, be a part of a Kyle Maynard fight, spend a day with Don King, and be one of Jezebel [magazine]’s 20 most eligible bachelors in Atlanta.”