On Sept. 27, the Baird Center will host the Xtreme Fighting Championships, a mixed martial arts event. “XFC 51: Evolution” will feature as many as 12 fights on the card. Organizers hope to draw 1,500 to 2,000 spectators for the event.
The main matchup features a clash of two top heavyweights with Alex “The Spartan” Nicholson, former Ultimate Fighting Championship and Professional Fighters League star who sports a 19-11 record, squaring off against former UFC combatant Zac “The Ripper” Pauga (7-3). Both are coming off dominant victories at XFC Grand Prix II in Detroit in May.
Emmanuel “El Matador” Sanchez (22-9), formerly a fighter with Bellator MMA who trained for many years in Milwaukee, is also on the card and will take on Detroit’s Kenneth “The Boss” Cross (14-4).
Sanchez, 34, has been competing in mixed-martial arts events for 16 years.
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“Right after school, people go off to college, get a job or go into the military and start to decide what they want to do in the real world,” Sanchez says. “MMA was starting to get popular and a little more mainstream at that time. I saw it and kind of fell in love with it and decided I wanted to try it. I had to find a gym, learn these arts and then maybe one day fight and see how far I could go. I knew it was something I wanted to do. I set foot in that first karate dojo and I haven’t turned back since. It’s taken me all over the world and I love it.”
Sanchez, who is currently based in Houston, formerly trained at the Roufusport, a renowned mixed martial arts gym on Milwaukee’s West Side that has produced current UFC welterweight champion Belal Muhammad and former UFC champions Anthony Pettis, a Milwaukee native, and Tyron Woodley.
Sanchez says fans can expect “fireworks” in his fight with Cross. “I know he brings it and I bring it,” Sanchez says. “It’s going to make for an exciting fight. I have more experience and I feel I have more of a hunger and a desire to prove that I’m one of the best in the world. Each and every time I go out there, I leave it all on the line. I want to always showcase all of my skills and why I belong on the highest level.”
Sanchez says he’s excited about returning to Milwaukee and getting to do battle in the Baird Center.
“Since I came up in my amateur days, I’ve fought at the Wisconsin State Fair, the Rave and the Bradley Center, where my teammate Anthony Pettis won the world title,” he says. “[Baird Center] is a beautiful place. I love fighting in Milwaukee. Those are my people.”
XFC is looking to expand its Midwest footprint with the Milwaukee event.
“The XFC continues to build an exciting platform for the next generation of mixed martial arts to thrive, and expanding our reach to Wisconsin is another step forward with our efforts,” says Chris Defendis, the president of Xtreme One Entertainment, which is presenting the event. “We’re thrilled to be in Milwaukee and look forward to sharing another outstanding card.”
XFC launched in the United States in 2006 but shortly after, given the growing popularity of mixed martial arts globally, the company moved its base to Brazil. “They did phenomenally well and were putting on dozens of a events per year in front of 13,000 or more fans,” Defendis says. “They had 180 fighters on their roster. Then, when the Brazilian economy collapsed in 2016-17 and they ceased operations after falling on some hard times.”
XFC now operates as a subsidiary of Xtreme One Entertainment, a publicly traded company. The first event with the relaunched brand took place in May 2023 in Detroit. XFC put on events in Lakeland, Florida and Detroit earlier this year. A former HBO and Warner Brothers executive, Defendis took over as president of Xtreme One Entertainment in July.
“As I got more involved and educated, I began to understand the strategy behind MMA,” he says. “You have to know multiple disciplines and be very well-rounded. We are positioning ourselves to a fighter-friendly league. A lot of leagues and promoters don’t always have the fighters’ best interests at heart. It’s not just lip service. We’re actually doing it by the way we put on events and treat the fighters.”
Defendis stressed that XFC isn’t a competitor to UFC or other high-level MMA promotions and serves as more of a development league. “It’s very important to know who we are and where we are,” he says. “We do not consider ourselves a competitor to UFC. In fact, we want our fighters to move on to UFC. That’s an important distinction. A lot of times some of the promotions will have a fighter who is doing really well and is ready to go to the UFC or PFL but that fighter is also selling tickets for that promoter, so they don’t want them to go to the next league. We want to do the opposite. We want to celebrate fighters when they get to that next level.”
Milwaukee is a natural spot for an XFC event, Defendis says.
“Milwaukee is a great fight town,” he says. “There are a lot of people connected to MMA, whether through Roufusport or through Anthony Pettis. We know that there are fight fans there. High-level MMA like UFC is spending a lot time internationally this year so we feel there is a lot of opportunity for us to go to places like Milwaukee and deliver a really solid arena-type show. The Baird Center, in particular, with the renovations is a state-of-the-art modern facility. That was also of interest to us. It’s right Downtown. It’s a great facility and a great location.”
A $456 million expansion of the Baird Center, completed earlier this year, doubled the convention center’s size. The project was undertaken to attract more and a wider array of events. “We consider sporting events to be an important part of our business and see an opportunity to continue to book more in the years to come,” Baird Center spokeswoman Charlee Hrubesky says.
XFC 51: Evolution will also be available as a pay-per-view event on TrillerTV. The event will also stream live to U.S. military forces stationed or assigned overseas via the American Forces Network.
Tickets to see the event live can be purchased at XFCFight.com, Ticketmaster and the Baird Center box office.
