Cage Kings: How an Unlikely Group of Moguls, Champions, & Hustlers Transformed the UFC into a $10 Billion Industry

A “propulsive and wildly engrossing” (Brad Stone, author of The Everything Store) account of how the UFC turned mixed martial arts into a multibillion-dollar business and global pop culture phenomenon.

Decried as “human cockfighting” by Senator John McCain and dismissed by the New York Times as a “pay-per-view prism” onto the decline of Western civilization, the UFC seemed by 2000 to be bleeding out. The cage fighting promotion had been banned in thirty-six states and was struggling to cover...