Combat sports: Good news for Pico; Holm, Borg in limbo

Aaron Pico got some good news this week — or, better expressed, made his own news. The Albuquerque-based (Jackson-Wink) MMA featherweight has signed a UFC contract.

For Pico’s Jackson-Wink teammate Holly Holm, and for former J-W fighter Ray Borg, this week’s news was not so good. The scheduled debut of the Global Fight League has been called off, and the entire GFL initiative is believed by some to be in jeopardy.

First, Pico (13-4): The California native and wrestling near-Olympian signed with Bellator in 2017. As an MMA neophyte, he lost three of his first seven fights but since has won 10 of 11, the only loss the consequence of a dislocated shoulder suffered during the fight.

Pico, 28, hasn’t fought since February 2024 and has publicly campaigned for a release from his Bellator contract. Once that was obtained, he signed with the UFC on Tuesday.

“It’s just the highest level,” Pico said during an interview with MMAfighting.com. “… I’m sure there’s guys in other organizations that can compete and win titles, but unless you’re a UFC champion you don’t have the respect.”

Meanwhile, Holm (15-7) had asked for and been granted a release from her UFC contract. The 43-year-old former UFC bantamweight champion then signed with the fledgling GFL. Borg (16-5), a former UFC fighter who’d once fought for that organization’s flyweight title, did the same.

Holm and Borg had been scheduled to fight on the GFL’s debut event May 24-25 in Los Angeles — Holm matched against fellow veteran Julia Budd, Borg against Brazil’s Marlon Moraes.

Then, as was widely reported in MMA circles on Wednesday, the GFL cancelled the May event.

Darren Owens, the GFL’s founder, issued the following statement: “Our primary investor didn’t fulfill his April obligation, which has caused some issues, however we have a solution in place. We are likely going to have to launch in June but 100 percent moving forward.”

Wrote prominent combat-sports journalist Ariel Helwani on X: “There are serious doubts about the future of the promotion.”

When Holm’s signing with GFL was reported, Albuquerque’s Lenny Fresquez, the fighter’s longtime promoter and agent, said the GFL appeared to be her best option post-UFC.

Holm, Fresquez said, had other options, but “as a team, this is what we felt was best for her.”

For Borg, 31, the GFL offered an opportunity to get back into competition after repeated failures to make weight prompted him to announce his retirement two years ago.

Borg said on Instagram that the only information he had on the cancellation had come from social media and not the GFL.

“I actually still haven’t even received an email or a text from the promotion,” he said.

The concerns, he said, had been out there.

“There were a lot of people who were anticipating something like this would happen,” he said. “… We’ll just sit and wait.”