The History of the Blackzilians Part 1: Timing is everything
Timing is everything in mixed martial arts.
Whether you're talking about fights getting made or titles being won, MMA is a sport built on timing working out to make things happen. One fighter can't take a fight on a particular date, another volunteers to take their place and the course of history is sometimes changed forever.
Timing is an especially important factor when looking at the formation of a team in Florida, founded in 2011, that was built from splintered pieces of fighters exiting other gyms and an owner who never intended to get into the MMA business in the first place.
It all starts with a Florida businessman named Glenn Robinson, who built a company called Iron Bridge Tools into a $100 million empire before he ever stepped foot into American Top Team while looking for a place to train.
"I liked the sport. I was a fan of the sport in general. I had no interest in getting involved on a business level, and I decided to train just to get healthy. I knew American Top Team was close to me, so I decided to take a class," Robinson told FOX Sports. "I took the regular class and the trainer that was there wasn't the normal trainer and he was a really cool guy. The next day I took the regular class and there was like 50 people there and it was like trying to learn piano in the advanced stages after two days.
"So I started to take some private lessons like two or three days a week, and I liked it. I really liked the sport. I liked ATT. They were all really nice to me."
Robinson said his first real introduction to a well-known fighter at American Top Team was the day he met Jorge Santiago, but their chance encounter didn't happen because they were both working on the mats together.
"I didn't know who Jorge Santiago was the whole time I was training there, but then I hired a woman to be my assistant and by coincidence her husband was Jorge Santiago," Robinson said. "They are divorced now, but at the time it was Jorge Santiago. She says later on that Jorge was a fighter and he was a champion in Japan and I hadn't even met him and then one day I was on the mat at ATT and he came over and that's how I met him.
"He would come in to pick up his wife and we would talk and we became friendly. That's how it all started."
It was around then, Robinson said, that Santiago started asking him some questions about business and financial concerns. Santiago was already a well-respected and established middleweight competing in Japan, but like many fighters, he was trying to make ends meet.
Santiago told Robinson he was going to begin managing himself, but still train at American Top Team whenever it was time to fight. It was in this same stretch of time that Robinson met former UFC light heavyweight champion Rashad Evans, who was working with a colleague of his on potential television and film opportunities.
From working with Evans and getting to know Santiago, Robinson also became friendly with another veteran American Top Team fighter, Gesias "JZ" Cavalcante. Robinson said he would offer them advice on business whenever they would ask, but the real turning point for his entry into MMA management came from a short-lived partnership he formed after getting to know UFC welterweight Thiago Alves.
"I knew Thiago Alves. I helped Thiago get some sponsors. I never charged him; we were just friendly, and I wanted to help him out," Robinson said. "Through Thiago, I met Malki (Kawa), and he said, 'Since I'm working with Jon (Jones) and you're working with Rashad, why don't we work together?' I didn't know Malki well enough and I agreed. A few months later, that went away. But during that time, basically Malki was trying to build up a thing and he comes to me and says, 'You need to meet Danillo and Yuri Villefort.' I said, 'All right,' and by that point Dan (Lambert, American Top Team owner) already found out I was working with Malki and he got pissed off and told me not to come back to ATT.
"I was actually very disappointed about it, because I really liked going there. I remember that night I was really sad."
It didn't take long for Robinson's exit from American Top Team to be followed by four of the fighters at the camp -- Santiago, Cavalcante and both Villefort brothers. Shortly after that, all four fighters visited Robinson's home to discuss a potential business relationship.
The fighters were ready sign with Robinson, who was now acting as Evans' manager as well, but he insisted on not working with anybody who was still under contract with American Top Team.
"They come over to my house and they bring a ton of family members. Jorge is there, and I the first thing I said was, 'Do you guys have a contract with Dan Lambert?' and Danillo says, 'I don't have a contract with anybody.' Yuri says, 'I do, but we spoke to (Ricardo) Liborio (American Top Team co-founder) and he says it's OK to work with other people.' That might be okay by Liborio, but since you have a contract, I can't even talk to you," Robinson said.
"He said, 'OK, I understand.' I told him I made a promise to Dan and I'm not going to break it."
The breaking point in the relationship for the fighters and American Top Team came after Danillo Villefort decided he was going to leave one of the managers associated with the gym and sign with Robinson instead.
"(Ricardo) Liborio came to us on Saturday on the same day we had the meeting with Glenn, I was about to fight Matt Horwich, and I explained I wasn't happy with Alex Davis being my manager and he wasn't doing much and I knew that he was trying but he couldn't do much," Villefort explained when speaking to FOX Sports. "I told Alex I wasn't going to work with him anymore and it was like breaking up with my girlfriend, it was tough to do. So I spoke to Liborio on Saturday and said 'I'm not happy, I'm going to work with someone else'.
"I was deciding between Jorge Guimaraes or Glenn and I had the meeting with Glenn and I was going to talk to Jorge on the phone. I explained everything to Liborio and he said as long as you train here, you pay your 10-percent and you don't train with (two previous coaches who were let go from American Top Team), he said you're welcome and that's what I wanted."
A few days later, Villefort says Liborio came back to the fighters and told them that American Top Team founder Dan Lambert decided he no longer wanted to allow the to sign with Robinson and a line in the sand was drawn.
"So Liborio came to my house on Tuesday and told my father 'Dan said if you sign with Glenn, (Danillo) must go'. Yuri freaked out on him and he started crying like a b--ch in my house. My father got upset with him," Villefort explained. "My father told me 'Liborio came here today and Dan's not happy you signed with Glenn and he wants you to cancel the contract'. I said I can't cancel the contract he said I could sign! He said if I don't cancel the contract I have to leave the team.
"I said 'f--k that, I'll leave the team'. I'm not going to let this guy treat me like a slave. My father said 'are you sure about that?' and I said 'yes, I'm sure about that."
Villefort and his teammates decided to leave the gym and go out on their own. At the time, Villefort was running his own American Top Team affiliate school and the plan was to take his brother, Cavalcante and Jorge Santiago to train there.
It all changed when Villefort says Lambert insisted that his partners exile him from the gym or risk losing their American Top Team affiliation.
"I ended up losing my business because of these guys," Villefort claims. "They threw everything of mine out of the gym and locked me out."
Lambert denies many of the claims made by the former American Top Team fighters, but the one thing that's indisputable is Villefort, his brother, Cavalcante and Santiago were officially no longer a part of the gym and now also had no place to train.
Robinson stepped in and was able to procure a small gym called Imperial in Florida that he rented solely for the four fighters to train at as they prepared for fights. Robinson said even at this stage he wasn't fully committed to MMA.
But when Evans decided to leave the team led by Greg Jackson over a spat with current UFC light heavyweight champion Jon Jones, Robinson saw an opening to bring all of his friends and clients together so they could begin to help each other. Robinson says he did this all "99 percent" as a friend, but once Evans and the other fighters got together, there was only one real option.
Make it work or watch these fighters suffer.
"I was just trying to help the guys, but then Rashad had a fight lined up and we had to make sure he had the right help. So we brought in the right people to help him and then another guy would get a fight and so we'd make sure he had the right help and my business mind kicked in and I wanted to make sure it was run right," Robinson said.
"I spent a lot of time analyzing this thing. Like, 'OK, now I'm in it, what the f--k do I do?'"
Robinson began investing his money into the fighters before moving into a new location, and eventually the team started to flourish and the one-time MMA novice began to really enjoy his new business. It was all coming together under one roof, but there was one key piece missing.
They still needed a name.
That changed when Robinson was in his office one day working on a website design for his fighter management company and Danillo Villefort walked in and joked about how all the athletes were either African-American or Brazilian. The next day, the conversation continued and almost simultaneously Robinson and Villefort looked at each other and uttered the same word.
"Danillo came up to me and made the joke and I shouted out the name," Robinson said. "He said, 'That's the name!' and it just kind of stuck."
From that day forward, the team was known as The Blackzilians.
Look for Part 2 of our History of the Blackzilians leading up to the April 22 debut of "The Ultimate Fighter: American Top Team vs. Blackzilians" on FOX Sports 1.
