Gaming Bare Knuckle Boxing CEO Shares Growth Plan And TikTok Success By Brian Mazique ,
Forbes contributors publish independent expert analyses and insights. Brian Mazique has covered combat sports and video games since 2011. Follow Author Jul 16, 2026, 08:11pm EDT --:-- / --:-- This voice experience is generated by AI. Learn more . This voice experience is generated by AI. Learn more . Summary David Tetreault, CEO of Bare Knuckle Boxing (BKB), is revolutionizing the sport by applying his extensive experience from 20th Century Fox, Golden Boy, and Triller. Tetreault envisions BKB as a "sports franchise" prioritizing athlete narratives, signing pedigreed boxers and former MMA champions. The promotion has seen significant growth through its distribution on VICE TV, talkSPORT, and a groundbreaking TikTok partnership. BKB's TikTok channel boasts over 53 million likes since April, setting watch-time records for live sports pilots. Tetreault's ambitious goal is to establish BKB as a mainstream Saturday-night event, selling out arenas across the US, UK, and Mexico, with a major expansion already underway in Mexico. The key challenge lies in whether bare-knuckle boxing can sustain a broad casual audience.
David Tetreault Credit: BKB David Tetreault has accumulated years of experience in the worlds of sports and entertainment promotion, but he's heading up something unique in his role as CEO of Bare Knuckle Boxing. I spoke with Tetreault about his vision for the promotion and its booming success on TikTok.
BareKnuckle Boxing Credit: BKB Tetreault’s spent more than a decade as a senior marketing executive at 20th Century Fox, working across studio films and sports properties, then roughly seven years as Golden Boy's chief business officer under Oscar De La Hoya, where he helped build stars like Ryan Garcia.
He describes the deal that defined that run bluntly: "John and I carved out at the time what I think is the largest ever boxing promotional deal in history, making Canelo the highest paid athlete in the world." A three-year stint at Triller followed before he joined BKB early last year.
Tetreault does not frame BKB like its rivals. "I don't look at BKB as just another promotion like Matchroom or BKFC or Top Rank or Golden Boy," he said. "I look at us as a sports team, whether it's like Manchester United, the L.A. Dodgers, the Boston Celtics."
That "athletes first" approach shapes the roster: pedigreed boxers alongside former UFC and PFL champions, from Victor Ortiz and Lee Selby to Yuriorkis Gamboa and the Vargas brothers on the "Summer of BKB" tour. Story is the engine. "There's no way that we can flourish without telling the athlete's stories," he said, and an in-house media division plus a Bally's-backed prospect series are both in the works.
The TikTok results are where the growth gets loud. "With our first pilot of that, which was at the Lee Selby show on June 27th in Cardiff, we blew the numbers off," Tetreault said. "We had the highest watch time of any sports platform ever in the history of TikTok live sports."
The promotion's TikTok channel has been firing since the middle of April, but it has already accumulated more than 53 million likes.
He puts the deal in rare company, alongside Fox's FIFA rights, ESPN and Red Bull, and treats the platform as real distribution rather than a highlight dump.
Tetreault’s three-year target is mainstream appeal across multiple platforms…