ALEX DAVIS | Resonating with “Peace Through Sports” and What Goes On Behind Fighter Management in MMA

By KARL R. De MESA

Fans remember the fancy knockouts and big submissions in mixed martial arts. They remember championship belts, the rivalries, and dramatic walkouts. What they rarely remember are the people behind the scenes, quietly helping shape careers long before the cameras ever come in or athletes step on to the lights of sold out arenas.

For more than two decades, Alex Davis has been one of those names behind the scenes.

To casual fans, Davis is a manager for some of the biggest names in MMA. To fighters, however, he is something even more rare: a mentor who understands the sport from the inside out.

In a sport obsessed with champions, Alex Davis remains committed to beginnings rather than endings. Of course the title belts and attention-grabbing headlines matter, but what interests him most is finding a fighter with potential, helping them navigate a difficult path, and watching their life change enormously.

A Brazilian-American, Davis was an accomplished athlete long before he became a manager. He earned black belts in both judo and Brazilian jiu-jitsu, became a national judo champion in both Brazil and the USA, came close to Olympic qualification, and later won the World Masters Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Championship three times. Outside combat sports, he nurtured another lifelong passion as a motocross rider and competitor.

His path into MMA was never part of a grand plan.

Davis began working with pioneering vale tudo fighter Marco Ruas before becoming involved with the legendary Nogueira brothers. As more fighters sought his help, what started as informal guidance gradually evolved into a career path.

As he puts it, becoming a manager was not something he chased. "It just happened."

That organic beginning would eventually place him at the center of one of MMA's most influential organizations.

Davis was a founding member of what would eventually become American Top Team, the powerhouse Florida-based gym that has produced generations of elite fighters. In early years ATT, he was a coach, corner man, translator, and trusted adviser for Brazilian athletes new to the American fight scene. Over time, he transitioned fully into management, helping fighters navigate career and life. The names he’s managed include Antonio Silva, Edson Barboza, Fabio Maldonado, Rousimar Palhares, Thiago Tavares, Adriano Martins, and Milton Vieira.

Meeting Tribe DD founder Bev Roach was either a fortuitous crossing of paths or an inevitability when people with similar convictions are drawn into each other’s orbit. Either way, the events of 2015 were going to happen sooner or later.  

Alex at UFC Fight Night Abu Dhabi with Alexia Thairnara (UFC) and Bev Roach, aka The Diesel Diva

“I met Bev in L.A. on the eve of a UFC event, when I had Roan Carneiro fighting Mark Munhoz,” said Davis.

Roach confirms this. “It was just before UFC 184 for Rousey vs Zingano,” she said. “I flew in from Afghanistan to attend and connected with some friends. Cris ‘Cyborg’ was fighting at Invicta FC the night before. Through all that, Alex and I hit it off immediately.”

This initial connection eventually grew into a friendship that was cemented when Roach went to visit Davis at his farm in Brazil, located in Cachoeiras de Macacu, northeast of Rio de Janeiro. Alex then welcomed Roach into his MMA family.

“What I saw the outset was his humble demeanor and how much he cares for his fighters,” added Roach. “What I really enjoyed watching was Alex’s transition from being less than enthusiastic about managing female fighters, to becoming probably one of the best managers for female fighters in the world. “

2016 Team Caliocane, Cachoeiras de Macacu, with unknown, Rudson Caliocane, and Bev Roach

All through the years, Davis’s influence in MMA through his fighters grew further. Through ATT, Davis was able to work with world champions, contenders, and legends. Yet Davis believes his greatest contribution has little to do with celebrity.

"I think that the difference between me and other managers is that I was an athlete," he once explained. "It's not just about percentages and money. It's about human beings."

That philosophy eventually became the foundation of his career.

While many managers focus on the handful of athletes capable of becoming champions, Davis argues that every fighter deserves equal commitment. He has pointed out that not every athlete among a hundred prospects will become a titleholder, but every one of them deserves an honest chance. Which is why what’s really motivated him is helping unknown fighters improve their circumstances rather than signing big names.

That perspective comes from his own athletic career experience. During his judo competition years, Davis lacked the kind of mentor he later became for others. He understands how seemingly minor decisions—small questions, overlooked details, a bit of guidance at the right moment—can alter the trajectory of an athlete's life.

His love for the sport also extends well beyond individual careers, into the structure of the sport itself.

Few managers have been as vocal about reforms in MMA. Davis has advocated for announcing judges' scores between rounds, increasing the number of judges to reduce error margins, as well as providing judges with accurate strike statistics during fights. All to create systems that discourage unfair, even dangerous, practices (like extreme weight cuts). He has also criticized the sport's tendency to reward social media and legacy press popularity over athletic merit.

Supporting his gang! Alex with Alexia Thainara, Amanda Ribas, Anita Karim, and Marcelo Ribas at UFC Fight Night Abu Dhabi

In typical Davis fashion, his frustration is expressed not as outrage but rather common sense. Humanity, he notes, can now perform extraordinary scientific feats, yet MMA still struggles to solve simple judging controversies.

Davis is also a man whose management career has been guided by a simple principle: honesty.

American Top Team founder Dan Lambert once told the press that Davis the most honest manager he had ever met. Davis himself believes honesty is the only way to handle the immense responsibility of another person's life and livelihood. It’s a responsibility he takes seriously.

Fighters entrust managers with the most productive years of their lives, years that cannot be replaced once they are gone. Davis has never forgotten that fact.

“He stands for his fighters, he stands against the dodgier activities that happen in the sport,” said Roach. “And he is fair. The sport is better for having someone like Alex Davis as a part of it.”

In this Tribe DD interview, Davis wrote back to us to expound his thoughts on everything from fighter management to reforms the sport badly needs.  

● ● ●

For those who might be new to the sport or young casuals who only know you because they always see you with fighters, how would you describe your job in MMA?

DAVIS: My job is to guide, assist, help these guys and girls make a livelihood through fighting.

In your 20 years of handling careers, would you say that honesty—and as a corollary integrity—is one of the cornerstones of your management style or philosophy?

DAVIS: Yes it is. I will leave this earth with my principles and ethics intact. This is not so easy, immersed in a medium where honesty and ethics, at this moment in time, are scarce. I believe that when you take responsibility over someone's life, career and dreams, the only way I can do this is with honesty, transparency and straightforwardness. 

How did the creed of “Peace Through Sports” in Bev’s Tribe Diesel Diva resonate with your own values, ethics, and way of management in the fight business?

DAVIS: It resonates very well. It is a great idea and principle. We need more of this attitude! Bev [Roach] also goes out of her way to help athletes.

Take us back please to Marco Ruas as your first fighter and the early days of MMA, which must have been an incredibly hard yet hopeful time for the sport. Now that MMA has approached near mainstream popularity, what if anything do you miss or remember about the good old, bad old early days that is now noticeably absent in the current crop of fighters and the industry in general?  

DAVIS: I met Marco Ruas when he was already UFC champion. I did not per se manage him. I helped him with other issues, like seminars and other things when he needed it. But it was through him that I became a manager, as my first fighter, Antonio Rodrigo “Minotauro” Nogueira, asked me for help. Was through Marco that I got Rodrigo his first fights in Japan. [Back then] the industry was very embrionary, and was very raw. These were the days when Pride FC was the largest event in the world. The UFC was still forbidden in the majority of the states in the US.

From the outside looking in, managing people who do combat sports for a living might look like an HR person’s worst day, every day! What might you say is the hardest thing about what you do?

DAVIS: MMA is a very competitive sports. It takes many specific qualities to become successful. Only in the last few years have fighters started to take a more professional attitude, emulating the kind of effort it takes to become successful in an Olympic sport for example.

What would make you decline to manage someone?

DAVIS: I try to stay away from problem children. In this sport there are many!

Looking back on all your successes, the fighters you’ve helped nurture to incredible titles, what would you say is the best, most enjoyable or most rewarding thing about what you do?

DAVIS: It is a sour and sweet issue. Many times we guide athletes through difficult times, bring them to the light. But then other managers swoop in with offers, more money, signing bonuses, promises that they can get better deals. It’s never true. Many times they pay commissions to the coaches. And then everything you have done for them is forgotten.

I will be very honest. It is very disappointing. But that will not change my ethics or principles. It will not change the man who I am. Two wrongs do not make a right. If I were to do the same, I would simply be descending to their level!

What makes me stick around is to change young athletes lives through fighting. And I have been successful at it.

As a lifelong jiu-jiutero and judoka, what are the values and tenets that you take with you off the mats that also happen to be applicable in your management of fighters?

DAVIS: I think one of the differences between myself and the majority of managers out there, is that I have competed all my life, reaching a pretty high level of success. I think that this gives me a better understanding of what it is that these young men and women go through as they pursue their dreams. Many people involved in the sport are more interested in notoriety, pictures, social media, and rubbing with celebrities, than they are in actually performing the work that it entails.

You’ve also been an advocate of many reforms in the sport that make incredible sense. Are there improvements or alterations in policy that you see as badly needed across the board?

DAVIS: We are in a moment in this sport, when we are only looking for profit, notoriety etc. No one, not the bigger promotions, not the athletic commissions nor the athletes are doing enough, if anything, to improve the sport as a whole.

Any items of advice to those would-be managers looking to get their first client and make their mark in the wild world of MMA and combat sports? 

DAVIS: My advice to anyone trying to become relevant in managing fighters, is to first make an effort to truly understand the sport in all its aspects. Unfortunately, most people that get involved, are seeking more hype than doing the grudge work that is necessary to help an athlete become successful.