Dana says UFC Fighters do not want the media or fans to know how much money they make

I’ve never understood peoples fascination with athletes salaries. On a basic level it’s none of your business.

These athletes have nobody to blame but themselves. These athletes willingly sign multi fight contracts that in most cases probably aren’t in their best interests. Then most of them drag their feet and take extended amounts of time to fight out these contracts knowing that they only have a relatively small window of years to maximize their athletic career. Then on top of that, they piss their money away. Conor MacGregor eluded to that same stupidity when he mocked Eddie Alvarez for accepting the most high profile fight that he would ever participate in without re-negotiating his contract. Eddie was in the driver’s seat for probably the only time in his life and he and his management were both too stupid to realize it. The UFC was desperate to make Conor a two division champion. Conor wasn’t going to go to 170lbs and challenge for that title and he was too big to make 135lbs so his only option was 155lbs. Both UFC and Connor needed Eddie and he wasn’t smart enough to leverage his position. On top of that Eddie, his family, and his management failed to realize or be honest about what Eddies career trajectory truly was. After the Conor fight, it’s all downhill for him. He needed to maximize his leverage then.

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I think we can agree Dana has done more for the sport than anyone else in mma or is that even up for debate?

That said I do think fighter are underpaid for what they do.

But there are a lot of professions that are severely underpaid. This isn’t unique to mma fighters. Do I think a no name fighter that has his first right in the UFC should be paid at least 1 years wage? I think that’s fair.

25K or even less isn’t 1 years wage, because a fighter has more than just himself so if you take that into account, along with training and such, it’s really not that much.

I agree with BLAF in this case.

In regular jobs, people don’t walk around talking about their salary. In fact I’ve never told anyone but my wife what I make/made, until years after I have left a job.

It’s discouraged in workplaces for many reasons. Obviously fighting is not a “regular” job but the principle is the same. Even if I wasn’t discouraged from sharing by my employer, I wouldn’t tell anyone. I was raised to keep these things to myself.

As mentioned before, it’s nobody’s business.

The more they make the less they fight.

I wonder if Dana pays a lot of these fighters on the side so they avoid taxes. You know like a gift thats not taxable. Just trying think outside the box

It’s been said 1000x on here, the reported income isn’t what most of these guys get paid, and I can say that with 100% certainty…and it’s not just champs getting PPV points.

Even Nate Diaz confirmed that years ago when he was holding out. His reported income was like 24/24, and he came out saying it’s bullshit that he only made 60/60 for his last fight while his teammates like Nick Diaz and Gilbert were making WAY more. He didn’t say what their pay was, but said his pay was like 60/60 or 65/65 when the reported was less than half that.

But yeah, Dana is right…the fact that they have 500-600 fighters under contract, and people are naming like 5 people ever who even talked about the real numbers pretty much proves his point. Most of the guys who aren’t even in the UFC anymore and HATE them aren’t out there talking about “I only made $X.” They’re just saying they were underpaid over and over and pointing to other pro sports.

Here’s the thing, the fighters should be saying that. Not Dana.

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The fighters aren’t the ones asked by the media about fighter pay. In some cases they are, but it’s just usually the disgruntled ones who talk about it first…and the media asks Dana weekly about fighter pay issues. Not sure what you want the guy to say.

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Yeah the per event pay is much much higher than other sports.

I’ve said multiple times the way to solve fighter pay issue is to change the current system so fighters fight more often. When they are up and comers they fight anywhere from 4-10 times in a year… then they get to the UFC and they are fighting once a year, sometimes twice a year, double the amount of fights and you double their income, problem solved.

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To be clear, I do think there are issues with fighter pay, I just don’t think it’s with the guys most often talked about. I’ve posted a few times about it, so I won’t go into extreme detail again…but I think the new UFC guys are paid just fine. If you’re coming off contender series, the UFC has no idea if you’ll stick. You might be cut after going 0-3, and how much $ do guys deserve if they fight in the UFC for a year and go 0-3? Most of those guys are fighting other new UFC fighters, on many of these cards we see guys who are 1-1 in the UFC fighting guys who are 0-2 in the UFC etc. Most new UFC guys aren’t fighting Sean O’Malley. So I think they pay “new” UFC guys just fine.

I think champs are paid well, most are making more than $1M per fight, many making 3M+ per fight.

My issue is with the guys in the middle, particularly the guys at the top, just below the champs. Wonderboy Thompson and Thiago Santos are the guys I’ve used in the past. Wonderboy had 2 super close fights with Woodley, he wins either and he’s making millions. Now he makes much less. Thiago Santos had a close fight with Jon Jones. If the judges go his way, millions. He fought is next fight for a disclosed 80/80. I’m sure he got more, but we’re still talking less than 25% of what he’d make if the judges scored it his way.

And if those guys who are just below champs are the guys making 200-300K per fight, what about guys ranked 10th? What about the guys just below that?

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in his last pay dispute Jon Jones says he doesn’t say because he wouldn’t have public support if he did.

There’s so many fighters in the UFC that are millionaires.
Fucking whiny ass fans. Always crying about fighter pay.

but but but…the percentages… SHUT UP BITCHES!

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This assumes people will take “mandatory” fights. One of the things that was always going to be an issue is when peope become stars and have much more to lose, they will do everything they can to pick-and-choose who they fight.

I say if you’ve made it to a main card of a PPV, you should probably be making at least $200k just to show up, imo.

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Yeah but those guys don’t need to bitch then.

They bitch that other athletes in different sports are making millions but they don’t understand those guys are competing anywhere from 15-100+ times a year and selling out venues that many times as well. Very few athletes make what the average ufc athlete makes per event.

Not sure if serious…

So you want the UFC to pay 26 fighters at least $200,000 each.

$5,200,000 total, minimum.

Plus PPV points for the champions, plus the fighters at the top of the card need to get paid more than the no names… right? So we are looking at around:

$6,000,000

That’s more than a 100% increase in fighter pay.

Yeah no dude, that’s a flat no from me dawg.

So the UFC is responsible for paying fighters more or they’ll go elsewhere and mma will miss out? Aren’t there other organizations that should be included? Nah. Only the UFC matters? Okay, got it

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