Jones needs to show the UFC he's willing to compromise

Underground
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Few things…yes, some of my commentary is around the PPVs Jon sold over time, but the biggest factor in my opinion is how GOOD of a seller he is consistently. Ever since Conor came on the scene, a “big” PPV is 1M buys. However, the UFC has had a VERY small % of PPVs sell over that amount. Many PPVs on a given year sell less than 200K, many really good cards do less than 400K.

Look at UFC 226. DC vs Stipe 1, 205 champ moving up to fight the HWT champ…great looking PPV headliner that we rarely see. Co-main was Ngannou vs Lewis, and everyone loved the fight going in. Card also had Pettis vs Chiesa, Perry vs Felder and Saki vs Rountree. FUCKING GREAT PPV in my opinion…sold less than 400K buys.

The fact that Jones tops 600K against Anthony Smith is excellent, and would have been one of the UFCs better selling events of the year. 400K is a good night, 600K is great, and over 1M is rare. Some years don’t have a single event that tops 750K.

So looking at Jon, the ones I can easily pull have him at 860K buys for DC 2, and as we’ve seen, DC doesn’t sell…he sold 860K with Jones and less than 400K with Stipe, so it’s not like DC was the reason for the 860K. Jones vs Cormier 1 sold 800K, Jones vs Gus 2 did 700K, Jones vs Evans was 700K, Jones vs Smith 650K, Sonnen and Rampage were in the 520-530K range.

I can only fight 3 Jones PPVs ever that were less than 400K buys. Even on a per event basis, he sells better than almost every UFC star. Any PPV selling over 500K buys is big business.

As for Khabib’s pay…I didn’t see the check, but it was pretty widely reported. As for the explanation as to why…Dana thought the PPV was going to sell better. The Conor PPV pulled huge numbers, the Khabib vs Poirier PPV sold over 1M (it was estimated and not fully reported IIRC, either way big PPV) and I think they assumed the Gaethje fight would sell better, and were paying Khabib huge money.

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Jon publicly said he never asked for 30Mil, and tagged Dana in the post saying he’s full of shit.

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He also said 10M isnt near enough…so which is it. If 10M guaranteed isnt enough he can get fucked. He is 1 fight into an 8 fight contract that HE negotiated. He can piss and moan on twitter or sign the fight agreement. I really dont care if Jones fights again. At this point Dana should say Jones has a contract and leave it at that.

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Your post makes a lot of good points. Ultimately, we’ve never seen checks and can only pontificate as to what really happened. That and we can look at leaked contracts (Randy Couture and Eddie Alvarez) and see the graduated pay tables. Based on Eddie’s contract, Jon would need to sell at least 7.8 million PPVs to get a 20 million payday. I can’t imagine the contract structure for PPV fights have gotten much richer.

Here is the Eddie Alvarez contract breakdown:

For each PPV buy:
$1 - between 200,000 and 400,000
$2 - between 400,000 and 600,000
$2.50 - over 600,000 buys.

Using the same numbers, if JJ vs FN sold 2 million PPVs, he’d make $4.1 million from PPV points.

If Eddie’s numbers are low, let’s say UFC doubled the numbers for each category above. That would make $8.2 million in PPV points (based on 2 million PPV buys)

To be clear, I don’t think the UFC has sweetened the pie by double. Even with a “doubling” and selling 2 million! PPVs, he’s at 8.1 million and probably 1 million show money.

This is the real issue.

It all comes back to the percentage of money the UFC is willing to piece out to fighters. Simple as that.

Based on their current payout (~17%), no way Jones ever makes the money he believes he’s entitled to.

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He is likely on some sort of PED suspension again and this is all theatre
Pulsed too hard or some shit

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I think a small part of the UFC thinking is, we’ve pulled this guy out of a bunch of shit a bunch of times. Will he screw us this time too? Hit & run, a cancelled ppv, literally destroying the main event of UFC 200, overturned fight, having to move an entire event to another state within days because Nevada wouldn’t let him fight with “picograms” of steroids in his system, numerous suspensions.
Jon is a bit of a liability. Cost alot of money to promote a super fight and we’re dealing with a guy who’s inconsistent in his personal life at best.

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This fucking Dana doesn’t want a 99% retired and non active GSP to box. You think he gives a fuck about what Jones wants?

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Maybe Jon should have stopped doing crazy shit. It’s just been one thing after another. You can argue PPV buys and purses all day - he has been an absolute NIGHTMARE to deal with. He started off as an early GOAT contender - from there his ego and ignorance would have destroyed his career if it wasn’t for his dominance and brilliance in the octagon. Lately however, his performances have been lackluster (Santos and Reyes). Jones only sees all the great things he has done, but he is ignoring all the damage he has done not only to himself, but to the sport.

I, like everyone else on this forum, was a huge fan earlier in his career, he was amazing to watch. He was this young kid, beating the shit out of all the MMA greats of his division. Since then, I just see someone who has sabotaged his own career and if he isn’t commanding as much money as Conor or Khabib, it’s his own fault. All this being said, he does deserve to get paid, they all do really, but he should really think about the opportunity he has right now. If he takes out Francis, the UFC won’t have any other choice but pay him numbers that could potentially dwarf Conor’s paydays.

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Lol at Jones not drawing like Nate & Masvidal. A big PPV against each other for a stupid fake belt because Nate rode Conors coattails doesn’t make them a bigger draw than Jones, he’s done 6-800000 for years and around 20 fights while Mas & Nate co mained Fight Night cards like journeymen should

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It hardly seems apt to compare Francis’ previous opponents with Jon Jones

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I do agree with this.

Jon Jones is the opponent that will beat Jon Jones every single time. Own worst enemy. Fight 1 of 8 on this contract? Is that accurate? I’d tell Jon to get fucked. He can just sit and age, but he is human now wine. Sitting = deteriorating and not earning. Every frigging Jones fight is bitching about $$ before.

Fans will watch, but people won’t pay. I have to be honest, piracy has to be affecting those #'s in ridiculous ways. I’m out of country right now, and it’s comical to see how many firesticks I’ve seen being used (or set up to be used) for watching any streaming content.

Give us a fight or two without any Jon Jones drama, and perhaps people could be a bit more forgiving. He’s had a few of those, rarely, and they do ease the pain of JJ’S history of fucking up.

1 fight of 8, Jon. At ten mil, you can still afford wheelies. Just get in there, you are getting older.

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Jones isn’t gonna want to play this game too much. I’m sure he can hold out for maybe a little extra pay but the UFC won’t have any problems keeping him on the sidelines.

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He threw away his only bargaining chip, LHW title. He didn’t think this through.

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Where is the comparison?

I simply pointed out that fighting Francis does not mean one deserves more money. This held true for all of his prior opponents.

I’ve explained the PPV points and possible payday scenarios already.

You’re probably in the camp that just throws out numbers based on deserving. Whatever that word mean.

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The word “guaranteed” was never used, and I haven’t seen it reported anywhere that Jon wants X millions plus PPV.

As for 10mil not being nearly enough, so 30mil must be right…if dude was making 2mil for many of his title fights, 4-5mil for some, and he’s saying 8-10mil isn’t enough for this one, that doesn’t mean he wants 30mil. We have no idea if the 8-10mil was even offered, and have no idea if they’re arguing over the difference between 8mil and 12mil, or if it’s 10mil vs 15mil etc.

I highly doubt the UFC is offering 10mil and Jon is demanding 30mil. The only person saying or reporting anything close to that is Dana, and I’m pretty sure nobody on here believes anything he says…unless of course it supports their argument.

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Sure, but even DC was saying that Jon made $10 million for their two fights, and he assumed Jon meant total, but he wasn’t sure. So he assumed Jon was making $5 million per fight. If they sold roughly 800K PPVs, we’re only talking about $2 million in PPV money based on that. So either Jon has a better deal, or a $3 million base salary.

Also, guys like Nick and Nate Diaz who basically walked away from MMA for years after a couple big paydays…they’re not doing that if they made $2 million. The rumors were they made $5-7M for their bigger selling fights (Nick had GSP and Anderson, Nate had the Conor fights).

I think some of these champions are making much more than we realize, and Jon is the only guy coming out with the real numbers. He’s the only UFC star (other than Conor who throws out crazy numbers) who says point blank “I made $X million for that fight.” And because Jon is the only guy saying the real numbers, people act like he’s overpaid and greedy.

When DC talked about it on a recent podcast, he was saying the number should be north of $10 million for Jon, and not in a fantasy world “we deserve more” kind of way. He seemed to think it was likely Jon would get more and have it not be a crazy norm breaking payday.

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I get what you’re saying, but many of Jon’s issues are things like speeding, revving his engine, drunk driving etc. I’m not saying drunk driving is a good idea…but when you compare that to Conor who is sucker punching old men at bars, smashing people’s cell phones on camera, accused of rape by multiple women…dudes like Mike Perry have domestic violence incidents, also beating people up on camera in bars…Jon’s stuff really isn’t crazy compared to others.

And before we get into the steroid stuff, you either believe USADA or you don’t and it’s not worth arguing it. They said it was a tainted supplement and gave him a short suspension. Guys like Dillashaw failed for EPO and served 2 years. If the UFC had the ability to bury tests and skew the results, we never hear about either failure, and both guys never get stripped of their belts…AND the UFC magically gets USADA to say TJ was a tainted supplement and get him 6 months.

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Yup, and now that it came out that the Kawa’s werent really a part of negotiations for the past few years, its hilarious that Jon did that all by himself. Genius that Jon!

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Very possible he pulsed again and had to step away from that title
This entire thing may just be a smokescreen for a forced absence for PED stuff

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No way. C’mon man! No fucking way.

Jon juicing? Don’t buy it He never gave anyone a reason to think he could be on the juice.

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