A Fighter's Life After Retirement

[herra]

Many MMA fighters have retired or washed out from professional competition in their 30's. What do they do next? What options do they have to earn a living? How do they maintain the same standard of living?

 

[BokaBokte]

 

[Luger]

Either coaching or dealing drugs

 

[Just Creed]

Most of them especially the old school guys will probably have testosterone issues, brain damage and no money

 

[BRASIL WAND]

Many open their own gyms and become coaches.

Mike Brown used to be the FW WEC champ and is now one of the coaches at ATT.

 

[lsa]

Get a regular job?

 

[filthynumber1]

Sell cars, get fat...
No disrespect, just statin facts

 

[cheesus]

They have plenty of options...security, coaching, sports education, school teacher, gym, nutritionist, strength and conditioning coach, television, fight promoter...really not that hard.

It sucks that a lot of them put in so much work but don't seem to reap the same rewards as high level boxers or football players etc, but a lot of the time they're just completely stupid with their money and just can't handle adjusting back to normality.

Really, mid tier guys who fight on main or co main events, have a few sponsors, few bonuses etc should be able to invest their money wisely into property, shares, pay off a mortgage etc and have a pretty fucking good start to their new career, much better than others so I don't always have sympathy for them when they have a big cry about how poor they are post fighting.

Although some guys have a really rough career especially among the old school shooto, pride, pancrase, vale tudo etc type breed of fighters who literally fought for chump change.

 

[herra]

Great post! It's depressing to see that most of the MMA fighters have shit lives afterwards especially Roger Huerta. He was on top of the world with a lot of promise, and then crashed and burned. GSP at the end of the video had me cracking up.

 

[dildos]

yeah being a fighter would fucking suck financially in the long run unless you actually make it, like really make it (Conor, GSP, Anderson to name a few because i dont think there are a lot to name.)

 

[Mr Wings]

Coaching (Pedro Rizzo). Running a martial arts school/gym (Randy Couture). Commentating (Frank Shamrock, Bas Rutten). Desk job at the UFC (Matt Hughes). Podcasting (Schaub, Bas, many others). Do porn and beat the hell out of your girlfriend (Jonathan "War Machine" Kopenhaver). Pro wrestling. Acting. Stunt man/woman.

 

[karate n stuff]

Rich Franklin is a public speaker; Shane Carwin goes on reddit.

 

[thobra]

MMA is not like most other pro, spectator sports, where top guys make a lot of money, so you can invest and live of it after you retired. Even the top ten guys in MMA need to have a backup-plan, because when you finish fighting, you need to find a job.

Working as a trainer in BJJ, boxing, kickboxing and MMA or a bouncer is an obvious choice, but of course every retired fighter can't do this, so then it is either back to school or flip burgers.

 

[nanika]

honestly they will probably go broke like most athletes. its hard to start a new career when you are almost 40. they also have little training in anything other than martial arts. its hard to maintain a successful gym. most will fail. its sad but true.

 

[Bacco]

• go do some more money in a smaller minor org

• get movie roles if you can

• do well paid seminars around the country/world

• open a gym and become coach

 

[Judge Lance Ito]

 

[herra]

Sell cars, get fat...
No disrespect, just statin facts

Keep the videos coming! Mark Kerr's body @ 10:00 he has the body of a 50 yr old software engineer who never lifted in his life.

 

[Nuremberg]

They have plenty of options...security, coaching, sports education, school teacher, gym, nutritionist, strength and conditioning coach, television, fight promoter...really not that hard.

One of the worst, uninformed opinions ever to be posted on Sherdog.

So Hector Lombard is ready to be a history teacher in a couple of years?

Roy Nelson a SPORTS educator?

WTF could bigfoot offer in terms of SECURITY with zero training?

Oh yeah, James TeHuna is primed and ready to be a fight promoter! He has the biz acumen because he fought Shogun Rua!

 

[Jesus X]

Many MMA fighters have retired or washed out from professional competition in their 30's. What do they do next? What options do they have to earn a living? How do they maintain the same standard of living?

A lot are getting into the ufc gym business franchising or running the gyms or opening their own gyms.

 

[Jesus X]

honestly they will probably go broke like most athletes. its hard to start a new career when you are almost 40. they also have little training in anything other than martial arts. its hard to maintain a successful gym. most will fail. its sad but true.

A lot of fighters have gyms or are co owners babalu sobral has one near my house for close to a decade . Din thomas is also training fighters now including tecia torres.