How long can a fighter be on the roster without fighting?

Moral Victory

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Does it come down to if they are declining fights or not? Can they choose to sit on the bench? Assuming they're not injured.

Can the UFC remove them but simply often choose not to?

Seeing Lauzon come back after 3ish years of inactivity, did they not offer him fights because he decided he'd be retired or did he decline them all and UFC kept him, or something?
 
Lil Nog didn't fight for years on end if I'm remebering correctly. Cruz and Cain?
 
Does it come down to if they are declining fights or not? Can they choose to sit on the bench? Assuming they're not injured.

Can the UFC remove them but simply often choose not to?

Seeing Lauzon come back after 3ish years of inactivity, did they not offer him fights because he decided he'd be retired or did he decline them all and UFC kept him, or something?


Further proof that it is 5 years

 
Well apparently their new contracts only a low a max time of a certain time from the date of signing.. but does that only work for champs? These new contracts are confusing and can change in a moments notice.

Lauzon came back after 3 years cause I think he was injured which basically freezes the contract.

But yea if UFC offers a fight and fighter declines they can extend the contract.

I don't think we will ever get the full story, like the 'official payouts' that are not even close to what they actually get paid
 
Further proof that it is 5 years


I can't imagine there not being stipulations there. Like if they turn down fights or get injured extensions. But I guess it could give the UFC a leg up in never negotiating mid contract again. UFC always trying to stay on top
 
I can't imagine there not being stipulations there. Like if they turn down fights or get injured extensions. But I guess it could give the UFC a leg up in never negotiating mid contract again. UFC always trying to stay on top


Read the rest of the tweets. This is the absolute MAXIMUM that a UFC contract can last. It can’t be extended longer or tolled or champion claused past this 5 year limit. All UFC contracts are void after 5 years
 
Read the rest of the tweets. This is the absolute MAXIMUM that a UFC contract can last. It can’t be extended longer or tolled or champion claused past this 5 year limit. All UFC contracts are void after 5 years
My bad didn't read em. But what I was trying to say is maybe they have different contract types ( which admittedly wouldn't make sense). The new contracts def don't do UFC any favors, so Im sure they got something in there with negotiating.. like wasn't ngannou unable to renegotiate his numbers bc of this new contract?.

Also, since they can't extend contracts for turning down fights, can they basically ice fighters now and not offer fights? Things have gotten sketchy with the contracts lately. We need Diaz to expose them lol.

Also, id love to see a clause that allows fighters the option one more fight if they win their last fight. . Moose and chook left bad tastes in my mouth
 
Read the rest of the tweets. This is the absolute MAXIMUM that a UFC contract can last. It can’t be extended longer or tolled or champion claused past this 5 year limit. All UFC contracts are void after 5 years
You seem more confident in this then the guy who'd tweet you posted lmao
 
You seem more confident in this then the guy who'd tweet you posted lmao

It’s been confirmed by multiple sources since then. The biggest one being Francis whose using this sunset clause to break his contract in December

EDIT: Also I did a SHIT TON of reading on the UFC contracts, the anti-trust lawsuit, fighter pay etc. back when I lost my job at the beginning of the pandemic — it was the only thing keeping sand in isolation— so I know ALOT on the subject
 
It’s been confirmed by multiple sources since then. The biggest one being Francis whose using this sunset clause to break his contract in December
I can read man. I'm just saying that doesn't mean it's in EVERY contract. Still a far way off from being able to say that.
 
Further proof that it is 5 years



Personally, I think this wouldn't be hard to contest in court. It's unconscionable that the UFC can control an inactive fighter for five years in a career that on average last three or four years.
 
Personally, I think this wouldn't be hard to contest in court. It's unconscionable that the UFC can control an inactive fighter for five years in a career that on average last three or four years.


According to this article from Combat Sports Law that may not be the case legally

https://combatsportslaw.com/2014/12/26/exclusive-contracts-and-ufc-fighter-career-length/

In their ongoing coverage economist Paul Gift, who is experienced as an expert witness in anti trust lawsuits, dissected the claims and provided a unique breakdown.

One point Gift addressed was the fighters challenge to UFC’s exclusivity requirement in their contracts. He pointed out that contracts generally need to exceed 8 years before courts consider them to be long term and therefore problematic. He opines that UFC contracts, which may average around three years, may not be met with judicial criticism. He notes as follows:

The fighters’ strategy has just been clarified. If a credible economic argument is to be made about raising rivals’ costs with exclusive contracts, they must be long term. This is an absolutely essential component to the story. In my experience, exclusive contracts in the range of three years or less are usually viewed as short term. 4-8 years is debatable and 8-10 years or more is generally viewed as long term. This is because contracts don’t expire all at once. They’re generally staggered.

I once worked on a case where a company foreclosed 100 percent of a critical resource from its competitors with exclusive contracts. That foreclosure rate is insane, but the length of the contracts was the critical component. They averaged about five years which meant around 20 percent would expire and become available for free and open competition every year. The defendant won the case partly because the contracts weren’t long enough to put its rivals at a sustainable competitive disadvantage.

In what follows, I’m going to use the Eddie Alvarez contract as a baseline. The term of Alvarez’s contract was the earlier of 40 months or 8 bouts. So the worst-case scenario is a length of 3 years 4 months as long as he’s reasonably active. This puts the plaintiffs in a real bind as they’re going to have a hell of a time showing that 3 years 4 months is long term. The complaint reveals that they likely know this and their strategy will be to downplay the contractual term (“Regardless of the term of the agreement”) and focus on the extension clauses (“thereby effectively extending the exclusivity provisions indefinitely”).




I don’t take anything away from Gift’s expertise and perspective, however, context is always important. While three years may not be a long time in the labour market generally, in the realm of ‘elite professional MMA’, three years may be a lifetime.

If the Court finds that the average UFC contract length mirrors the average professional athlete’s time in the elite league the exclusive time period will be all the more problematic considering the crux of the Plaintiff’s allegations is that the UFC prevents fighters from enjoying reasonable access to true free agency during their short careers. If you are following this lawsuit you can expect this topic to be acutely studied.
 
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