An idea to help solve fighter pay issues

[Pierced7681]

ufc fighters get a base pay of 50k for first fight, no show/win split purses everyone gets a full paycheck, every fighter on a card who gets a finish gets a bonus, and ufc allows fighters to have sponsors again but the sponsor has to be cleared ahead of time by the ufc so no holzer reich racist crap going to make it on tv

 

[HHJ]

I have an idea. Stop streaming fights and stealing from the fighters then we wouldn’t have a fighter pay issue

Oh hush up you old woman.

 

[Goutfather]

Hold some single night elimination style tournaments, where everyone earns the same damn thing but profits increase throughout the subsequent rounds.
Examples!
Round one is $50,000 to the winners.
Round two is $100,000 to the winners.
Round three finals is $250,000 to the champ.
We would have a different perspective on those champs even if they lost in their divisions. We used to rank MMA fighters in their respective divisions taking these situations into account. Fight brackets could be determined at the weigh ins, that way nobody gets to plan ahead and everyone is on the same playing field.

MMA was EXTREMELY interesting when we used to do things similar to this...

i like the idea of fighters not knowing who they’re fighting ahead of time, for reasons that have more to do with competitive legitimacy than money.

but on the money question, other orgs have tried different compensation structures. long story short, the business has to be profitable to justify continuing it. and when i say “profitable,” i mean that the owners need to make money hand over fist, not merely break even after giving everyone a generous cut. so is the amount you’re proposing less than the payout for a normal fight card? does it incentivize the sort of fights that generate more business? and i think someone else asked it, but what about fighters who lose? fighters rely on some kind of show money if they spend time preparing just to end up with a loss.

at the end of the day, i think ufc has it basically right. fighters are paid what they’re worth to the company. that’s really all you can ask for, although there should perhaps be more transparent, objective criteria for determining value. people wanna see the fights they wanna see, and they’re not terribly interested in the format, the brackets, compensation regime.

 

[NoBiasJustMMA]

Just allow fighters to have their own sponsors again, that would about double everyone's pay.

 

[HHJ]

Just allow fighters to have their own sponsors again, that would about double everyone's pay.

Pretty much everyone except the UFC agrees with this.

 

[SuperNerd]

Lol.

If you just listen to MMA fans for 10+ years, you realize why pro-wrestling exists, and why something like it is inevitable.

 

[Ripp0ntare]

In all of my fucking years watching MMA, I've never once streamed a single event.

you can't use your own anecdotal experiences to prove a point.

We ALL know that hundreds of thousands of people stream every weekend and its lost revenue.

Don't pretend that doesn't happen.

 

[avenue94]

They do get paid, just not as much as the winners.

How about losers get half of what the winner's make?

It's a pretty bad business model for fighters. Most athletes make the same whether or not they lose a contest. The entire concept of show/win was invented by SEG to reduce fighter costs.

 

[avenue94]

at the end of the day, i think ufc has it basically right. fighters are paid what they’re worth to the company. that’s really all you can ask for, although there should perhaps be more transparent, objective criteria for determining value. people wanna see the fights they wanna see, and they’re not terribly interested in the format, the brackets, compensation regime.

Not sure why people still believe this grade school lie. Laborers are not paid what they are worth they are simply paid what they can negotiate.

FYI your statement implies the value of a slave's labor is zero lol.

 

[fightfan70]

pay them more? not all of them, quite a few make so much, that they pick and choose who, when, where to fight.

some guys are making too much, others are scraping by doing the exact same job

i get that you keep what you earn, and you have to earn to keep anything.

but just like any big company, a few at the top earn more than the rest combined

 

[avenue94]

pay them more? not all of them, quite a few make so much, that they pick and choose who, when, where to fight.

some guys are making too much, others are scraping by doing the exact same job

i get that you keep what you earn, and you have to earn to keep anything.

but just like any big company, a few at the top earn more than the rest combined

Which fighters are overpaid? Because economically speaking, the most overpaid fighters are preliminary fighters, while the most underpaid ones are top tier draws.

 

[AmonTobin]

Hold some single night elimination style tournaments, where everyone earns the same damn thing but profits increase throughout the subsequent rounds.
Examples!
Round one is $50,000 to the winners.
Round two is $100,000 to the winners.
Round three finals is $250,000 to the champ.
We would have a different perspective on those champs even if they lost in their divisions. We used to rank MMA fighters in their respective divisions taking these situations into account. Fight brackets could be determined at the weigh ins, that way nobody gets to plan ahead and everyone is on the same playing field.

MMA was EXTREMELY interesting when we used to do things similar to this...

Pay out much bigger win and finish bonuses. Charge less for PPV.

 

[Goutfather]

Not sure why people still believe this grade school lie. Laborers are not paid what they are worth they are simply paid what they can negotiate.

FYI your statement implies the value of a slave's labor is zero lol.

if you think you’re worth $20 million, but ufc is only willing to pay you $8 million, how much are you worth to the ufc? or should we just have some government agency determine everyone’s worth?

 

[avenue94]

if you think you’re worth $20 million, but ufc is only willing to pay you $8 million, how much are you worth to the ufc? or should we just have some government agency determine everyone’s worth?

It sounds like at that point you test the market. Aka what he did.

And no, a free market should determine most competition, but regulatory guardrails are necessary to correct for inherent power imbalances. Especially in combat sports.

 

[Goutfather]

It sounds like at that point you test the market. Aka what he did.

And no, a free market should determine most competition, but regulatory guardrails are necessary to correct for inherent power imbalances. Especially in combat sports.

i wasn’t talking about “the market.” i was talking about fighter’s value to the ufc, under their business model. a fighter might be able to command more or less on “the market,” but what the ufc is willing to pay is up to them. as it so happens, ufc usually pays the most for top talent. the impediment to testing the market is usually a contract (read it, don’t sign it if you don’t agree) not some inherent unfairness in the ufc's business model. if the fighter’s contract is up, and they think they’re worth more, of course test free agency. but the ufc is allowed to determine its profitability margins, it’s allowed to determine what it can afford.

“regulatory guardrails” are a joke, just like commissions. they’re all bought off, and they’re just a way to ensure larger companies have less competition. that’s reality.

 

[SaigeVanZant]

Fighters get paid too much as is

 

[Kb7]

Just allow fighters to have their own sponsors again, that would about double everyone's pay.

They already can have their own sponsors.

 

[NoBiasJustMMA]

They already can have their own sponsors.

Not really, if they could they would have a bunch of logos on their shorts and banners like they did before the Reebok deal.

When fighters were able to pick their own sponsors and advertise for them during televised events something like 40-60% of their total earnings generally was from sponsors. Ever since the Reebok deal the amount fighters get from sponsors plummeted.

 

[TIMELESS TRUTH]

Not really, if they could they would have a bunch of logos on their shorts and banners like they did before the Reebok deal.

When fighters were able to pick their own sponsors and advertise for them during televised events something like 40-60% of their total earnings generally was from sponsors. Ever since the Reebok deal the amount fighters get from sponsors plummeted.

Also anecdotal, but I've never once bought any product like Condom Depot just because some random cage fighters had it painted on their backs. Never going to happen.

 

[Bend NvR Break]

Sherdog doesn't understand capitalism or business.

As far as the UFC is concerned there is no fighter pay issues.