DJ to DC about fighting TJ: If I got the same paycheck you did....then it's a whole different story

[lsa]

Fighting the most obscure? WTF LMAO. He's fought every single guy in his division. How is it his fault that he is small or that the division is shallow or that he outclasses his competition every single time. He has done what a champion should do.

I cant help comparing it to Cyborg.
Some how being too big for the division, fighting smaller fighters refusing to go down in a weight class with competition makes her the GOAT.

Sherdog...

 

[Blayt7hh]

in what world does MM think he would get the same paycheck as fucking DC?

He didn’t say he would. He said he wasn’t going to do what the UFC wanted unless he did though. Seems fair to me

 

[randumo24]

I cant help comparing it to Cyborg.
Some how being too big for the division, fighting smaller fighters refusing to go down in a weight class with competition makes her the GOAT.

Sherdog...

That's just a bad comparison. She's just too big to make 135. They had videos of her trying to make the cut and she looked like she was literally going to die at 140. Sometimes it's not a matter of refusing. Besides, if we're talking about superfights with her, Ronda absolutely should have went up to fight her. Ronda fought at 145 her whole career until the strikeforce title fight.

 

[MikeMcMann]

Right, and my point is that there's a discrepancy between how things are actually run and how they act like it is run. If revenue is all that matters, why do they ever bring up titles, legacies, legitimacy, and so on? Because they have to maintain this illusion of a legitimate sports league to maintain their extremely favorable position over the fighters. I can accept that championships, defenses, everything but revenue is irrelevant to their bottom line. I can't accept them waffling on that, or this idea that these things should be meaningful to everyone (especially the fighters) but them. It's almost like if WWE got to run things based on what happens in the show they write.

As it is, they get to have their cake and eat it, too. They get to say there's a standard for the UFC, that championships matter, that wins matter, but also get to contradict that whenever it benefits them. They've set up a system that allows them a free pass at the expense of the fighters. "We can't do that, it doesn't make us money" and "We can't do that, it doesn't make sense rankings wise/championship legitimacy, and on and on" should be mutually exclusive, or else there's virtually nothing keeping them from doing whatever they want. And if they wanted to do whatever they want, to the extent that the AC's would allow, anyway, that would be totally fine with me. Just pick a side and go with it. I'm just a single fan and don't matter but jesus christ, that's got to be incredibly insulting to and frustrating for fighters who do business with them, especially the ones who've done everything right, won, broke records, etc.

These things are not mutually exclusive.

The ideal situation for the UFC is when they have a popular fighter or champ who has titles, legacies, legitimacy, and so on that they can promote and WHO ALSO a big draw. Reality is a fighter or champ can have all those things and not be a draw or fighter who is not a champ may have none of those things and be a draw. In the end, again is not the specific reasons why you are a draw, even if they would prefer it was their champions with titles, legacies, legitimacy, and so on, as what matters is how much money they can make off you. That is the one contestant thing across any and all reasons they might promote and pay a fighter well, champ or no champ.

 

[MikeMcMann]

That's just a bad comparison. She's just too big to make 135. They had videos of her trying to make the cut and she looked like she was literally going to die at 140. Sometimes it's not a matter of refusing. Besides, if we're talking about superfights with her, Ronda absolutely should have went up to fight her. Ronda fought at 145 her whole career until the strikeforce title fight.

Cyborg was told she was getting a title shot at 135lbs when she was weighing 160lbs lean and fighting at 140lbs when she first came to the UFC. She then roided up quickly to 170/5 lbs lean and was still making weight at 140lbs.but started crying she could not make 135lbs and needed Ronda to move up to fight her.

So no, as much as I dislike Ronda (and I really, REALLY do) she was absolutely right not to move up to fight Cyborg who was ONLY looking to gain a massive size advantage via Roids with her being massive while cutting to 140lbs.

 

[Nate Dogg]

In the world where he holds the title for record title defenses.

Funny, because most fans won't even revere that accomplishment when he retires. Roids or not, Silva will be the king with most legit title defenses. DJ fought even tinier manlets like Ray Fucking Borg

 

[Gorkle]

How would you know that? The traditional revenue streams that the UFC has relied on for years aren't the only ones available now. They aren't even the biggest. Check out of FrankieNYC's threads; that should show you that despite meager buys and gates this year, the UFC continues to rake it in, and it has everything to do with cutting costs. Fighter pay is significant part of costs.

Yes, the UFC continues to rake it in.

That is not due to everyone going mental for the next MM fight, if anything it is despite a complete lack of interest in what should be one of the biggest draws, but instead of choosing to fight elite competition is happy to sit and fight Ray Borg and friends and then gets confused when noone cares.

 

[MescalineDreams]

Can't really blame DJ. He's not fighting to please us sherdoggers. It's his career, his family, and his finances. He's obviously not ducking TJ, but I do think he's chosen to not budge to the UFC demands - and the UFC has a pretty damn good track record of being cunts, especially in the WME-IMG-era.

It seems to be a question of him standing his ground instead of accepting peanuts to fight another champion from a higher weight-class.

smart man

 

[randumo24]

Cyborg was told she was getting a title shot at 135lbs when she was weighing 160lbs lean and fighting at 140lbs when she first came to the UFC. She then roided up quickly to 170/5 lbs lean and was still making weight at 140lbs.but started crying she could not make 135lbs and needed Ronda to move up to fight her.

So no, as much as I dislike Ronda (and I really, REALLY do) she was absolutely right not to move up to fight Cyborg who was ONLY looking to gain a massive size advantage via Roids with her being massive while cutting to 140lbs.

Oh please, don't even pretend like Ronda wasn't the one avoiding the fight. Cyborg was not avoiding the biggest payday of her career to fight someone she would have easily beaten.

 

[PapaBherd]

Yes, the UFC continues to rake it in.

That is not due to everyone going mental for the next MM fight, if anything it is despite a complete lack of interest in what should be one of the biggest draws, but instead of choosing to fight elite competition is happy to sit and fight Ray Borg and friends and then gets confused when noone cares.

Way to miss the point. You honestly think that the UFC would continue with FlyW if they didn't continue to make money off of the only recognizable figure in that division? They've even introduced two new classes that are even bigger disasters. That should show you the value the UFC sees in these niche divisions, but why do that when you can bury your head in the sand?

 

[anuscakes]

Funny, because most fans won't even revere that accomplishment when he retires. Roids or not, Silva will be the king with most legit title defenses. DJ fought even tinier manlets like Ray Fucking Borg

Silva's reign has an asterisk beside it though.

 

[Gorkle]

Way to miss the point. You honestly think that the UFC would continue with FlyW if they didn't continue to make money off of the only recognizable figure in that division? They've even introduced two new classes that are even bigger disasters. That should show you the value the UFC sees in these niche divisions, but why do that when you can bury your head in the sand?

Of course they continue to make money from it. By paying fighters their worth in what they will generate for the UFC.

Hence not giving fighters like MM huge paychecks.

 

[randumo24]

 

[MikeMcMann]

Oh please, don't even pretend like Ronda wasn't the one avoiding the fight. Cyborg was not avoiding the biggest payday of her career to fight someone she would have easily beaten.

Cyborg ONLY wanted the fight the way Cyborg takes fights. She did not want to face Ronda with only a 10lb weight advantage or so which is all she would have had if she stayed at 160lbs and had cut to 135lbs as she was given the chance to. She would have come into that fight around 155lbs and Ronda would be around 145lbs. So Cyborg absolutely ducked that fight. Not enough of an edge.

When offered the fight she immediately then ramped up her special breakfast juice and pushed her lean weight up to about 175lbs and started crying that making 135lbs would kill her and Ronda needed to move up. that was because Ronda would still enter the fight around 145lbs but Cyborg could be around 165lbs in cage for a 20lb difference. The only way Cyborg wants to fight someone.

So I again say Cyborg ducked the fight quite deliberately. She had just come to the UFC and had the biggest fight of her career offered to her. She said yes and then gained a ton of muscle so she could not take it and started to call Ronda to move up so she could have a huge advantage. That is ducking and no one should reward Cyborg for such crap. She should have lost the extra muscle mass and moved back down if she wanted the fight.

Imagine if she was the one to break Ronda instead of Holm. She missed out being afraid to fight someone without the huge size advantage.

 

[Shocktagon]

These things are not mutually exclusive.

The ideal situation for the UFC is when they have a popular fighter or champ who has titles, legacies, legitimacy, and so on that they can promote and WHO ALSO a big draw. Reality is a fighter or champ can have all those things and not be a draw or fighter who is not a champ may have none of those things and be a draw. In the end, again is not the specific reasons why you are a draw, even if they would prefer it was their champions with titles, legacies, legitimacy, and so on, as what matters is how much money they can make off you. That is the one contestant thing across any and all reasons they might promote and pay a fighter well, champ or no champ.

Those two things can exist in one fighter, absolutely. Of course they want a fighter who can accomplish great things and is marketable enough (because of or in addition to that) who warrants being paid the big bucks, since they get to say, "This is the apex of MMA. Come here, prove you're the best in the world, and get paid like it." That is the illusion of a legitimate sports league that they're peddling but, as you say, what ultimately matters is the ability to sell their shows, which results in the mutual exclusivity between the UFC's valuation of those great accomplishments and their valuation of the ability to sell the UFC product.

How can UFC logically say, "This is the Super Bowl of MMA. Your accomplishments and fighting ability matter" and have that mean anything at all (especially to the extent that they hype it up to mean) when in the same breath they can say, "but your inability to get people to care about you and buy shows dictates how we will pay and treat you"? They can't. Those two things cannot be true because the latter immediately and thoroughly invalidates the former whenever they damn well please. Championships, wins, rankings, title defenses, and all of those things are currency with value determined solely by UFC and that value dips near or to nil whenever they want it to. That's why they can say, "Highest level of MMA, bro, world champions, title defenses" then turn around and hire someone at better pay than most of their talent despite a severe and utter lack of any professional experience.

That brings this back to Demetrious Johnson and their position towards fighters in general. Here's someone with 11 defenses, undefeated for almost 7 years, highlight reel finishes, OTN bonuses, never gets in trouble, has picked up a fight to give a card a headliner, has called out of very few fights in his entire career, and is an all around consummate professional. They want to say none of that matters because he can't bring in enough viewers to warrant the money he's asking for? That's fine. That's how they run things. Wonderful, so don't turn around and dangle the prospect of big money in front of others who are less tenured, less accomplished and tell them to work their way towards it via things you've established don't mean anything. That's UFC getting to play both sides.

And this straddling the fence on something that should be mutually exclusive is how they get to dick fighters around in other ways. It's what gives them basis to hire CM Punk but say Ben Askren isn't UFC worthy, give Gustafsson a title shot after getting knocked the fuck out but deny a surging Ryan Bader, let Mousasi walk but keep Hector Lombard on, just to give some recent examples. These things, and all that happens because UFC has given themselves the ability to play both sides of the contradictory system they've established, add a ton of nuance to the argument of "that's how business works," nuance that UFC doesn't want to own up to. It's a system under which the UFC can't lose or do anything wrong because they have an ace up their sleeves any time they lie or contradict at the expense of a fighter. It's a bullshit system.

 

[Based Akali]

he said he disagreed with the fight in his statement for multiple reasons. it's not a narrative, it's his own words

You can disagree and still accept the fight, which is what happens when two fighters agree on terms like DJ and TJ didn't, but apparently asking for compensation in the tune of 0 dollars is too much for the UFC. That is unless they knew TJ couldn't make weight and were trying to force a senseless fight from the start.

The more you know.

 

[CRuck1980]

You can disagree and still accept the fight, which is what happens when two fighters agree on terms like DJ and TJ didn't, but apparently asking for compensation in the tune of 0 dollars is too much for the UFC. That is unless they knew TJ couldn't make weight and were trying to force a senseless fight from the start.

The more you know.

he said Dana threatened to close the division and he told him to go ahead and close it. He chose that instead of fighting. his words not mine

 

[Based Akali]

he said Dana threatened to close the division and he told him to go ahead and close it. He chose that instead of fighting. his words not mine

He called a companies bluffed and they backed down, again keep your narrative going. It's funny how Sherdog wants slaves that don't stand up for themselves as fighters. Bunch of entitled people you are.

 

[CRuck1980]

He called a companies bluffed and they backed down, again keep your narrative going. It's funny how Sherdog wants slaves that don't stand up for themselves as fighters. Bunch of entitled people you are.

You have no room to call someone entitled when you make a slave comparison