Eddie Alvarez is being sued by Bellator He basically says that he doesn't think they matched UFC's offer at all and if it goes to court the judges will agree with him. source: http://www.mixedmartialarts.com/news/435339/Eddie-Alvarez-I-am-being-sued-by-Bellator/
Bellator is funny. Im all for the growth of MMA. I dont want UFC to be the only big show out there, but ive never been able to get into Bellator.
I'm interested to see what the law says if Bellator is offering the exact same terms as the UFC, but since Bellator has lower ratings and probably lower PPV buys, the event-related pay is likely to be much lower. There have to be similar cases from other industries.
probably UFC just offered alvarez ppv money soo Bellator couldn't match... wait Rebney said that he won't make a problems for alvarez right?
I like watching Bellator, but hate what they do with their fighters. I really hope Eddie finds a way out.
They do not have PPV buys and that is likely the difference...Bellator likely match the 75k/75k numbers (or whatever the UFC offered) however they have no way to match the PPV bonus' they likely offered as well.
Almost the same strategy used by the UFC to Randy back when he wanted to fight Fedor in Affliction. Bellator will just drag this on and on to prevent Alvarez from making it to the big leagues. I doubt if they care at all whether they lose him or not. They just want to give him problems. Then when he comes to the UFC, with all the problems he went through, he might just lose.
as Dana said, ugly. i hope the average dickish sherdogger can now stop with their "he just wants to be a big fish in a little pond" shit now. hey, i can hope.
Great work by the Zuffa hype machine making Bellator look to be some kind of bad guy in all of this. Bellator is just looking out for his interests. I see no foul play, it's Eddie and Ufc that are full of carp.
There is bad blood with Viacom and Zuffa, this semes like its above Bjorn Rebneys pay grade. Im about to watch the interview now but how is this in comparison to what happened with BJ Penn, Tito Ortiz or Hendo?
Bellator may have something in the original matching clause within the contract with Eddie that states they only have to match offers "within reasonable terms to base pay or salary" so on and so forth, determining any PPV revenue or additional monies beyond that salary as having no measurable proven value. Since the UFC can't say they guarantee any PPV pay since Eddie may not be on a PPV or since the amount paid cannot be set ahead of time, so maybe bonuses don't count and Eddie and his lawyer are hoping the other way.
But I believe PPV's are mentioned in the Bellator contract, at least that's my impression from the stories about this.
Here is another article from BE: http://www.bloodyelbow.com/2013/1/7/3847076/eddie-alvarez-sued-bellator-after-they-tried-to-match-ufc-contract-mma Here is a question that I asked Eddie after the MMA Hour on Twitter: Is the UFC going to assist in anyway with either the lawsuit or settlement? Isn't there anything they can do to speed it up? His reply was: i dont think they can do anything but wait
In the interview eddie gave today, he said bjorn as 2 sides to him. He basically said he takes people at their word and unfortunately in the business people lie to you. He didnt go as far as calling Bjorn Rebney a liar but he did say there are 2 sides to him he said he can talk to him like a man and say that looking at the contracts bellator's does NOT match UFC's offer and bellator is turning around and saying YES it is matching. Alvarez says 'its not even close' the numbers are NOT close from anyone's point of view. Eddie was candid in the interview today airing his frustrations, and also indicating he has been acting like a company man for bellator because thats what he felt like he had to do under contract with them, but now he is pulling no punches with them, and you cant tell he has every intention of going to the UFC. It will all come down to money, he said he would resign with bellator if in fact they matched the UFC deal, because he understands his original contract requires him to do so, however he does NOT believe bellator matched and that is why he is being sued... I asked Eddie how long the process would take if he were to just say "fk it" and walk away, and not sign with UFC and not sign with Bellator for the moment and down the road sign with UFC -as in how long is the matching period good for - and he said "about a year" which for a fighter is terribly long time as eddie is entering his prime and this is when he needs to strike to make his largest paydays