Fighter Pay

[pTw]

Does that excuse the UFC? Both boxing and MMA need to step it up when paying the prelim and lower card fighters.

That's how the game works bro. Why don't you go complain about people who work low skilled jobs for minimum wage? Do you know how much more money general practitioners make over fast food cashiers? They probably make in a year what the cashiers make will make in 10 years. Do you think that's fair? Fighting at the highest paying level is a sought after position, and you have to bust your ass to get there. Whoever told you life is fair is a damn liar. When you apply for a job, there's countless other people applying for it, when you get it over them guess who doesn't have a job? The other guys who applied for that job you just filled. Is that fair? Fuck no.

Fighting is a high risk, high reward career. Anyone can go out and do it too. There isn't an institution that gives out diplomas and grades fighters based on their performances, these are all things left up in the air, if the audience likes a fighter, they can become a sensation over night, this is part of the game. Do you think it's fair that a guy like Conor McGregor has had more exposure and probably has more fans and is likely making way more money than a guy like Matt Mitrione, who has been with the UFC for 4 years now? UFC fighters have it pretty good man, they have accidental insurance so if they're training for a fight and get injured, all their shit is covered, they have the potential to make 50k bonuses given they put on a good performance when they fight, they receive undisclosed payments, and they have the ability to become superstars if they're talented...wtf more do you want? Seriously...you don't even need a high school education to do this, do you understand how big of an opportunity this is for people? Yet they complain about fighters at the bottom of the totem pole getting shafted? What the hell is wrong with you people?

 

[dragonclaw]

UFC 100: With the PPV revenues and gate combined the total take was $77 million dollars. Now let's say the cable and satellite companies took half of that. That leaves $38.5 million before advertising revenue or anything else.

What was the total reported fighter purse? Less than $2 million. Where the fuck is all that other money going? Because I tell you what there are UFC fighters making shit money. Literally close to minimum wage if you counted their training hours. The math just doesn't add up for the UFC apologists on this one.

Here's what the UFC does.

They offer fighters something called contracts, which tells them this is how much you will get paid when you fight. The fighters say OK I agree, and sign on.

The UFC then puts their own money into promoting these fighters, advertising their brand and events, hoping for what? You guessed it, a big pay day. They are putting up their own money on the line to promote events. Do they know how much they are going to get back in return? No. It's a gamble.

Did they know how much UFC 100 was going to pull in? No.

Your logic makes sense if this one a one-off event. For example if the UFC can say hey we're going to put on this event, pull in 15 million dollars in profit after all is said and done. So we're going to keep XXX amount, and divvy up the rest to the fighters to pay them fairly. But guess what? The game doesn't work like that.

You guys only see the small picture, you say hey the UFC just pulled in this amount of money, see the fighter payouts, and say hey something is wrong.

You fail to see everything else just so you can make your point.

If a fighter isn't happy with their pay, then only they have the power to change things. They can either become a better entertainer, win the fans over, and work their way to the top, where the big money is, or they should shut their trap and go do something else with their life. These fighters are bitching and complaining after they agreed to get paid a certain amount, which obviously they were satisfied with or they wouldn't have signed, and then after they see how much the UFC is making their crying foul. What if the UFC was losing money? Would they agree to have their pay decreased? Haha, I doubt it.

 

[FrankieNYC]

UFC 100: With the PPV revenues and gate combined the total take was $77 million dollars. Now let's say the cable and satellite companies took half of that. That leaves $38.5 million before advertising revenue or anything else.

What was the total reported fighter purse? Less than $2 million. Where the fuck is all that other money going? Because I tell you what there are UFC fighters making shit money. Literally close to minimum wage if you counted their training hours. The math just doesn't add up for the UFC apologists on this one.

It has been said zillions of time, the numbers reported are not what a lot of fighters leave with
Randy Couture's contract that went public proved that
This was his added salary

Less than 100,000 buys: No money
100,000-175,000 buys: $1.00/buy
175,000-300,000 buys: $1.50/buy
300,000-330,000 buys: $2.00/buy
Over 330,000 buys: $3.00/buy

He got $3 per PPV buy after 330k, you know Brock & GSP were in that area as well (if not more)

Let's say Brock & GSP had same deal:
They both made about $3m in bonuses alone
Add in Mir & Fitch, etc & they paid out a lot more

This has been discussed a lot in the MMA community, just so many refuse to believe it to further an anti-UFC agenda

 

[Swiftmayhem]

No they don't.

Unless you have numbers to back up anything, please don't speak on things you know nothing about.

You guys always compare the UFC to every other sport but you don't have any evidence or support to back up your reasoning of why fighter pay should be more than it is.

I think we can all agree that the UFC is nowhere near the level of where the NFL is, in terms of popularity and profitability. Since the majority if the gripe you whiners have is with the smaller name fighters, let's compare the lowest paid NFL athletes to the lowest paid UFC athletes.

Minimum salary for NFL player is $300K a season, which requires the player to compete in 16 regular season games (mind you, this isn't including pre-season, play-off and time practicing but that's part of the salary as well), the average pay for an NFL athlete is roundly around $18K a game.

Again, the NFL is 10x more popular and profitable than the UFC.

The UFC pays it's fighters $6K fight, $6K win.

You do the rest of the math and somehow come up with a reasonable answer of why UFC fighters aren't being paid enough. I'm going to assume your answer will be something along the lines of "well that just means the NFL players need to be paid more as well".

So 12k is fair for months of training, travel, preparation and a 3 round fight? They're lucky if they even break even. You have guys like Matt Riddle who can't afford to be an MMA fighter, so he retired. That shouldn't happen in any sport. Jon Fitch considered retirement while in the UFC. Numerous fighters have talked about the low wages they get, but are unable to do anything about it because they have no union to fight for them.

 

[Chi-City]

So 12k is fair for months of training, travel, preparation and a 3 round fight? They're lucky if they even break even. You have guys like Matt Riddle who can't afford to be an MMA fighter, so he retired. That shouldn't happen in any sport. Jon Fitch considered retirement while in the UFC. Numerous fighters have talked about the low wages they get, but are unable to do anything about it because they have no union to fight for them.

Matt Riddle lost 125,000 cuz he couldn't pass two piss test for weed. Also Jon Fitch might wanna talk to his buddy Kos because he seem to be doing well.

 

[FrankieNYC]

So 12k is fair for months of training, travel, preparation and a 3 round fight?.

Yes, if you are in the opening bouts.
Those fighters are not adding to the revenue.
It is their chance to shine & then move up the cards & make better money

 

[Joshy6442]

some of you sherdoggers are the worst fucking "fans" I have ever seen. It's no wonder that fighters stop coming by here.

It's purely my opinion but I think most of the ufc fighters get paid dogshit overall. Especially when you considers the ufc's ridiculously high sponsor tax.

I think it's fucking nonsense that you can only make money if you're top 5, even if you're in the premiere fighting organization in the word. A lot of you zuffa-siders say "well, the lower paid fighters should just get a normal job if the ufc pays so little" like you have no problem of a talented athlete good enough to be in the ufc having to give up his passion just because the ufc pays so little that it's actually financially detrimental to work for them, especially considering that the ufc has the money to double or even triple the base fighter pay.

when you consider that the ufc is pretty much the nfl of mma, 6k to show, 6k to win is pretty goddamn pathetic.

 

[FrankieNYC]

when you consider that the ufc is pretty much the nfl of mma,

You are insane to compare the two
NFL brings in an insane amount of revenue - 9 billion a year
UFC was reported at about 500 million in 2012

That is 1/18 or about 5.5%

What else you have?

 

[MMA Fan 505**]

I'm sure Mayweather is jumping at the chance to get a disclosed pay of $250K but a super duper secret locker room bonus of $39.7 million dollars.

If Dana White was paying the fighters well, he would be the first to tell us about it because he loves to toot his own horn, but he only says there's secret pay but won't give a number because they aren't getting paid that well.

 

[Chi-City]

I'm sure Mayweather is jumping at the chance to get a disclosed pay of $250K but a super duper secret locker room bonus of $39.7 million dollars.

If Dana White was paying the fighters well, he would be the first to tell us about it because he loves to toot his own horn, but he only says there's secret pay but won't give a number because they aren't getting paid that well.

Randy Couture took the UFC to court and they open the books to show his payouts how did that work out for him again?

 

[eiyuu]

Yeah cuz when you see injustice you should just stfu and ignore it. That's how things have gotten accomplished throughout history.

A person agreeing on a contract to fight for a certain amount of money and getting paid that amount of money is not injustice.

If they were forced to sign that contract at gunpoint--then that would be injustice.

Free will to sign or not sign a contract is just fine and dandy to most normal thinking individuals.

 

[Chute Boxe SP]

Who cares, this is such a foolish thread. They aren't forced to fight, they choose to. If they feel boxing makes more money, focus on boxing. If they feel neither make enough, go to college. Tired of hearing people cry for pro-athletes. Been a Marine for 18 years and people say this crap to me all the time and I say the same thing, if I was unhappy with the pay I could have always got out.

Ex-fucking-actly! Well said.

 

[MilesAbove]

^^^ And for the 900th time, enough with the "They aren't forced to fight" argument. Nobody is saying they are. Elite craftsmen should be paid properly. Not being paid enough to focus on the craft while the company continues to make millions upon millions per showcase is what some have a problem with. Focus on that if you're going to make an argument. Don't create strawman.

some of you sherdoggers are the worst fucking "fans" I have ever seen. It's no wonder that fighters stop coming by here.

It's purely my opinion but I think most of the ufc fighters get paid dogshit overall. Especially when you considers the ufc's ridiculously high sponsor tax.

I think it's fucking nonsense that you can only make money if you're top 5, even if you're in the premiere fighting organization in the word. A lot of you zuffa-siders say "well, the lower paid fighters should just get a normal job if the ufc pays so little" like you have no problem of a talented athlete good enough to be in the ufc having to give up his passion just because the ufc pays so little that it's actually financially detrimental to work for them, especially considering that the ufc has the money to double or even triple the base fighter pay.

when you consider that the ufc is pretty much the nfl of mma, 6k to show, 6k to win is pretty goddamn pathetic.

See, whitebelt gets it. MMA has some eye-rolling levels of fans. But I say it often.... most MMA fans are horses.

 

[Bigj383]

Fighters who have pulled over 1,000,000 for a single fight.
Randy Couture
Chuck Liddell
Tito Ortiz
Rampage Jackson
Rashad Evans
Anderson Silva
Georges St. Pierre
Brock Lesnar
Alistair Overeem
BJ Penn
Nick Diaz
Jon Jones

Others who most likely have
Cain Velasquez
JDS
Forrest Griffen
Lyoto Machida