News Fighters including Wanderlei Silva, Shane Carwin, write letters of support for UFC antitrust lawsuit settlement: ‘I desperately need these funds now'

[Rataria]

Sage Northcutt? Cat Zingano? F outta here lol

 

[duke_droese]

There's so many unfair elements in MMA /UFC fighter pay.

The main one is % fighters receive compared to other sports.

The UFC imposes all the negatives of being an employee but skates out of all the positives with the "independent contractor" card.

It's old school Italian mob tactics.

 

[StewDogg11]

Sage Northcutt? Cat Zingano? F outta here lol

Didn’t Sage get his entire face literally broken in ONE?

 

[mkt]

Carwin is surprising. He only had 14 fights and was never KO'd/TKO'd. JDS was the only guy to really land a lot of shots and probably rattle his brains a bit in a lopsided fight. Guys like Roy Nelson and Mark Hunt probably took 100X more damage.

 

[mkt]

Cigano beat the absolute shit out of him. He was a bit too tough for his own good in that one.

True, but Roy Nelson took at least as much damage from JDS and had similar beatings from Stipe, Werdum, Overeem, Arlovski, Barnett and many others.

 

[Pierced7681]

Carwin had like 30 minutes of combined fight time in his entire career, was never KO'd and only ever really took punishment in his final fight. If anything is bothering him in later life its probably the after affects of being roided to shit when he was fighting.

Imo Carwin likely sustained most of the damage during sparring for his fights. Other than the Gonzaga and JDS fights he was never even hit really during his ufc fights.

 

[mkt]

Sad stuff. If you look at Carwin's record, he really had very little fight time. First 11 fights were over in 2 minutes or less, basically. IIRC Gonzaga did rock him pretty good though.

Mir took slightly longer. Brock ended in the 2nd round. And then he had a tough 3 round decision loss against JDS. That's it. Probably under 40 minutes of total fight time (of course I'm sure there was lots of shots in training + he wrestled and played football). Now he's not even 50 and his mental state leaves him unable to work.

I don't think Brock even landed a solid punch, either. Brock took all the damage in R1 then took down and subbed a gassed Carwin quickly in R2. And many of Carwin's wins were quick flash KOs where he barely took any damage.

 

[mkt]

Imo Carwin likely sustained most of the damage during sparring for his fights. Other than the Gonzaga and JDS fights he was never even hit really during his ufc fights.

Maybe, but IIRC he was still working part-time or maybe full-time as an engineer when he fought. I can't imagine him taking nearly the damage in sparring as Chute Box guys (and others) did in hard sparring in the early 2000s.

And like someone else said, he limited his training due to old wrestling injuries. At most, he trained like a part-time fighter for a few years.

 

[wufabufa]

Didn’t Sage get his entire face literally broken in ONE?

What does that have to do with this case against the UFC? He should be suing ONE.

 

[Only Here for Attachments]

What does that have to do with this case against the UFC? He should be suing ONE.

The suit isn't about personal injury, it's about illegal suppression of wages and contract fuckery.

 

[Pancake Sprawl]

it's amazing. the fighter's play victim, they get their lawsuit, and now they're trying to settle without pressing the very company they said has taken basically everything from them?

fighter's are just as much grifters as youtubers, the problem is they're dumber.

 

[StonedLemur]

Among the fighters writing letters of support was Spencer Fisher, who was declared permanently disabled and unable to work from the damage done in a career spent as a professional fighter including 17 fights over 12 years in the UFC.

“While fighting for the UFC, I suffered many significant injuries including broken hands, torn shoulder, torn retina, fused neck, bulging discs, a plastic buckle in my right eye, and many concussions,” Fisher wrote. “I had a right hip replacement in 2021 and am facing a left hip replacement in the near future. I have had two spinal taps that show the presence of the Tau protein which is a positive indicator of dementia. I struggle with problem solving and rationalization skills and get confused easily. I rely on my amazing wife Emily to function in daily living skills. I fear that during my career I have suffered traumatic brain injury (TBI) and am noticing symptoms common with TBI and CTE including depression, mood swings, and irritability. To date, no treatment for CTE has been found. I have been diagnosed permanently disabled by an independent neurologist. I also suffer bouts of vertigo. I experience memory loss and endure frequent headaches.

“This would truly be life-changing money for me and for other members of the class. These funds would ease the burden on my spouse Emily and allow me to obtain healthcare I need and assist my family in paying for basic life necessities. The sad reality is that funds years from now may be of no use to me. I desperately need these funds now.”

UFC Hall of Famer Wanderlei Silva, who spent six years with the promotion after making a name for himself in PRIDE FC in Japan, revealed that he believes he’s dealing with serious brain damage as a result of his fighting career.

With his health compromised, Silva is hoping that the financial relief provided by the lawsuit settlement will help him and his family.

“While fighting for the UFC, I suffered many significant injuries, including concussions,” Silva wrote. “I fear that during my career I have suffered traumatic brain injury (TBI) and am noticing symptoms common with TBI and CTE including depression, mood swings, and irritability…. I suffer from sleep apnea and have difficulty sleeping and breathing. That I can recall, I have had four surgeries on my nose, 1 on my face, 2 on my left knee, 1 on my right knee and 1 on my elbow.

“These funds would also allow me to obtain the healthcare I need and keep a roof over my head and food on my table. The sad reality is that funds years from now may be of no use to me. I can use and enjoy.”

Cung Le, who was one of the founding members of the antitrust lawsuit filed against the UFC in 2014, admitted that he’s nearing bankruptcy and he’s needed to rely on friends to help support him in recent years.

“Due to the strain of my current health limiting my everyday activity from working consistently, I’ve been relying on a friend who, through God’s provision, has generously sponsored my essential needs, including food and shelter, while I await the settlement of this case,” Le stated. “Without this support, I would likely need to file bankruptcy and apply for disability to manage my basic living and healthcare needs.”

Former interim UFC heavyweight champion Shane Carwin wrote in his letter of support that he’s been unable to maintain employment with his engineering degree due to health issues that continue to haunt him long after his fighting career was over.

“Despite having a degree in engineering from the Colorado School of Mines, I have been unable to maintain adequate focus to hold down an engineering job,” Carwin wrote. “I face serious challenges in meeting basic everyday expenses for food, shelter, and transportation and in basic life skills necessary to function.

“These funds would also allow me to obtain the healthcare I need and keep a roof over my head and food on my table. The sad reality is that funds years from now may be of no use to me. I desperately need these funds now.”

Additional fighters providing letters of support for the UFC antitrust lawsuit settlement include Nate Quarry, Ross Pearson, Joe Stevenson, Cat Zingano, Gray Maynard, Matt Brown, Nate Marquardt, Jon Fitch, Chris Leben, Sage Northcutt and many more.

As far as the financial compensation many of the fighters would receive, the brief filed by the plaintiffs laid out the benefits to this settlement, particularly with the increase in funds as part of this new agreement.

“The $375 million all cash recovery provides a swift and significant payment to the Class against the delay, costs, and risks of a trial and appeals. As discussed above, Plaintiffs had initially proposed to allocate 75% of the Prior Settlement to the Le Class (75% of $335 million is $251.25 million), and thus this Settlement would increase the amount going to the Le Class by $123.75 million. Plaintiffs subsequently proposed to allocate 90% of the Prior Settlement to the Le Class (90% of $335 million is $301.5 million), and in that light, this Settlement involves $73.5 million more for the Le Class.

“Under the Settlement, Le Class members would recover (on average), after all fees and costs are deducted, $250,000. Thirty-five Class members would net over $1 million; nearly 100 fighters would net over $500,000; more than 200 fighters would recover over $250,000; over 500 fighters would net in excess of $100,000; and nearly 800 would recover over $50,000. By any reasonable measure, the Settlement, if approved, would put “life changing” cash into the hands of the families of several hundred fighters now.”

When the judge previously issued his denial, he stated that he objected to the settlement because the agreed upon payout seemed low and that the fighters represented in the second lawsuit — covering athletes from 2017 to the present — could object to arbitration and class-action waiver clauses in existing contracts.

Fighters write letters of support for UFC antitrust lawsuit settlement: ‘I desperately need these funds now’

A total of 56 fighters wrote letters of support for the UFC antitrust settlement submitted to the courts and now everyone involved is waiting to find out of Judge Richard Boulware approves the deal

www.mmafighting.com

Had they held out they could've easily received 5 times that amount and been truly taken care of.
When they accepted the first offer given I knew they were fucking themselves, and so did the judge.
They're not making the impact that they said they were going to.

The UFC is laughing at this amount.

 

[Fight Professor]

Carwin was still actively working as an engineer while fighting and that was 13 years ago. Not sure why he would be having money issues.

I don't doubt that some of these guys are having issues but these are copy pasted statements from their lawyers. And some of them are absolute BS, such as Wand having financial problems.

It is stated in the original post that Carwin cannot work as an engineer due to concentration/brain issues.

 

[europe1]

Carwin is surprising. He only had 14 fights and was never KO'd/TKO'd. JDS was the only guy to really land a lot of shots and probably rattle his brains a bit in a lopsided fight. Guys like Roy Nelson and Mark Hunt probably took 100X more damage.

The scary thing about CTE is that its seemingly totally random how durable a person's brain is to it.

Jake LaMotta is legendary for the kinds of beatings he took. Yet the guy stayed lucid to his 90s.

Jerry Quarry died age 53. For the last decade or so he couldn't even remember who his own brother was. Said brother serving as his caretaker since he couldn't feed nor clothe himself either.

 

[skylolow]

Are you telling me that these same fighters who decided getting punched and kicked in the head for quick money was a good idea, now also think that getting a few bucks ASAP is better than holding out for more money, when even the judge is saying they should?

100% spot on.

I think someone behinds scenes might of got few $$$$$ for writing some very sappy letters from some 3 letter org to sway the judge to approve the new settlement.


P.S.: These letters sound like they are going to be getting high six figures and I think I read the old settlement it was going to be like 50K or some thing before uncle sam takes his cut.

 

[wufabufa]

The suit isn't about personal injury, it's about illegal suppression of wages and contract fuckery.

Yeah I was confused about the ONE comment. My bad.

 

[Natural Order]

Breaking!!

Prize fighting has serious consequences.

 

[skylolow]

Edit, I don't understand how health insurances work in the US, I'll admit that, like if someone has their own insurance and pay every month so they are covered if some of these injures happen after a few years.
It is what's most sad about this, milking it or not, the headtrauma. But it kind of comes with the job..? Very unfortune truth. Some get it some don't. Some gets koed 2 times and retires, gets another job.

Healthcare in the US is for profit. Because of this health insurance is crazy expensive for individuals and businesses to provide it. As an example, my wife and I with no health issues her employer pays about 23K a year for our insurance(this isn't covering every thing a 100%, its about 80% but they always try to weasel out of things so reality is they cover probably closer to 65% to 70%) and she pays about $700 a month for that. If your individual who makes say 80K a year and your employer doesn't offer health care you can expect on your own to pay about $500 to $800 a month for similar health insurance. These insurances also have yearly deductibles you must meet in many situations before your insurance pays and that can range from an individual 1.5K to 10K+ with an average around 3K to 6K a year. Some family plans it will be for each individual to meet the deductible or it will be combine amount. Insurance cost is a big part of inflation over the last 15-20years in the US.

Simply put, health care insurance in the US is on path that is unsustainable long term. Over the last 15 or so years many small businesses(under 100 employees) have simply got rid of health insurance because they can't afford to offer it or what they can afford is so shitty that if an employee needed to use they may not be able to afford to use it(deductible is too high for an employee making 50K a year to pay). Even large companies have started policies that they will only cover the employee and not the spouse or kids/some are employee and kids but not spouse. It is very scary to think were health care cost in the US will be in 20 years.

 

[HOLA]

The scary thing about CTE is that its seemingly totally random how durable a person's brain is to it.

Jake LaMotta is legendary for the kinds of beatings he took. Yet the guy stayed lucid to his 90s.

Jerry Quarry died age 53. For the last decade or so he couldn't even remember who his own brother was. Said brother serving as his caretaker since he couldn't feed nor clothe himself either.

There are some videos of Quarry towards the end of his life on YouTube. He was only about 50 and he didn't even know how to sign his own name anymore. His brother was trying to explain a Q to him. Really sad to see.

 

[skylolow]

There's so many unfair elements in MMA /UFC fighter pay.

The main one is % fighters receive compared to other sports.

The UFC imposes all the negatives of being an employee but skates out of all the positives with the "independent contractor" card.

It's old school Italian mob tactics.

All the major sports have gone through this in there respective histories.

UFC will be no different and we are all crazy if we don't think TKO knows that time is coming. Eventually the fighters will unite. Praying out the goodness of TKO's heart that they will all of sudden give them another 20% of the revenues is just a dream and the sooner the fighters realize the sooner they can make a change.