Media Former UFC veteran says putting fighters first and paying them what they demand will ruin MMA (look at PFL and Francis)

[TR1]

There should be no such thing as a living wage or any baseline social safety net. You get what you get.
Also, anyone that is dumb enough to be exploited should be exploited to the maximum.

Dogshit society mentality.

 

[Chayanne]

And so fighters like Matt have to end up with brain damage and little money

 

[StewDogg11]

Pride's downfall had nothing to do with how well they paid fighters.

They also rigged fights. Remember that? Should the UFC start paying guys more to take a dive like they did numerous times?

 

[Mohawk Banditó]

They also rigged fights. Remember that? Should the UFC start paying guys more to take a dive like they did numerous times?

No? Thanks for the question. I'm sure there's a non-stupid point in asking it that I just haven't found yet.

 

[GrantB13]

There's definitely room to meet in the middle given the UFC's financials. I don't want these fighters demanding millions and millions to show up to work once a year and I definitely feel like it would change the tone of the sport if fighters got paid as much as some of them are asking.

 

[usernamee]

In DJs video with team Khabib DJ said Bibiano Fernandes never fought in the UFC because they only offered him 15 and (here he told cameraman to turn it off)

so 15 and 15 most likely

that's pretty disgusting.. putting zero respect to the level of fighter that guy was

BUT from their perspective.. they'd be bleeding money out their ass if they kept giving the deserved checks for everyone

 

[Billthebutcher]

Brown sounds like a bitter guy after his unceremonious exit from the UFC.
He takes a lot of pot shots at fighters & orgs for podcasts=his income.

 

[Nathan LaMontagne]

Oh wow... so if one extreme doesn't work, surely the other extreme is the correct choice by default, isn't it? Even a 3 year old having Goldilocks read to them understands that this is illogical.

UFC fighters can absolutely receive reasonable rate of pay so that they can afford to fully dedicate themselves to the sport. This would lead to higher quality fights (and more revenue for the UFC) because many potentially great fighters are not going to risk their livelihood to pursue a career with an extremely low likelihood of success. Even the tippy top MMA fighters make peanuts compared to other sports so why risk it? There's a reason we're not seeing college wrestlers dominate the UFC anymore and it's not a cliche like "the sport has evolved"... it's because you can make a better living using your degree than you can taking a shot at being a D level pro athlete.

It is very hard to believe the hype that we're seeing "the very best fighters of the world" when the majority of the fighters in the top promotion still have full time jobs outside of MMA. However, since the UFC has convinced everyone that they still showcase high quality talent, they can continue underpaying athletes plucked from developing countries and most people won't know the difference.

If you actually need any convincing that the UFC doesn't care about their fighters, remember that they prevent fighters from obtaining lucrative sponsorships of their own and instead, force them to represent sponsorship deals where they are paid pennies on the dollar while the UFC makes hundreds of millions of dollars. Mighty Mouse losing his X Box money so the UFC can shill the horrible Reebok uniforms was next level scum bag behavior and a deliberately malicious move to control fighters. They didn't have to pay a CENT extra to fighters to allow them to get sponsors... they just took money right off of their plates.

Monopolies are never a good thing... but Matt Brown got kicked in the fact for a living so I wouldn't expect him to say anything intelligent

This exactly, the UFC has gone out of their way to effectively LOWER fighter pay without even much benefit to themselves, especially with cutting sponsors. The UFC could easily have gotten the reebok deal without completely removing sponsors and I highly doubt the UFC made as much as the fighters lost.

but Matt Brown got kicked in the fact for a living

If this is a typo then it's the most fitting typo ever.

 

[Tweak896]

Fighter pay increase will go to guys like Jones or Conor, it's going to be like boxing. Guys will make 10M instead of 2M and there will be less prelim fighters. The guys on the posters are the ones who will always have the highest % of pay, everyone under them just basically gets lottery tickets that they can be the next UFC superstar. Boxing is same way. It got to the point in boxing where guys are asking for more money than the event profits, so only the oil Shieks in the middle east are cool with paying the price tag.

It's incredibly disingenuous to compare NFL/NBA/MBL to combat sports. Measure the amount of time they are playing sports on tv per dollar if you really want to make a fair comparison. To even be equal, fighters would spend a season sparring vs opponents every week in headgear to really give the company the same amount of sports content, which in turn would give more frequent advertisers and money.

The sport will naturally scale in time, I think that people bring up good points, but need to slow their roll. Fighters can start a union if they really were done playing the lottery superstar game. This topic has been beaten to death.

 

[skylolow]

Pride's downfall had nothing to do with how well they paid fighters.

Sak himself said he couldn't compete with what the UFC was offering his fighters at the end. Pride's revenue simply couldn't keep up even if the Yakuza stuff didn't sink the ship.

 

[skylolow]

Oh wow... so if one extreme doesn't work, surely the other extreme is the correct choice by default, isn't it? Even a 3 year old having Goldilocks read to them understands that this is illogical.

UFC fighters can absolutely receive reasonable rate of pay so that they can afford to fully dedicate themselves to the sport. This would lead to higher quality fights (and more revenue for the UFC) because many potentially great fighters are not going to risk their livelihood to pursue a career with an extremely low likelihood of success. Even the tippy top MMA fighters make peanuts compared to other sports so why risk it? There's a reason we're not seeing college wrestlers dominate the UFC anymore and it's not a cliche like "the sport has evolved"... it's because you can make a better living using your degree than you can taking a shot at being a D level pro athlete.

It is very hard to believe the hype that we're seeing "the very best fighters of the world" when the majority of the fighters in the top promotion still have full time jobs outside of MMA. However, since the UFC has convinced everyone that they still showcase high quality talent, they can continue underpaying athletes plucked from developing countries and most people won't know the difference.

If you actually need any convincing that the UFC doesn't care about their fighters, remember that they prevent fighters from obtaining lucrative sponsorships of their own and instead, force them to represent sponsorship deals where they are paid pennies on the dollar while the UFC makes hundreds of millions of dollars. Mighty Mouse losing his X Box money so the UFC can shill the horrible Reebok uniforms was next level scum bag behavior and a deliberately malicious move to control fighters. They didn't have to pay a CENT extra to fighters to allow them to get sponsors... they just took money right off of their plates.

Monopolies are never a good thing... but Matt Brown got kicked in the fact for a living so I wouldn't expect him to say anything intelligent

All things that can easily be resolved by the fighters banning together. The UFC is doing what every business does, maximize profits.

It is the natural progression of every sport. Big Bad Corporate makes way too money and eventually the athletes band together. UFC's time will come, just not fast enough for fans.

We are crazy as fans if we don't think for one second the UFC brass doesn't know this day is coming. They are cleaning up while they can. Hell, I won't be surprised if the UFC brass even have a plan in place that if they feel fighters coming together is quickly approaching that they'll spearhead it with some type of much better system then they currently operate on and try to sell that to the fighters.

 

[Ara tech]

Ignorant and foolish because Francis and PFL is an awful example.

The very least for a fair world would be : 50% of the revenue to the fighter, 50% of the revenue to the organization. No more no less.

PFL gave Francis heavy money, a couple of millions away. But did Francis generate those millions back ? Absolutely not.

WHAT PFL SHOUD HAVE DONE : HEY FRANCIS WE PUT YOU ON PPV, WHATEVER YOU GENERATE WE TAKE 50%.
If the numbers are shitty, you take a minimum wage of a few hundreds thousands dollars.

The problem is that it is hard to become a star outside of the UFC, they have 80% of the attention. But that will change by god will.

 

[Mohawk Banditó]

Sak himself said he couldn't compete with what the UFC was offering his fighters at the end. Pride's revenue simply couldn't keep up even if the Yakuza stuff didn't sink the ship.

Wasn't that only after the loss of network deals after the discovery of Yakuza involvement? I think we have to draw a line between the difference of "We failed because we were paying fighters too much" which is what is being posited in this thread vs "We failed because we could no longer pay fighters (because the major income source is gone)."

 

[koa pomaikai]

Wasn't that only after the loss of network deals after the discovery of Yakuza involvement? I think we have to draw a line between the difference of "We failed because we were paying fighters too much" which is what is being posited in this thread vs "We failed because we could no longer pay fighters (because the major income source is gone)."

How is it not all interrelated? Businesses fail due to cash flow problems, the biggest expense for a fighting promotion is fighter pay.

If you can keep fighter pay down to a lower % of revenue, you are solving one of your biggest cash flow problems.

If Pride had less expenses early on, they’d have more cash to tank through tough times.

Do you know how many businesses succeed due to their ability to lower the cost of goods?

 

[skylolow]

Wasn't that only after the loss of network deals after the discovery of Yakuza involvement? I think we have to draw a line between the difference of "We failed because we were paying fighters too much" which is what is being posited in this thread vs "We failed because we could no longer pay fighters (because the major income source is gone)."

They lost it, doesn't really matter outside of killing it quickly instead of slowly.

You have to remember there biggest media deal was reported to be about 20M. By 2008 the UFC's revenue was around 250M, 2009 300M and continues on and on. UFC revenue was just crushing what PRIDE could bring in. If somehow they stuck around chances are they won't be much different than what RIZIN is today.

Sak initially made comments when CroCop left in 2006 that they simply couldn't compete with the UFC's offer and was worried about moving forward when top fighters contracts came up.

Sucked when they went away, but it is what it is. Talking about fighter pay and Pride, they had many of there own strong handed issues back in the day. They were far from fighters first.

 

[Only Here for Attachments]

PRIDE was a different model, though; they weren't (initially) trying to be international. When your one market turns its back on you due to a major societal issue (Yakuza dealings), you're toast.

 

[shunyata]

Pride's downfall had nothing to do with how well they paid fighters.

Yup, Pride fell apart because the Yakuza tried to shakedown Fedor's lawyer / manager and sign Fedor over to them.

He went to the police with everything, the police got Pride's tv broadcast license cancelled and that in turn killed the promotion.

 

[VulcanNervPinch]

Is what he is saying here wrong?

He is spitting facts.

Fact 1) ufc has been the only successful business model in mma.

Fact 2) UFC’s model is to lowball fighters

That's great, except you left out the important fact that completes the picture.

Fact 3) The UFC dominates because it was the first and it uses it's wealth and brand recognition from that headstart to control and crush competition.
It locks fighters into long-term, inescapable contracts, so that other orgs can't accumulate enough fighters to have legitimacy.


If Dana and his overlords felt like paying non-elite fighters better, they'd have no problem doing so, and would still dominate the market via their recognition and immense wealth.

They don't, because they don't feel like it and don't have to.

 

[GordoBarraBJJ]

contender who's just happy to not have to drive for Uber Eats anymore.

Except that they will still, probably, have to have that outside job.

 

[Hannibal Lector]

God mma has the stupidest fans(Matt Brown included).