Leslie Smith dishes on the UFC's underhanded tactics - interview with Luke Thomas

[tithas]

You have no clue how this works. The UFC will not give them employee status. The fighters must unionize first to be treated fairly. To do so they need 30% of the fighters on board. The fighters are in fear of signing there name because the UFC will fire them if they find out. Once they have 30% then they can go to the NLRB and then it still has to be scheduled. It is a very delicate and scary issue for the fighters. It is not as easy as going to the NLRB snd solving this in 30 mins. Again, highly skilled sports athletes and regular unskilled union jobs are like comparing a $2 ice cream cone to a Kobe beef steak from Japan. Please tell me how old you are so I can stop arguing with children.

IC's cannot unionize. If people cannot even use the proper terminology how can I expect them to understand anything more complex than that.

 

[dim_]

no, Sports is different than a 9-5 union job.
They are obligated to media and fighting.
They have uniform requirements.
They can not preform their job for any other entity besides the UFC
They are treated like employees. But are not given benefits of one.

no.. they arent.

If the UFC said, right. everyone move to Vegas or California. Everyone attend a UFC gym 50 weeks a year, mon-fri, 9 till 5.. 2 weeks holiday..

then you start getting into employee areas..

You think NFL players just turn up on sunday, and do what the fuck they like the rest of the week?



And whats uniform got to do with it..?

Thousands upon thousands of sportspeople who are independent contractorss have uniform policies..

 

[mad55555]

IC's cannot unionize. If people cannot even use the proper terminology how can I expect them to understand anything more complex than that.

wow, you are not right in the head. These are a group of people who have a very restrictive EXCLUSIVE contract with the UFC. The UFC and the UFC alone consider them Independent Contractors. These people can get together and unionize and the UFC only can fire the people under contract before they try to do so. Please tell me your age because you come across as a whiny child.

 

[tithas]

wow, you are not right in the head. These are a group of people who have a very restrictive EXCLUSIVE contract with the UFC. The UFC and the UFC alone consider them Independent Contractors. These people can get together and unionize and the UFC only can fire the people under contract before they try to do so. Please tell me your age because you come across as a whiny child.

No. Only employees can unionize. IC's can establish collective bargaining via a association but that is not a federally protected union. It is vastly different. As long as the UFC does not consider them employees, until they get classified as one (doubtful it ever happens) they cannot unionize in a federally recognized union.

 

[puppybird]

Who the fuck is Leslie Smith anyway

 

[mad55555]

no.. they arent.

If the UFC said, right. everyone move to Vegas or California. Everyone attend a UFC gym 50 weeks a year, mon-fri, 9 till 5.. 2 weeks holiday..

then you start getting into employee areas..

You think NFL players just turn up on sunday, and do what the fuck they like the rest of the week?



And whats uniform got to do with it..?

Thousands upon thousands of sportspeople who are independent contractorss have uniform policies..

Restricting Independent contractors to work only for you in itself is enough to consider them employees. 9-5 and holidays have nothing to do with highly skilled sports athletes employment. Please tell me your age and background because you ignorance on this topic is a waste of my time if I can not have a back and forth intelligent conversation.

 

[eiyuu]

So we got a fighter who is bitter over not being re-signed, and now trying to sue them.

When other fighters tried suing the UFC who were bigger names and had better cases (ie: Randy Couture and Ken Shamrock) they failed miserably.

I don't see this going any better for this one.

 

[ineverpost]

smart move not to fight. I felt before she even held the interview that the 5K offer from Ladd's team was BS. There's no way they have any money to be giving away, and it creates a tax headache if you were going to structure it like that. Smith knows she's not good and had a high probability of losing. Ladd knew she wasn't going to make it, so she quit cutting. That's a clear advantage, and the smart move was to take the higher guaranteed payout. It doesn't take a genius to realize that if you have a bad relationship with your employer and your performance sucks, you're going to get fired.

 

[dmwalking]

Some people really think they're more important than they really are.

 

[BBMN]

Or we think that she should have fought a fighter who was only 1.8 lbs overweight. If she did, she probably wouldn't be out of a job right now.

You're right. I must have just imagined all those posts. Thanks. I could've sworn there was more than one poster on the first page of replies making these statements, but in reality those posts are just figments of my imagination.

My bad.

 

[dim_]

Restricting Independent contractors to work only for you in itself is enough to consider them employees. 9-5 and holidays have nothing to do with highly skilled sports athletes employment. Please tell me your age and background because you ignorance on this topic is a waste of my time if I can not have a back and forth intelligent conversation.

ive been an employer for 20 years.

beyond that, my age and background is none of your business.

 

[mad55555]

ive been an employer for 20 years.

beyond that, my age and background is none of your business.

don't really care about your background or age just to know you are an employer and probably have nothing to do with unique, highly skilled athletes. You can not possibly compare a everyday union job to sports athletes. There needs are way more different than any regular person. I deal with employee/employer contracts and all the facts that I heard about the contracts scream employee. There is no if ands or buts about it. The early zuffa UFC was a little more independent contractor friendly, but still restrictive. so I would think you would not understand about the freedom of american workers should have the rights to be had. number one is no fear of the employer for voicing the employees concerns about being treated fairly.

 

[Timurd123]

I don’t believe for a second that NJAC has any say on what the UFC pays her

What NJAC contract ? Her contract is with WME-IMG, the commission oversees and has absolutely no power in deciding “fighter a missed weight so fighter b gets ____” outside of the standard 20%


I call bullshit

Besides that, non of it is underhanded, she knew 100% what she was doing, knew 2000% her standing within the company when she made her decision

 

[Timurd123]

Well you've just hit the nail on there, they cut her because they don't like her opinions.

That is poor.

It’s poor of her to think otherwise

Go into work and start talking shit about the system and mobilize employees about it, chances are the second they can fire you, they will, chances are they will find a tiny reason to if they really wanted to

It’s not like UFC is some unknown employer, she knew who she was dealing with and made her choice

 

[SCTwins]

In addition, she gave us this brutal finish in the UFC:

Look at that amazing technique. Puts Money Mayweather to shame. UFC should extend her contract indefinitely.

 

[Fahcough]

Most of these WMMA fighters are stealing a living anyway as they are not any good, no one wants to watch them and they are only there for political reasons. Lets not sugar coat it.

If you ever run for Prez, PM me your real name so I can vote for you. 10 second head nod when someone else understands WTF is really going on.

 

[Fraz]

Most of these WMMA fighters are stealing a living anyway as they are not any good, no one wants to watch them and they are only there for political reasons. Lets not sugar coat it.

Boom

 

[Better Every Day]

Most of these WMMA fighters are stealing a living anyway as they are not any good, no one wants to watch them and they are only there for political reasons. Lets not sugar coat it.

LOL !!!

Would you have us believe that Dana White brought Ronda Rousey and WMMA into the UFC because Dana had a liberal/feminist political agenda to do so? Ha ha ha! Or that he was folding to extreme political pressure by feminists/liberals? Ha!

Dana brought Ronda (and WMMA) in because he expected it to make money for the organization. Profit motive, not political motive. Let's not bullshit coat it.

 

[leto1776]

As I've stated before, I've matched Aspen Ladd when she was at the end of her ammy career. She's used this excuse often and it was silly for her to use it again... as if other women don't deal with this same issue all the time.

The UFC was underhanded for sure. Leslie Smith is not "easy to deal with", but that's also called standing up for yourself. This is a woman that fought Cyborg when nobody would. She'll fight her ass off if you respect her... and the UFC just doesn't.

Maybe she was "bloated" in this pic lol.

 

[Hard To Tell]

LOL !!!

Would you have us believe that Dana White brought Ronda Rousey and WMMA into the UFC because Dana had a liberal/feminist political agenda to do so? Ha ha ha! Or that he was folding to extreme political pressure by feminists/liberals? Ha!

Dana brought Ronda (and WMMA) in because he expected it to make money for the organization. Profit motive, not political motive. Let's not bullshit coat it.

Ronda Rousey was a one off, a case of the stars aligning, her being in the right place right time and where the UFC were able to take advantage of the gullibility and stupidity of the general public. But the hype train eventually crashed and burned and after the way it all went down they are never going to manufacture another Ronda Rousey because the whole thing was so OTT and obnoxious. Long term they really shot themselves in the foot. So now they are are stuck with WMMA and I'm sure Dana and WME would get rid it tomorrow if they could but they know if they did, the kind of backlash they would face in today's political climate. They are stuck between a rock and a hard place.

Near enough every MMA fan I know in the real world hates WMMA, thinks it's utter garbage and would prefer it if it wasn't there. Certainly on main event cards anyway. It's only on sherdog do I encounter legions of hardcore WMMA fans, most of whom come across as creepy weirdos to be perfectly honest. Just look at the way viewing figures and PPV numbers are going, people are turning away and substandard WMMA is definitely playing a big part in this. Now if you want to talk about profits you can draw parallels with Hollywood. Yes, of course they want to make money yet they still insist on pushing bullshit political agendas that simply turns people away. Hollywood has year on year been suffering the worst ever years for profits in its history yet they continue to churn out the same garbage that most people don't want to watch. Just because something has been successful doesn't mean this will continue or that the people in charge don't get it wrong.

UFC 224 is coming up which is being headlined by Amanda Nunes vs Pennington and has Mackenzie Dern vs Amanda Cooper on third from the top of the bill. Who in their right mind wants to part with their hard earned money to watch this crap? It's an utter joke and is killing the UFC.