This is a contrast that leads to my criticism of Ivan. 45 loves the UFC and Ivan loves to hate it. How can this be construed as a pro and con of Ivan, I have no idea.

Also, your contention that he owes the UFC respect now because he didn’t take a pay cut when the UFC was “hemorraging money” is absurd. He may not have taken a pay cut but he also didn’t jump over to Japan for a bigger pay day, now did he? The UFC has made way more money off of his name than he is made from the UFC.

That is NOT my contention. Obviously, if you can’t get my point, then you make it up. Why didn’t you read my follow up paragraphs rather than take a vice grip on one and take it out of context? I provided you proof on why the UFC gave Randy respect by offering him the fat contract he has, given the fact that Randy was beaten into retirement by Chuck Liddell. Not only do they give him the contract that made Randy a happy man, they also gave him a title fight at HW!!!

Yes, even Randy is surprised at how well he turned out. Regardless of the current situation, the Randy that signed that contract is not the same Randy that is today. He was OVERPAID when he signed it. Now he wants to renege… please! Randy, show the UFC the same respect they showed you when you signed the contract!

Unionization is not only about pay. It’s about power and respect. Right now, all the power is in the hands of the promotion – they have a near monopoly on the sport and negotiate with isolated fighters in secrecy. They have no incentive to treat fighters with respect. Collective bargaining balances the power disparity between promotion and fighters.

Once fighters are united, pay will merely be one of the issues they will be able to address. Fighters will have a say on health insurance, marketing, control over their own image, where to fight, how often to fight, protection against exclusive contracts or other unfair contractual obligations, severance regulation, time off, respectful treatment by the promotion, drug testing, rules, judging, refereeing, the relationships between agents, managers and promoters, etc.

You can be sure that one of their first demands will be full disclosure of fighter pay and regulation of signing bonuses and PPV revenue distribution, and the elimination of locker room bonuses. These practices are meant to keep power in the hands of the UFC management, and keep fighters at the mercy of the promotion.

When 85% of your income is off-the-books, it’s not a bonus, it’s not a gift… it’s an unwritten part of your contract. Then the UFC turns around and makes like it’s an act of charity, that they are “the only company that pays fighters more than their contracts require”. This would never fly in a union environment, in any industry.

- Fighters should never have to fight injured, or feel they are jeapordizing their career by delaying a fight due to injury, or feel pressured to use dangerous drugs in order to perform, like Hermes Franca

- Fighters should have a say in how they are promoted, what their image will be, and full rights over their likeness, and share with the promotion the rights to fight footage

- Fighters should have a say in when/where to fight, so we never have a situation where Dan Henderson’s wife is forced to undergo a procedure to schedule the birth of her child at a convenient time for the promotion

- The promotion should never to coerce fighters into fighting at inconvenient times by disrespecting them in public, as the UFC did to Wanderlei Silva – he just moved to America and changed his life, and they accuse him of ducking Chuck Liddell

- Fighters should have more freedom to fight at different promotions. No promoter has the right to “own” a fighter, as Dana White loves to brag – EVER

- There needs to be a “minimum wage” for undercard fighters

I could go on. These issues are as important, or MORE important than the issue of pay, which everyone is focusing on. I repeat: Unionization is about POWER and RESPECT. Pay is only one facet of that.

Couture, you can do it. Devote your post-fight career to serving other fighters and no one will ever bash you for having a large salary again. Start privately interviewing fighters you trust. Team up with Tito Ortiz and veterans like the Shamrocks and assemble a roster of disgruntled fighters. Develop a unionization plan and a PR strategy and go public when the time is right. NOW IS THE TIME!

The power that baseball players have comes from the fact that they collectively bargain. They unionized to gain this power.

If MMA fighters want power in their negotiations, the answer is a simple one. They aren’t going to get it by attempting to negotiate separately. That answer has NEVER worked for employees attempting to get a bigger share of the profits of their company.

He rails on about the UFC playing games and using ‘PR wars’ and other misleading things…but then he goes and makes this post:

” is anything about Zuffa’s $222 million in gross PPV revenue in 2006″

Hey Ivan, talk about misleading and talking about YOU intentionally using a misleading number of above to help prove your already heavily biased assnine views.

The UFC never saw $222 million. That is the total take, but the UFC never saw that money. InDemand (the consortium that runs the ppv business model) reportedly keeps around 60% of the above figure. So that said, the UFC’s take was quite a bit less than that number. But then again, you knew that, but still intentionally quoted the higher figure, you lied to try and help prove a point.

You are a lying asshole.

You asserted that on the one side you have 45 Hurdle and on the other you have Ivan. This has the appearance of being a paragraph setting up a manner to discuss both sides which is what he charged you with. His interpretation of the sloppy manner in which you structured your argument is not a straw man argument.

“Who the hell in their right mind would offer him that much money after he retired due to two KO losses? Randy, you’re not fooling any one.”

A billionaire that paid big money to a Middleweight to fight a HW?

“Randy is right, it’s about RESPECT. But it’s not Fedor that he feels he’s being disrepected against. It’s Chuck Liddell. Randy feels that he should be paid Chuck’s money since he is obviously the bigger draw. He’s right in that regard. Too bad, Randy is so confused he don’t even know what he’s talking about any more.”

So he’s right that he’s a bigger draw than Liddell but he’s confused that he shouldn’t be compensated for the superior drawing power you state that he has?

The only one that isn’t making any sense is you.

Liddell has lost twice both times very badly; first round KO, tooled to a decision victory by a guy that Dana brought into feed to Chuck. Couture is “Captain America” he puts on good fights, wins against the odds and so has a good story that people can pick up on. There should be absolutely no question that he carries the ppv’s he is on. He obviously feels that he was not treated like the top guy in the company. This is the fault of the UFC it is their job to make their talent happy and to have them want to perform for the company. They obviously failed at that and so it’s their own fault.

Also, your contention that he owes the UFC respect now because he didn’t take a pay cut when the UFC was “hemorraging money” is absurd. He may not have taken a pay cut but he also didn’t jump over to Japan for a bigger pay day, now did he? The UFC has made way more money off of his name than he is made from the UFC.

And the speculation about where he should be and whether he has a justification for being upset is completely fruitless because the UFC operates in a shady manner and doesn’t put it out there for people to see. This leads to criticism for them being cheapskates when the fighters salaries are reported by the state athletic commissions and is now causing them problems because lockeroom talk has led to the belief in discrepancies between payouts. If they want the problems to go away they could simply stop doing things like “shower room” pay outs and report it for everyone to see, instead of expecting people to take their word for things.