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Quote of the week

By Zach Arnold | November 2, 2007

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On the next edition of Fight Opinion Radio, we discuss the masterful job of public relations that Zuffa has done in the last week in regards to their contractual dispute with Randy Couture. As I argued in my latest Bloody Elbow column, the mainstream media focus and portrayal of Randy Couture right now is of an athlete who’s money hungry and has a Terrell Owens-sized ego.

With that in mind, a quote from The Bleacher Report:

More importantly the last thing that many MMA fans want is for the fighters to turn money hungry. Every other sport, especially baseball, has seen this happen. The athletes do not participate for “love of the game” but rather for “love of the money.” That will ruin MMA for what it is. Soon enough only the fighters who do not care what they get paid will be fighting. In that case goodbye good matches, hello the end of MMA.

Topics: Media, MMA, UFC, Zach Arnold | 26 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |

26 Responses to “Quote of the week”

  1. JP says:

    Couture is money-hungry. Good riddance. Randy

  2. garth says:

    PR it is indeed. Seems more like Randy took a stand that they org was making hundreds of millions and paying a relatively tiny fraction to the people who made fans buy PPVs. Do you buy an event featuring Couture because it was produced by Zuffa? Doubtful.

  3. JP says:

    He made millions too. He made more than any other fighter in the org, but he wanted more…

  4. Michaelthebox says:

    Garth, would you buy a bodog PPV if it had Couture? You’d be one of the few people in the world to do so.

  5. Zack says:

    I wish Randy would’ve resigned before I lost $250 betting on Gonzaga šŸ™

  6. jeff aka whaledog says:

    Yeah, we wouldn’t want the fighters to get money hungry and demand their fair share of the profits they generate. That would be terrible.

  7. Zack says:

    I think the money issue just kills the up and comers and the top level talent that doesn’t draw. Generally, the Titos, Chucks, Randys, Fedors, Cro Cops, Nogs, etc will get paid a good wage. There will also always be dudes willing to fight for peanuts. The problem is the disappearing “middle class” of elite fighters like the Sakurais, Hansens, and Kawajiris. Look at the Bushido 9 GP (generally regarded as one of the greatest MMA events of all time.) Most of the LW competitors have been locked out since Pride folded.

  8. jeff aka whaledog says:

    “I think the money issue just kills the up and comers and the top level talent that doesnā€™t draw. Generally, the Titos, Chucks, Randys, Fedors, Cro Cops, Nogs, etc will get paid a good wage.”

    Guys who don’t sell tickets will never make a ton of money. The guys who sell a lot of tickets, however, deserve to be rewarded for the income the generate.

    ===============

    Also . . .

    I am waiting for the day when one of these idiot writers makes a column saying money is ruining MMA, therefore the UFC should only charge $10 for PPVs.

    I don’t understand why it’s a bad thing when fighters get ‘greedy” but its perfectly acceptable for the UFC to rake in hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue.

  9. The Gaijin says:

    These money hungry fighters ruining mma, thank god there’s Zuffa here to save the day…you know running the UFC for the charity of the fans.

    All for a low, low affordable price off $40/PPV ($50 in HD).

  10. cyphron says:

    Funny. When the fighters get paid more, do you think it’s coming out of the UFC’s coffers? No, it’s coming out of the fan’s. The day top fighters get 3 mill a fight is the day that PPV is $50 or more. The UFC will make money, one way or another. Fighters make more, the UFC doesn’t make less. That’s a lesson we should all learn.

    Excuse me if I don’t shed a tear for these millionaires. Quite frankly, I’m sick of everyone who think that fighters “deserve” to get paid more just because all these other athletes are paid a ridiculous amount of money. How much money do you really need to live today anyway? Why are we so conditioned to believe that atheletes deserve multi-million dollar deals? Just because A-Rod gets paid $25 mil to hit a ball doesn’t mean that MMA fighters should as well. If you argue for the under card fighters, I can understand. But cry me a river if you think the Coutures, Titoes, and Liddells should earn more. All athletes and entertainers should be paid LESS not MORE.

  11. The Gaijin says:

    There’s maaybe 3 fighters who could claim to have become millionaires under the Zuffa umbrella bro…give your head a shake.

    And whether you think they should make more or less money is not the point, the market is dictating that the fighters be making a lot more; however there is one entity which is managing to keep its hand on the throttle of salaries as profits sky rocket.

    NO ONE is saying fighters should make $25M/year – but they are saying that the fact that profits are going thru the roof and have been sustaining their upward trend, there seems to be little trickle down to the fighters.

  12. Bryan says:

    Also, no one is crying over the UFC not paying him millions of dollars per fight. That is within their right. However, it also within in his right to not put his body on the line and perform for them if he feels the compensation is inadequate.

  13. Zack says:

    Jeff, I wasn’t disagreeing with you, just stating my disappointment that a lot of top level MMA fighters have been locked out for the last 9 months or so.

    Hansen going back to Shooto. Sakurai doing Shootbox. No news on Kawajiri? Total bummer.

  14. lynchman says:

    Gaijin,

    I know for a fact that several fighters are currently millionaires as a result of fighting in the UFC: Couture, Ortiz, Jackson, Liddell, Shamrock, Gracie and Hughes have all had million dollar paydays in the UFC. Not over the span of a year, but for one fight.

    Others have made over a million in the course of a year. Ask Rich Franklin if he has seen any extra coin, I know he has. Rich Franklin, under his current contract, has taken home over one million. I know of two 300k paydays he has had. GSP? He has had at least two six figure paydays that I know of.

    Hell, Tyson Griffin has made an extra 100+k in FotN and SotN bonuses alone. Tyson made 64k for his win over Taraves.

    Sean Sherk pointed out that his suspension could cost him as much as 500k in fight money and endorsements.

    The market is dictating SOME fighters get more. You are worth whatever you can get.

    Paul BuenTello has shown that. His deal pays him more than most companies would because he is a Cali fighter and thus has more value to Strikeforce.
    Just like several Japanese fighters are looking at nice deals from K-1. They are the hometown heroes and will make more there.

    Mirko got a huge signing bonus because that is what it took to get him to jump to the UFC.

    If Gilbert Melendez does sign with the UFC, it will be because they offer more than Strikeforce or Pro-Elite.

    Guys like Franklin and GSP are going to see their pay shoot up as their contracts expire.

    For UFC 76. 13 of 18 fighters made five figures. Are they rich? No, but clearly the average fighter pay is going up.

    The lowest paid fighter is 3k right now. Hopefully that goes up to 5k. That is more than many of the UFC debuting fighters would get on other shows, but the UFC can certainly afford to make the starting pay 5+5.

    Regarding the “P.R.” surrounding Randy Couture. Randy screwed himself. At his planned press conference, he gave out numbers that were incorrect.

    He misrepresented his UFC 68 pay by 400k. That hurt him big time. Ignore the rest of it and look at that. This was not an off the cuff answer to a question, this was a prepared statement. He said the wrong thing and the UFC jumped on it.

  15. cyphron says:

    Gaijin,

    I believe the undercard fighters should be paid more. The top fighters don’t need to be paid any more than they are now. Considering the fact that anyone can lose at any time in MMA. This is a bad precedent. If Silva, Rampage, et. al start pulling this crap, we can all kiss MMA goodbye and say hello to boxing.

    Bryan,

    I agree with you. But it is not within their right to walk out on a contract because they feel the compensation is inadequate.

  16. The Gaijin says:

    Lynch,

    Gracie and Shamrock made their fortunes under the SEG umbrella of UFC and to a greater extent hawking their legends in Japan – to credit that to Zuffa is quite misguided. Jackson made a shitload of money in PRIDE before he ever stepped foot in the octagon.

    These three in particular never would have been offered the money they were offered had they not brought the clout they already possessed to the bargaining table. It basically came down to the fact that they wouldn’t have gotten them if they didn’t shell the cash out – they would have all been getting offered 30+30 if they already werent proven commodities…I think we’re talking apples and oranges on that one.

    Rich Franklin makes $45,000/fight – no one knows what he makes in bonuses but apparently its less than Couture was getting (a) on a raw scale and (b) on a %age. So where you’re getting that he’s pulling in “millions” is somewhat mysterious to me – maybe I’m missing something however. How much is attributed to sponsors and how much is coming out of the profits that are being pocketed by his employer?

  17. white ninja says:

    the point is despite the PR – its all about $$$ for both UFC and Randy

    you cant expect fans to support either of them (its hard to get righteous about arguments about who gets more of your hard earned) and its something that is best handled behind closed doors as both are damaged by it.

    unfortunately, for randy, his amateur hour efforts at PR have and will damage him more than the UFC who, lets face it, live and die from PR, so, well…. they’re sort of good at it

  18. lynchman says:

    G,

    Gracie and Shamrock each had contracts that gave them a ppv percentage. Hughes was also given portion for his bout with Gracie. The Gracie/Hughes bout and Ortiz/Shamrock II did enough buys that all parties involved took home over a million.

    Franklin, as champ, has had at least two 300k paydays. That is simply what Zuffa paid him, not the sponsors. Meltzer publicly confirmed that Franklin made around 300k for the Loiseau bout, and I know he made similar money for the Silva lose. I don’t what he got for 68, but he has made over one million on his current contract, not for one night, but overall.

    Rich has been well paid beyond his contract.

    Trust me, several fighters have ended up making over a million in fight pay. GSP and Hughes each did very well for their title bout, as did GSP/Penn and Hughes/Penn.

    Regarding Jackson: He is making more now than he did in Pride. Rampage never made millions in Japan. We can dispense with this myth that Pride was paying millions. Rampage left for more money, Mirko left for more money, Nog left for more money and Werdum left for more money. We have seen what these guys are getting so that gives you an idea of what they were making overseas.

    Most of the UFC main eventers end up making a bonus based on the success of the shows. Guys like Jackson and Karo have mentioned getting bonuses (Karo for the Burkeman bout). I am talking about the guys that do not have a cut of the ppv. Are these bonuses millions? No, but they often in the six figures.

    Randy did confirm that discretionary bonuses are regularly paid after shows. He mentioned getting 500k after the Liddell bout because it was such a big bout for the UFC. It was after that bout that this became more common. That was UFC 57 and UFC 58 (Franklin/Loiseau, Penn/GSP) did better than they expected and this resulted in those fighters getting bonuses.

    This has been reported by Metlzer and I have spoken to some (and camp members of some) that have done better than reported.

  19. Misrepresented and then some. We still don’t know anything about the “substantial” locker room bonuses. Everyone seems content to not talk about numbers on those things.

    That’s the one I’m MOST INTERESTED IN.

  20. The Gaijin says:

    “Regarding Jackson: He is making more now than he did in Pride. Rampage never made millions in Japan. We can dispense with this myth that Pride was paying millions. Rampage left for more money, Mirko left for more money, Nog left for more money and Werdum left for more money. We have seen what these guys are getting so that gives you an idea of what they were making overseas.”

    Uuuhhhh….you’re so far off on this statement it’s not even funny.

    They jumped ship after PRIDE lost its TV deals and the financial backing of the TV companies and sponsors. That financial backing and sponsorship allowed them to pay fighters huge sums of money – it wasn’t until the proverbial well ran dry b/c of the yakuza scandals that fighters went where they could get the most money available – the UFC.

    Nice attempt to rewrite history though. šŸ˜‰

  21. The Gaijin says:

    Not to mention you keep talking about these “secret bonuses” – the amounts of which are never revealed and rarely verifiable (for ppl other than Couture, Liddell and a small elite echelon of fighters)…so until I actually hear numbers, these claims are just conjecture as far as I’m concerned.

  22. dice says:

    The Gaijin Says:
    November 3rd, 2007 at 11:20 am

    “Not to mention you keep talking about these ā€œsecret bonusesā€ – the amounts of which are never revealed and rarely verifiable (for ppl other than Couture, Liddell and a small elite echelon of fighters)ā€¦so until I actually hear numbers, these claims are just conjecture as far as Iā€™m concerned”

    No but these people know for a fact that all these guys are millionaires. It doesn’t matter that they can’t provide links or sources. They know man, because…. well because they heard it somewhere and so it must be true.

    ps I have noticed that people selectively use Meltzer as a source, only when his numbers work for them. So when dana and lorenzo state that Fedor was offered less than randy was making; you don’t see them calling those 2 liars because Meltzer reported the contract was worth 1.5-2.0 million. But then if someone says that Rich only takes home 45,000 grand then all of sudden is “meltzer reported he made $300,000 for his last fight”. As far as I am concerned I am not using meltzer as a source at all anymore . And heres why
    http://sports.yahoo.com/mma/news?slug=dm-103007ufcconference&prov=yhoo&type=lgns

    So randy was somehow going to make $10 million to $12 million for his last 2 fights? Makes a guy wonder why he ever would have left when he was on track to make that kind of scratch. Meltzer had 10 times the credibility when he just had his independent newsletter, before he associated himself with Yahoo and that retard Iole. Instead of yahoo printing a retraction they try to play a game of semantics.

  23. lynchman says:

    Meltzer never said Randy was making that much. The only comment he made about that is saying that he knew Iole’s source and that the source was in a position to know.

    That peice was an add-on by the editors of Yahoo, not a statement by Meltzer.

    G,
    Don’t believe me, I have no problem with that. I am not repeating heresay, I am stating what I know. You will note I only mentioned a few names because I only know of some for certain.

    I heard about the Franklin bonus (the Loiseau one) from somebody at one of the gyms that rich trains at. It was the first real time (other than Randy and Chuck) that they paid out extra based on the success of the show. Rich was pretty jacked about it.

    Tim Sylvia may have made more for facing Randy, but I am not saying that because I don’t know it for a fact. It would only be conjecture.

    Even Randy himself said they were common.

    It is a method of paying fighters more for more successful shows. Look at UFC 72, I am betting very little was paid out over the top since the show actually lost a fair amount of money.

    Using this method, they are preventing themselves from over-commiting on fighter pay. By using discretionary bonuses and ppv percentages, the fighters only make more if the shows do well.

    When Rampage signed with the WFA, he openly said that contract was the biggest he ever had.

    I love the fact that because Pride never had to report their numbers, folks create this myth that they paid millions. That is not the case.

    But G, you don’t want to believe me because I can’t point to a web link with numbers, can you offer any data about these huge paydays Pride was paying? They rank right up there with the mythical 90,000 people that Pride had. That number is impressive since they never ran a show in a venue that can actually hold that many.

    Pride paid more than the UFC in the past, but it was more a matter of them paying 200k to a fighter when the UFC might only be able to afford 100k.

    Fedor has had one million dollar paydays with Pride because he got a share of some of the gates.

    Pride does not reveal pay so we know it must have been huge, the UFC pays bonuses but since we don’t have publicly revealed numbers, it must be BS.

    The Pride vs. UFC mentality is old and sad.

  24. The Gaijin says:

    Nothing to do with PRIDE vs. UFC at all, but glad you’re trying to turn it into that…

  25. The Gaijin says:

    p.s. most of PRIDE’s top guys revealed in their interviews what their pay per fights were.

    Most of them were in the $250,000+/fight range from what I read. As far as I’m concerned that’s a pretty reliable source and likely better than “I heard from a guy, who knows a guy, who’s sister dates a guy at the same gym as fighter X”.

    As for the 90,000 claim – while I’m not sure about the number – I do know that they ran “sold-out” (how many were comp’d, I don’t know) shows at the Tokyo Dome that were absolutely rammed to the rafters. The facility’s capacity for baseball games is ~55,000 and iirc the way the show was set-up was that the ring was in the middle of the baseball field and there was tens of thousands of seats located on field level. What the actual official number is I am unsure, but rest assured it was a monstrous number.

  26. lynchman says:

    Regarding the Tokyo Dome:
    The 2003 MW tourny finals (Silva over Rampage) drew 53,000. That was the biggest (along with the night that Silva beat Sak to be crowned MW champ) they had (excluding the Pride/K-1 card that drew 71,000).

    My comment about Pride vs. UFC comes from the fact that no payroll has ever been revealed for Pride except the U.S. shows. And several guys on the U.S. show were paid non-contracted bonuses as well (not unlike that of the UFC). Fedor did not make 100k for that show, it was around 300k. This is coming from folks within the actual locker room.

    250k number is likely accurate for the top stars, I know that Mirko was making around that amount before he jumped to the UFC. The numbers came out when he was battling for extra pay for the OW GP finals since he would have to fight twice. I am guessing Silva was also in that range, though I don’t know that for a fact. Some of the japanese guys likely made a lot more because of their drawing power.

    Mid card guys were not making that much, I know the pay for some of the 183 pounders and they were making mid five figures.

    It was not that Pride started cutting the pay of the fighters, it was that the UFC was now able to offer more money than Pride was paying. Mirko jumped for a fat (very fat) signing bonus and a 350k paycheck.

    As I said, you can believe whatever you choose. I will say that the numbers I have said were not pulled out of the air, they are not from a person that talked to a person and so forth. The Franklin number comes from his training crew. The Fedor number came from two different folks, one seconding a fighter and the other with the production (the U.S. production crew).

    In all honesty, I can tell you that the UFC usually pays the fighters in the top two bouts extra coin based on the success of the show. Hughes does not have a ppv percentage in his contract, but he did VERY well for the Gracie bout. They paid him not too much less than Gracie ended up making. Gracie had a ppv cut in his deal.

    As I said, this started as the UFC shows started drawing bigger buys (2005). When guys like GSP and Hughes were able to pull 500+k buys, they picked up extra coin for those shows. Again, they did not make anywhere near what Couture, Liddell or Ortiz take home with the cut of the buys, but it has made them fairly well off.

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