Sponsorship money is a lot harder to get now than a few years ago, for obvious reasons. Top top guys are still doing very well, but bottom guys it's a lot harder.
As far as a percentage of revenue, UFC fighters are lower as a whole than most athletes in the unionized sports. They are higher than WWE performers, though. WWE performers are in the 10-12% range in total. UFC isn't high by any means, but when you have people using the less than 10% based on the announced athletic commission figures, they are either stupid or being intentionally dishonest. There have been main events where the two guys in the main event alone have gotten more than 15% of the total revenue including PPV cuts. In Lesnar vs. Couture, the two guys alone were around 16% not including the undercard guys.
over 1 year ago
Keith Harris
2 comments
0 recs |
Email
PrintComments
That still doesn’t address the huge discrepancy in pay between the top earners and the undercard fighters. Still, it’s nice to see some harder figures. If Meltzer could somehow get a breakdown of actual pay as a ratio to revenue for one event, it’d be really illuminating. A pipe dream, I know, but it’d be nice.
This is what annoys me. Being a private company in Zuffa, Dana doesn’t have to show the books to anyone. But his saying “Some guys don’t want others to know what they’re making” schtick just doesn’t fly for me. Meltzer hints fighters get more from the UFC then their base amounts reported by the commissions and it’s long been debated if this was the case.
A little transparency would go a long away if for nothing else then to stop people bitching at Dana to pay the fighters more. nothing to fear, nothing to hide?
Unless of course the real truth is Dana doesn’t want his fighters asking for more when they hear what the other guy is making. But if these fighters really are ‘contractors’ and not ‘employees’ the reality is you have to bid to retain their services if they’re making you money.
by KJ Gould on Sep 29, 2010 1:16 PM EDT reply actions 1 recs
Comments For This Post Are Closed
Secondary Sidebar
User Tools
Related FanPosts on Cageside Seats
Related FanShots on Cageside Seats
FanPosts
Community blog posts and discussion.
