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By: Cameron Lyman, MMATorch Contributor
Last week, a back and forth exchange of words between Jon Fitch and Dana White has once again put the topic of fighter pay in the spotlight. First Fitch came out, calling the UFC a hostile working environment, stating that he was clearly not wanted in the organization. Dana White responded by calling Fitch “delusional," citing that the UFC paid Fitch above and beyond what they were contractually obligated to. In response to that, Fitch released a video to “shine some more light” on his financial matters.
In the video, Fitch broke down his pay over during his time with the organization. Between October 2005 and February 2013, Fitch fought eighteen times for the UFC, an average of 2.5 times a year. According to Fitch, when you average out his pay, he made $176,000 a year before management and gym fees, which Fitch stated was 20%. This leaves him making just over $140,000 a year, or $56,000 per fight. Since training camp is two-three months and a fighter does have to attend promotional events a fighter can typically fight about three to five times a year. We can make the deduction that Fitch made $140,000 for roughly eight months of work per year. However, if you feel that Fitch was only paid for his in-cage time, which over his career was just over four hours, then he made around $262,000 per hour.
The subject of professional athletes making too much money has been around for a long time now. While some people think it's ridiculous that someone can be paid millions of dollars a year to do something they love, others point at the revenue generated by team owners: If there is this much money being made, then the athletes deserve a proportional amount of compensation (which is usually around 50% of revenue in the NHL, NFL and MLB). However, there are some stark differences when it comes to the UFC and other sporting organizations.
You could point to the sport of boxing as a fair comparison, where top tier fighters are making millions of dollars per fight (Note: Some undercard boxers are only making $100 a round while the lowest a UFC undercard fighter makes is around $6000). However, boxing is structured differently, where there are many major organizations a fighter can fight within while being independently promoted. Professional boxers are paid by their promoter, not by the organization they are fighting in. On top of that, the production company, whether it be HBO or Showtime etc, will come in to pay for the marketing or the event, where only the main card fights reach an audience. Think Cris Cyborg, fighting in Invicta FC, in a card that's being promoted by Tito Ortiz, and an event that's marketed by HBO. Then a few months later, she fights in Strikeforce, in a card that's promoted by Ortiz but marketed by Showtime. As we all know, Zuffa fighters can only compete in Zuffa branded events.
The UFC is a different beast as they are the fight organization, as well as the fight promoters and event producers. The sport of boxing has had over 100 years to establish a worldwide following while MMA is still in its adolescence. In this case, it might make more sense to compare the UFC to another organization like the NFL. Again, this is not a fair comparison, as the NFL doesn't pay its players, it has teams which do that. Perhaps it makes more sense to compare the UFC to a major sports team then?
Let's compare Fitch's salary to that of Daniel Alfredsson, the captain of my beloved NHL team, The Ottawa Senators. Alfredsson was paid 4.5 million dollars in the 2011 season (2012 was a shortened season - more on that later). He logged 23.6 hours of ice-time during the regular season which spans from late September to April (or 8 months). Again, NHL players have to train, and attend promotional events, not to mention sit on the bench while waiting for a line change. If you look at Alfredsson's pay based on ice-time, he made just over $190,000 per hour; over $70,000 less than Fitch.
However, there are various factors that should be examined when making such a comparison. For one, Daniel Alfredsson signed a four year, 19.5 million dollar contract. He is guaranteed this money even if he is injured for the entire span of his contract. If Fitch doesn't fight, he doesn't get paid. As well, the hockey club covers the player's medical and travel expenses, not to mention gives him access to their high-end training facilities and a number of athletic development personnel. Alfredsson is an employee of the hockey club but is also part of the NHLPA, the NHL players union. This union is the same one that could not come to terms with the NHL which resulted in a partial lockout of the 2012-2013 season.
Fitch, on the other hand, was a contract employee of the UFC. In his last fights he was making $60,000 to show up with a $60,000 win bonus, making him a mid-tier earner in the promotion. On top of the win bonus, the UFC pays out bonuses for Fight of The Night, Submission of The Night and Knockout of the Night. Additionally, the UFC passes out undisclosed backstage bonuses, which Dana White claims Jon Fitch benefited from, to the tune of $302,000 over his career.
Top draws in the UFC have pay-per-view sharing worked into their contract, which can allow a fighter like Brock Lesnar or GSP to take home several million after all is said and done. In addition to the standard UFC contract, the fighter must also sign a merchandising contract which entitles the fighter to a certain percentage of revenue from merchandise sold on behalf of the UFC.
Something important to note while observing the UFC contract is that the fighter's pay is accelerated only if they continue to win. If they lose, they are stuck at the base pay of their contract. That's not the only thing that happens if you lose. If a fighter comes up short in a bout, the UFC can end their contract then and there.
The UFC doesn't really do the greatest job of taking care of their fighters when it comes travel time. The UFC will typically pay for the flight for the fighter and one or two members of his corner, will cover the cost of one hotel room and will give the fighter a $50 per day food allowance. A fighter usually has two or three members in his corner, and they are forced to pay for the third member's accommodations, not to mention his team's food. On top of that, an American fighter must pay taxes to the host nation when fighting abroad, and then again to the US upon return. For a fighter making $8,000 to show, it is hard to make a living. Again, it should be noted that in boxing, some undercard fighters walk away with a few hundred dollars for their efforts.
One area where the UFC has done a great job is supplying their fighters with insurance for any injuries that occur during the fight or during training. While this may be surprising, this is not standard among combat sports organizations. This is one of the many expenses that Zuffa takes on while operating. Remember how I mentioned that sports teams typically spend about half of their revenue on athlete salaries? Well in 2011, the UFC generated $168,750,000 in PPV buys and $59,575,617 in live gates. Disclosed fighter salaries for that year totaled $30,939,714. That's just over 7% of the revenue, but there are some things to remember here.
In boxing, the promoter only markets the main event. The UFC markets many fights on the card and also pays for all of its production and marketing costs. In boxing, the production company will cover these expenses, while the UFC pays for these costs out of pocket. This bit the UFC in the ass when they famously had to cancel UFC 151 after spending millions of dollars marketing it. Additonally, the Fertitta brothers have invested millions of dollars growing the sport to the point where it is today. The UFC's continued worldwide expansion is a massive machine with many working parts and many, many paychecks.
Something Fitch did not touch on was the amount of money fighters can take in from sponsors. While lower end fighters can probably earn a few grand to feature a few brands on their shorts, a fighter with a Nike sponsorship can earn presumably much more. The UFC has been criticised in this arena, where it limits which sponsors a fighter can do business with. On top of this, the sponsor must also pay a fee directly to the UFC for the ability to have a fighter don their logo in the Octagon. This may seem a little too controlling but then again, Daniel Alfreddson, or any other athlete in major sports today, couldn't slap a sponsor of their choice on their jersey.
After looking at all of these comparisons, there is one conclusion that sticks out: you simply cannot compare the UFC to any other sporting organization. The UFC's organizational structure, its infancy, global expansion, and its growth trajectory really do make it difficult for us to say how much they should be paying their fighters.
However, I do have a few conclusions of my own. Fighters at the low end of the pay scale should be getting paid more for what they are putting in. I believe that as the sport grows, all UFC fighter salaries should continue to increase (as they always have). To be completely honest, I don't want my favourite fighter to make twenty million dollars a fight. I want them hungry to get to the top. With the current state of affairs, you are paying in to be part of the UFC brand, until you can string together a few victories and establish a brand of your own, a la Jon Jones. Maybe the question I should be asking here is this: Is the UFC providing the fighter a platform to succeed or is the fighter supplying the UFC with the product to sell? The answer, of course, is both. I suppose the real question then becomes: what is more valuable, the UFC brand or the brand of the fighter? To answer this question, we need to look no further than Jon Fitch's fight Friday night.
[Jon Fitch art by Cory Gould (c) MMATorch.com]
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