I can give you Dana's side. "We pay our fighters well and this guy sat out a long fucking time trying to get more money. He's just not worth it. Who gets excited to see All Iaquinta fight? Nobody! I checked his Mom's fight pass account and even she doesn't watch his fights. He hasn't sold a single fight kit! He's fucking stealing from Reebok with the way they pay him so well. Look, I'm done talking about this guy. He held us hostage for two years, he backed out of a fight he accepted, and he's turned down at least 30 fights. I don't think this guy wants to be a fighter."
That's what I like to hear: fighters standing up for themselves and getting paid better!
That was my first thought too. With all of the crazy shit he has said publicly about his employer and the hardball tactics he better win and win well.
None of that has anything to do with what Al's point is. WME is the worst thing for MMA ever. They pay fighters like shit unless you are the top 1% of fighters. Al may have acted like a douche, but the guy is a absolute A level fighter in his prime and a guy like Al should be getting at least 70K to show, at least. Fuck the WME< this is good for the fighters, what's the issue.
I don't need to hear the other side, the other side is WME, basically the devil. They have owned the ufc for a year plus and its obvious they are shit. They pay fighters horribly unless you are the top 1%. Listen to what all these guys are LOUDLY saying.
Listen to what guys like Nikita Kyrlov, Gegard Mousasi, Albert Tumenov, Lorenz Larkin etc....listen to what they say about WME> WME pays shit. Gegard not only finished his ufc run on a 5 fight win streak against beast fightes, the last 4 wins where all finishes by strikes. So it's not like Gegard is an out of his prime fighter, or some wrestler lay and pray. We are hardcore fans and we know obviously Gegard is an ALL time great.
So what do these pieces of shit do, they offer Gegard a new contract at the exact same rates of his old contract. Kirk Cousins is a FA in the NFL now, no team would be able to sign him by offering him no raise, Kirk will get paid bigtime, all sports are this way.
UFC's first offer to Gegard, same exact 70 K or 80K show he already had, with a win bonus of only 40K, not even a penny raise. Meanwhile Bellator is giving him a flat 200 to 250 K win or lose, plus he can get his own sponsors and not have to get the shitty reebok pay. Plus he can go to LHW if he wants, he can kickbox if he wants and make even more money.
That is how you deal with top fighters, Viacom gets it, look at how different they structure things, then you got WME< no freedon, horrible contracts, horrible marketing etc...
NO need to hear WME side, we know what they are, they are poop. They literally have zero new marketing idea in the 17 months they have owned this shit.
I can't argue with any of that.
Check out the leaked Bisping pay schedule....money advertised is not even close to money paid. The rest of your statement has nothing to do with Al and his hormones....but it does sound like Ari fuked your sister.
Iaquinta, 30, says he contacted the UFC several weeks ago to discuss his retirement. The catalyst for the call was because he was still subject to random drug testing by the United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) -- an inconvenience he no longer wanted.
It appeared to be the final straw of a strained relationship. Iaquinta has fought just once in the past two years, stating his pay simply isn't worth the risks of stepping into the cage.
"After my last fight [in April], I put a number in my head, and I wasn't going to fight for anything less," Iaquinta told ESPN.
"They almost got me [in December]. I accepted a fight against Paul Felder, but it wasn't the number I had. I kind of rushed into it. So I pulled out of that fight. I stuck to my guns.
"One day, I got on the phone with [UFC matchmaker] Sean Shelby and said, 'Listen, USADA is coming to my office to test me. This is unacceptable. I said I was going to pull myself from the USADA program. And they came back with the number I wanted."
"I signed a new four-fight deal," Iaquinta said. "They gave me a new contract on the second fight of my old deal -- I don't think they do that for many people. All these fighters kind of take what's given to them. Very few know their worth.
"I still think I'm worth a lot more, but this is a step in the right direction."
Iaquinta's UFC deal 3 times better than earlier
Let this set a precedent for fighters who are getting screwed! Sometimes ya gotta play hardball with Dana and Co.
Good job Raging Al. You know your worth and you held out for it. Great example for other fighters.
LOL I don't have a sister and if I did Ari the weasel would not even get a moment from her.
Also you are proving me right and you seem to stupid and low IQ to grasp that. You had to use Bisping, one of the biggest stars ever in the UFC and the biggest star in Europe to even back up your numbers. We are not talking about the top 1% of fighters, we are talking about the heart of the roster clown.
Calm down princess... the Bisping numbers were old numbers. He wasn't in the top 1%. He was mid tier, just coming off of TUF.LOL I don't have a sister and if I did Ari the weasel would not even get a moment from her.
Also you are proving me right and you seem to stupid and low IQ to grasp that. You had to use Bisping, one of the biggest stars ever in the UFC and the biggest star in Europe to even back up your numbers. We are not talking about the top 1% of fighters, we are talking about the heart of the roster clown.
Show us numbers for the meat of the roster. Bisping coming off TUF was already being pushed as the golden ticket for them to start hosting UK cards. Did you forget all of this. Show us number usuing fighters from the meat of the roster.
Come On cuzzo
Come On cuzzo
Dude, if you been following this you would see its been a multi year issue. Its not like Al just stuck to his gun and then the ufc caved, its been an ongoing ordeal of 2 to 3 years now. most fighters don't have that time or extra money to put up a fight and the WME shitfuckers take advantage of that. Al was smart enough to make decent money while on the shelf workign real estate, allowing him to stick to his guns. So yeah maybe fighters can get 2nd jobs to have more leverage but then that hurts their training time and ability to progress in skill level. Not everyone can be like Stipe and only train part time while working as a firefighter, most guys can't do that and are not skilled enough too improve as fighters while barely putting in the hours on mat. Also, Al is not a dumb guy when he is sober lol.
1) Al made almost no money in real estate.
2) Stipe is a volunteer firefighter.
3) None of the decisions made in this scenario have anything to do with intellect, but more to do with timing and negotiations to which we're only partially privvy.
1, how do you know Al made no money in real estate, from what I read he was doing alright there.
2.Stipe as a volunteer may not be full time but still devotes time to firefighting, that does cut his training time in spells.
3.You need a modicum of intellect as a fighter or agent to know when the timing is right
If you are one of these guys who is from another country and you get a ufc contract on that shitty 10k show 10 win bonus and 3500 reebok pay and you can't even afford rent and live at the gym like some guys do its pretty fucking hard to say no to a shitty ufc offer if you are in that position. A union would help but thats another thread and another story for some other day.
2.Stipe as a volunteer may not be full time but still devotes time to firefighting, that does cut his training time in spells.
3.You need a modicum of intellect as a fighter or agent to know when the timing is right
If you are one of these guys who is from another country and you get a ufc contract on that shitty 10k show 10 win bonus and 3500 reebok pay and you can't even afford rent and live at the gym like some guys do its pretty fucking hard to say no to a shitty ufc offer if you are in that position. A union would help but thats another thread and another story for some other day.