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http://www.bloodyelbow.com/2012/1/23...y-night-fights
by Brent Brookhouse on Jan 23, 2012
In their response to the ESPN Outside the Lines feature and ESPN.com article on UFC fighter pay, the UFC released the full video they filmed of the Lorenzo Fertitta interview. They also released a smaller part of the video focusing on a segment of the interview where Lorenzo tried for a big "gotcha moment" when he asked John Barr why it was okay for a fighter on the previous Friday Night Fights to have only made $275 for their four round fight. It was a meaningless point to begin with, given that ESPN has a flat budget for Friday Night Fights and the fighters are booked and paid for by the promoters, not the network.
However, tonight I was organizing Nevada's boxing payouts for last year, putting together a database for Bad Left Hook, and I got to the event in question and noticed something.
There was no fighter on the show who made only $275 for their fight.
There were four fighters on the card who were in four round fights. Timothy Hall, Jr. was 2-10 in his last 12 fights and was paid $2,500 gross for his losing performance on this card. His opponent, Badou Jack, made a gross purse of $2,000. Razvan Conaju made a disclosed $500 (more on him in a moment) and his opponent Kourtney Boden scored $1,000.
Conaju is a former Olympian from Romania and I think this is a case where the disclosed pay doesn't tell the whole story, especially given that he made $3,000 for his pro debut a few months earlier. Still, not a $275 payout.
This isn't a huge deal, it doesn't mean I'm saying "look, I caught him in a lie!" In fact, I'd probably never have mentioned it if the "gotcha moment" weren't treated as such a heavy and legitimate argument by many UFC/MMA fans.
Here's the official pay sheet from Nevada for the event in PDF format:
http://assets.sbnation.com/assets/89..._pay_sheet.pdf
by Brent Brookhouse on Jan 23, 2012
In their response to the ESPN Outside the Lines feature and ESPN.com article on UFC fighter pay, the UFC released the full video they filmed of the Lorenzo Fertitta interview. They also released a smaller part of the video focusing on a segment of the interview where Lorenzo tried for a big "gotcha moment" when he asked John Barr why it was okay for a fighter on the previous Friday Night Fights to have only made $275 for their four round fight. It was a meaningless point to begin with, given that ESPN has a flat budget for Friday Night Fights and the fighters are booked and paid for by the promoters, not the network.
However, tonight I was organizing Nevada's boxing payouts for last year, putting together a database for Bad Left Hook, and I got to the event in question and noticed something.
There was no fighter on the show who made only $275 for their fight.
There were four fighters on the card who were in four round fights. Timothy Hall, Jr. was 2-10 in his last 12 fights and was paid $2,500 gross for his losing performance on this card. His opponent, Badou Jack, made a gross purse of $2,000. Razvan Conaju made a disclosed $500 (more on him in a moment) and his opponent Kourtney Boden scored $1,000.
Conaju is a former Olympian from Romania and I think this is a case where the disclosed pay doesn't tell the whole story, especially given that he made $3,000 for his pro debut a few months earlier. Still, not a $275 payout.
This isn't a huge deal, it doesn't mean I'm saying "look, I caught him in a lie!" In fact, I'd probably never have mentioned it if the "gotcha moment" weren't treated as such a heavy and legitimate argument by many UFC/MMA fans.
Here's the official pay sheet from Nevada for the event in PDF format:
http://assets.sbnation.com/assets/89..._pay_sheet.pdf
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