Mikey Garcia's 'slave contract' with Top Rank

[about.thousands]

Idek how you'd get a union in boxing when the power structure of the sport is so spread out. A union would have to deal with promoters, alphabet groups, commissions & networks lol. Be the most expensive union ever probably with all the work they'd need to do & the level of knowledge & experience they'd need to have. Or it'd just be a limp ****.

I can't imagine your average promoter would openly go to simple & fair contracts.

And I don't think many fighters in that promising prospect to notable champion region can work on a promoter by promoter basis. Only a handful of huge names can do that. And of course the journeyman & lower level guys can do it cuz they don't have enough value. But the sweet spot of promising prospect to notable champion region needs a promoter investing in their progress on a longer term basis. It wouldn't make sense for promoters to fork over the money to build up a guy on a fight by fight basis on their break even or in the red card when they'll never get to the pot of gold with him.

You could never unionize all the fighters because it's a worldwide sport. The push for a union would have to come from the top down. But the top fighters are making enough money and comfortable. But if the top fighters would start the movement the lower tier fighters would follow suit. But people would rather look out for their own interests instead of the interest of the group. The UFC should've been unionized. Especially after that reebok deal.

[Eff Pandas]

There IS a way to deal with this. Fighters hiring good lawyers so they aren't caught in bad contracts.

That all sounds simple & easy, but I think for the most part fighters come from poverty or not so great backgrounds where the only knowledge they often have of legal counsel is a public defender & hiring a lawyer to sign a paper seems a foreign concept.

And I think part of the issue with some promoters is they offer you a lawyer to "look over" your contract & that lawyer's job is more promoter oriented then for the boxers best interest. The fighter is either trusting of the promoter cuz they think they are in it together with them or they are just naive to the whole situation or just focused on the dollar signs on the contract.

I think its just a situation ripe for hustling young athletes in a wild wild west/circus-y type sport that has lil blowback for the bad elements. If there was a Arum or IBF like person & group in a more mainstream sport those en****** would have been made an example of for the corruption they were involved in, but in boxing its just a whatever sorta thing. /rant

[sicko]

This forum Be Like: "Mickey Garcia is Ducking A Bad Contract He Is A Coward!"

[Eff Pandas]

But people would rather look out for their own interests instead of the interest of the group. The UFC should've been unionized. Especially after that reebok deal.

Yea thats obviously a big part of the problem too.

And I expect the UFC to be unionized sooner or later. The fighters for sure got effed on that Reebok deal & they need representation with that & a bunch of other things, but there is a market correction currently going on with a Bellator exodus thats largely because of that huge error the UFC made with that Reebok deal.

[FrankieClutch]

That all sounds simple & easy, but I think for the most part fighters come from poverty or not so great backgrounds where the only knowledge they often have of legal counsel is a public defender & hiring a lawyer to sign a paper seems a foreign concept.

And I think part of the issue with some promoters is they offer you a lawyer to "look over" your contract & that lawyer's job is more promoter oriented then for the boxers best interest. The fighter is either trusting of the promoter cuz they think they are in it together with them or they are just naive to the whole situation or just focused on the dollar signs on the contract.

I think its just a situation ripe for hustling young athletes in a wild wild west/circus-y type sport that has lil blowback for the bad elements. If there was a Arum or IBF like person & group in a more mainstream sport those en****** would have been made an example of for the corruption they were involved in, but in boxing its just a whatever sorta thing. /rant

I agree with your post 100%, but there has to be at least one guy/trainer/family member that's giving a young fighter good advice.

[Raonic]

If fighters want to sign contracts, they can do whatever the hell they want. If they don't want to honour a contract they signed, then let them suffer because of it.

[DoktorSleepless]

Let me not even pretend to know what the hell that picture even means

Garcia's contract is automatically extended to 5 fights or 30 months (whichever is first) whenever he wins a title. He won a title against Roman Martinez about 30 months ago, which is why the release is happening now.

This was actually the main point of contention in the lawsuit. The contract says "Promoter shall have the exclusive right and option to promote the Fighters' first five title defenses or bouts"

Arum interpreted the bouts part to mean any bout even if it wasn't for a title. So Garcia vacating his belt doesn't automatically mean he's free from his contractual obligations.

Garcia was trying to interpret it as "title defenses or title bouts" claiming the "title" in front of "bouts" was implicit even though it didn't say that because "title" was an adjective for both defense and bouts. Writing title in front of bouts would be redundant. So Arum only would have rights if Garcia defended a title, or was in a bout contending for another title. But since Garcia dropped his belt, he thought he should be free.

But now even if Mikey's interpretation is correct, the contract would be up under Arum's own interpretation by now.

[firstborn]

If fighters want to sign contracts, they can do whatever the hell they want. If they don't want to honour a contract they signed, then let them suffer because of it

I agree however at one point Garcia claimed Arum wouldn't negotiate another fight for him unless he signed a contract extension. That was supposedly one of the primary reasons Garcia sat out.....Chavez Jr. mentioned something similar before breaking with Top Rank.

At the end of the day only Arum and Mikey know the absolute truth!

[Fetta]

Let me not even pretend to know what the hell that picture even means

Lets say you sign for 3 fights and on the third you win a championship. Arum now owns the rights for sole promotion of your next 5 titles defenses. Minimum pay being 75K.

Say you give 3 defenses then decide to move up, let the title go and will have to sign new contract cause you still owe but now you have the same cycle.

Now to get out you have to decide 5 title defenses in a never ending cycle contract or 30 months

And thats just from this little snippet.

Im sure he would lowball and had them sign new contracts to guarantee maybe 350K with similar stipulations.

[Raonic]

I agree however at one point Garcia claimed Arum wouldn't negotiate another fight for him unless he signed a contract extension. That was supposedly one of the primary reasons Garcia sat out.....Chavez Jr. mentioned something similar before breaking with Top Rank.

At the end of the day only Arum and Mikey know the absolute truth!

And I'm fine with that. Garcia cost himself 2 years because he made a bad decision.

And yea, only Arum and Mikey know the truth, though I did find it funny no one even bothered to question how OP could get a copy of the contract lol.