Bloggaday: Bloggaday 131 – UFC’s 6-Figure Contract

Bloggaday 131 – UFC’s 6-Figure Contract

As I’ve said in previous Bloggadays, I’m a fan of a show called The Ultimate Fighter. The show takes several non-bigtime MMA fighters and has them duke it out until 1 ends up victorious. That one final fighter gets the coveted “6-figure contract.”

Now I thought that was pretty good. 100+k a year for fighting. Not a terrible living. Aside from the winner, a select few other TUF’ers tend to also get that fabled contract with the UFC.

Well that was all cool and dandy until I found out about the actual specifics of the contract. I was actually rather appalled. Here’s how it breaks down.

“The winners of the first three seasons of The Ultimate Fighter competition, and certain runners-up depending on their performance in their competition finals, receive the touted "six-figure" contract to fight in the UFC. These contracts are specifically three-year contracts with a guaranteed first year. Each year consists of three fights, the first year's purse per fight consists of $12,000 guaranteed with a $12,000 win bonus (a maximum of $24,000 per fight), the second year's purse per fight is $16,000 with a $16,000 win bonus (a maximum of $32,000 per fight) and the third year's purse per fight is at $22,000 with a $22,000 win bonus (a maximum of $44,000 per fight). A TUF winner who goes 9-0 can earn $300,000 total on the contract, but only $150,000 is guaranteed for all three years if 9 fights are fought.[1]”

That means the least/most they can make their first year is $36/$72k. Second year? $48/$96k. And the third year is $66/132k. The most that they can win depends on whether they win their fights. So if they win every single fight and the UFC actually decided to keep them for the entirety of the contract, they can average $100k a year. If they don’t win and the UFC for some reason decides to keep them, they’ll AVERAGE 50 grand a year.

Okay, I’m watching the Ultimate Finale (the last episode of The Ultimate Fighter to determine the winner and a few other UFC fights) and it’s the second round of the Jardine/Hammil fight, and you know it’s a rough fight when the camera gets blood on the lens. I don’t see how that fight isn’t fight of the night.

Anyways, I understand they’re just fighting, but I imagine it takes a considerable amount of money to be a UFC fighter. I hear a lot of talk about the camps that they’re in, this world-renowned training. That and their conditioning and everything has to take a lot of money. These guys have to put on one hell of a show their first year so they actually get a second year and I can’t imagine 30 grand goes too far.

If the winner of their show only gets $36k for their first year, what do their nobodies get? I would imagine considerably less. As I’ve implied, after the first year of the 6-figure contract, the UFC can drop their contract, so if the contract holder isn’t winning, there’s not much reason to keep them if they can get some cheaper fight to lose fights.

Now the biggest counter to my point and the unknown variable to me are the sponsorships. I’m sure the folks who move on from the TUF house and other fighters in the UFC in general make a good amount of money from that. I don’t know, the contract itself just seems a little a little lacking*. Considering how popular the UFC is, it seems like they could pay a little bit more to their fighters.

Listening to

The Ultimate Finale

Twitter Tag

A six-figure contract? Only on Bloggaday

Exit stage right to my corner of the interweb > \/

http://twitter.com/daviddysart Plaster Caster Twitter Strutter

http://daviddysart.tumblr.com/ Hung My Head in a Tumblr

http://thebloggaday.blogspot.com/ A Little Less Conversation and a Whole Lotta Love

http://www.facebook.com/thedaviddysart?ref=sgm If I Never See Your Face Again

Youtube Awesomeness

http://www.youtube.com/user/DavidDysart Still deciding to try to capture it or let it slip

For the Piccaday