UFC 84 fighters' salaries: payroll tops a million bucks

[D-Bo Dre]

UFC 84 fighters' salaries: payroll tops a million bucks
by MMAjunkie.com Staff on May 27, 2008 at 1:14 pm ET


UFC lightweight champion B.J. Penn defended his title at Saturday's UFC 84 event, and he picked up the night's biggest reported paycheck -- $250,000 -- in the process.

MMAjunkie.com (www.mmajunkie.com) today obtained the list of official UFC 84 salaries directly from the Nevada State Athletic Commission.

UFC 84 took place at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas. A sold-out crowd of 14,773 created a live gate of $3.7 million.

In addition to Penn's quarter-of-a-million dollars, Tito Ortiz picked up $210,000 in defeat. Wanderlei Silva got $150,000 for his victory, and Lyoto Machida got $100,000 for his.

The total disclosed payroll for the event was $1,098,000.

The full list of salaries included:

B.J. Penn ($250,000) def. Sean Sherk ($35,000)
Wanderlei Silva ($150,000) def. Keith Jardine ($10,000)
Goran Reljic ($6,000) def. Wilson Gouveia ($18,000)
Lyoto Machida ($100,000) def. Tito Ortiz ($210,000)
Thiago Silva ($50,000) def. Antonio Mendes ($4,000)
Rousimar Palhares ($10,000) def. Ivan Salaverry ($20,000)
Rameau Thierry Sokoudjou ($80,000) def. Kazuhiro Nakamura ($20,00O)
Rich Clementi ($40,000) def. Terry Etim ($10,000)
Yoshiyuki Yoshida ($12,000) def. Jon Koppenhaver ($8,000)
Dong Hyun Kim ($40,000) def. Jason Tan ($3000)
Shane Carwin ($12,000) def. Christian Wellisch ($10,000)
All of the winning fighters' salaries included 50 percent of the total to show and 50 percent as a win bonus -- except Wanderlei Silva, who received a flat $150,000 for the fight.


Now, the usual disclaimer: the figures do not include deductions for items such as insurance, licenses and taxes. Additionally, the figures do not include money paid by sponsors, which can oftentimes be a substantial portion of a fighter's income. They also do not include any other "locker-room" or special bonuses the UFC oftentimes pays. In other words, these are simply base salaries reported to the commission and do not reflect entire compensation packages for the event.

---------------------------

Wanderlei Silva, Rousimar Palhares, Goran Reljic and Wilson Gouveia all secured $75,000 "fight night" bonuses stemming from Saturday's UFC 84 event
Silva earned the Knockout of the Night bonus, Palhares earned the Submission of the Night bonus, and Reljic and Gouveia each picked up Fight of the Night honors.

[NEMESIS RR]

only 35k for sherk is a joke. I hope he has a nice contract with the ufc

[g0dsend]

I wouldnt even fight if I was Jason Tan, 3 thousand to get pounded and need medical treatment afterwards?

[Coop77]

I'm surprised BJ Penn made so much more than Wanderlei & Tito

[jbonez19]

i'd love to know what the P.P.V. dollars were....

[roid_rage]

WTF??? 35 k for sherk!!! that's and insult! and 10 for JARDINE!!! not that Jardine is such a star, but he's been around for a long time already and he had beaten chuck... so WTF!!!! no wonder why people are running the **** out the UFC... I hope Affliction can settle as and org and the future (eventhough it's not their intention) or any other ORG can become strong enought to compite fairly with the UFC... then Danna may realize that he aint the king of world and that the UFC aint the only org in the world...

[D-Bo Dre]

i'd love to know what the P.P.V. dollars were....

UFC 84 produced an estimated $12 million in gross revenue for Zuffa (live gate and pay per view buys)

Soo, if live gate sales were $3.7million the rest of the $12mil came from PPV sales..

[D-Bo Dre]

WTF??? 35 k for sherk!!! that's and insult! and 10 for JARDINE!!! not that Jardine is such a star, but he's been around for a long time already and he had beaten chuck... so WTF!!!! no wonder why people are running the **** out the UFC... I hope Affliction can settle as and org and the future (eventhough it's not their intention) or any other ORG can become strong enought to compite fairly with the UFC... then Danna may realize that he aint the king of world and that the UFC aint the only org in the world...

Yeahh ur right, dont know if I would agree to take an ass whoopin from Wandi for $10k

[zimmy]

to give some of those guys 10k and such and then give tito 210k....THAT'S a joke

[Pooks]

I feel like I'm entering Soviet Union or something...

They all had the chance to negotiate their contracts with the UFC..
Money is prolly one of the reasons White and Tito don't get a long.. Tito works him for all he can get.

Its Capitalism basically.. WE ALL TAKE IT UP THE ASS, TILL WE MAKE IT BIG, than we can do the ASS F'in.. well the 5% of us, or whatever that make it big hehe

[jbonez19]

I feel like I'm entering Soviet Union or something...

They all had the chance to negotiate their contracts with the UFC..
Money is prolly one of the reasons White and Tito don't get a long.. Tito works him for all he can get.

Its Capitalism basically.. WE ALL TAKE IT UP THE ASS, TILL WE MAKE IT BIG, than we can do the ASS F'in.. well the 5% of us, or whatever that make it big hehe

with all due respect...that's complete bullshit. these guys are professionals, they train their asses off and they risk serious injury every time they step in the gym let alone the ring. they deserve a larger slice of the pie. jardines 10k is a ****in' disgrace. your argument that you have to get famous before you get paid is just ****in' stupid. so if you don't have a flashy media driven consumable personality like tito or chuck you shouldn't get paid? just bullshit. no disrespect intended to chuck. so jardines 10k is justified coz he's an ugly prick and he prefers to let his fists do the talking? **** that. it's not WWE...either UFC needs to pay them what they deserve, or they will continue to hemorage fighters to more lucrative offers. dana white seems to think that zuffa built MMA and therefore deserves to **** everybody. he will find over time that this is not the case. if randy couture, one of the most well liked and respected people in MMA says all is not right with dana white then....

[Pooks]

with all due respect...that's complete bullshit. these guys are professionals, they train their asses off and they risk serious injury every time they step in the gym let alone the ring. they deserve a larger slice of the pie. jardines 10k is a ****in' disgrace. your argument that you have to get famous before you get paid is just ****in' stupid. so if you don't have a flashy media driven consumable personality like tito or chuck you shouldn't get paid? just bullshit. no disrespect intended to chuck. so jardines 10k is justified coz he's an ugly prick and he prefers to let his fists do the talking? **** that. it's not WWE...either UFC needs to pay them what they deserve, or they will continue to hemorage fighters to more lucrative offers. dana white seems to think that zuffa built MMA and therefore deserves to **** everybody. he will find over time that this is not the case. if randy couture, one of the most well liked and respected people in MMA says all is not right with dana white then....

You summed it up good, Thats how it appears to be :-p Good Ol' US of A
Hey.. GM just looked for 19,000 volunteers to leave the company so that they could hire guys at $14 an hour instead of the usual $28.
Thats life lol

[yannick35]

Jardine at 10k ?????

[T_Own]

I'm surprised BJ Penn made so much more than Wanderlei & Tito

titos in probably just cause he lost, and it wasnt a title fight. im sure hed be 250k+ if he had the belt.

wanderlei is still fresh in the ufc, and his pride background is the only reason hes getting that much at all.

[gixxerboy1]

with all due respect...that's complete bullshit. these guys are professionals, they train their asses off and they risk serious injury every time they step in the gym let alone the ring. they deserve a larger slice of the pie. jardines 10k is a ****in' disgrace. your argument that you have to get famous before you get paid is just ****in' stupid. so if you don't have a flashy media driven consumable personality like tito or chuck you shouldn't get paid? just bullshit. no disrespect intended to chuck. so jardines 10k is justified coz he's an ugly prick and he prefers to let his fists do the talking? **** that. it's not WWE...either UFC needs to pay them what they deserve, or they will continue to hemorage fighters to more lucrative offers. dana white seems to think that zuffa built MMA and therefore deserves to **** everybody. he will find over time that this is not the case. if randy couture, one of the most well liked and respected people in MMA says all is not right with dana white then....

thats they way it should be. It a business. People arent buying tickets or payper view because of Jardine. People want to see tito fight. His name sells tickets. So he should get more.

[papaaj]

How they can give jardine 10k is ridiculous hes been there for a long time. Also 3k wtf is that shit. UFC is not treating their fighters well at all.

[Odpierdol_sie!]

I personally think that these guys fighting on a world stage like the UFc should be bagging more money per fight.

Talking about the small purse of 3k, you can argue as hes a novice he is not worth anything more, but those of us who have followed the UFC all the way over the last 15 or so year will remember that back in the day of Mc Hammer and Vanilla Ice and Marky mark, if you got knocked out in the first round of the UFC your purse would only be 2k so giving a pro fighter 3k for an undercard fight, debut or not 15 years later is a fvcking insult.