For as long as Conor McGregor has made noise—which is to say, as long as he’s been in the UFC—he has drawn critics. Those who said he’s all talk, those who said his wins were hollow, those who said he’s paved his own soft …
For as long as Conor McGregor has made noise—which is to say, as long as he’s been in the UFC—he has drawn critics. Those who said he’s all talk, those who said his wins were hollow, those who said he’s paved his own soft road.
Some of this kind of backlash is inevitable in the midst of a quick rise. There are always non-believers, doubters, and yes, haters.
Success, after all, is its own kind of magnet.
They can quiet down now, the whole lot of them, after McGregor accomplished something previously though impossible, something that has never been done in the 23-year history of the UFC. In knocking out Eddie Alvarez, he became the first fighter ever to simultaneously hold two UFC championships, adding the lightweight belt to his featherweight title.
Gold, gold, everywhere.
“They’re not on my level,” McGregor (21-3) said in the aftermath. “You gotta have some attributes. If you’re not an equal to me, I’m gonna rip your head off. Eddie’s a warrior but he shouldn’t have been in here with me.”
That’s obvious now, after McGregor captured yet another night of headlines while main eventing the UFC’s first foray into New York since 1995.
While the pay-per-view results will come in time, the early returns show record crowds for McGregor, whose presence drew $17.7 million in money to Madison Square Garden, according to UFC president Dana White, who revealed the number in the post-fight press conference. That number shattered the UFC box office record of just over $12 million, set at UFC 129 at Toronto’s massive Rogers Centre.
Under that kind of pressure, before both cynics and fanatics, McGregor reached greatness. On merit alone, no one can match what he just did.
Question his opponents or the matchups, but when the stakes were highest, McGregor stepped up, competed, succeeded. With the world watching, he shrugged, relaxed and fired out his left until Alvarez could no longer stand up to it.
It was a thing of beauty, both awing and confusing in its accuracy.
For McGregor, it was a shockingly quick, if unsurprising result. He’d walked into the Octagon at Madison Square Garden favored, but dispatched his opponent in stunning style. While Alvarez had been finished before, it had been five years since he’d been stopped on strikes, and he’d never been dominated as he was by McGregor, who battered him throughout before finishing him 3:04 into round two.
The Irishman was poised and patient, capitalizing on his reach advantage to stay out of his opponent’s range while landing his own pinpoint strikes from the outside. In less than two full rounds, he knocked Alvarez down multiple times and finally finished him with a four-piece combination that saw all of those strikes land.
If it wasn’t death by 1,000 cuts, it was still surgical, precise, exacting. Alvarez, it seems, never really had a chance. He never got quite untracked, losing the striking battle 32-9, according to FightMetric.
“Conor is special,” said UFC president Dana White. “He throws that left hand with no effort, but once he lands it, they go.”
Remember, prior to the fight, Alvarez had said McGregor was the easiest fight in the lightweight division. So much for that theory.
Only once had the the attempt to simultaneously win multiple titles been made, at UFC 94, when lightweight champ B.J. Penn moved up in weight to fight welterweight kingpin Georges St-Pierre. That fight was as one-sided as last night’s except it was in favor of the champion. St-Pierre took Penn down repeatedly and after four rounds, Penn had enough and his team declined to let him answer the bell.
This was almost the exact opposite, the man that was in theory the smaller of the two dominating the bigger one practically from start to finish.
It not only confirms the greatness of McGregor but sets him up for whatever the biggest money fights may be. Essentially, the UFC is his, and he can move forward in any direction he wants. He can return to 145 and fight Jose Aldo. He can stay at 155 and take his pick of Tony Ferguson or Khabib Nurmagomedov, who also won at UFC 205. He can take time off and see how things shake out without him. Given his current standing, he can move up to 170 pounds and fight current champ Tyron Woodley. He can fight Nate Diaz again at any weight they agree upon.
It may sound crazy, but truly, every road leads back to McGregor. That’s what happens when you’re in the position he’s in, not just a champion but the very best in the sport.
The critics may still be around, but they have much less ammunition than they used to. No matter the situation, no matter the opponent, he has won. He has beaten wrestlers, strikers, grapplers. He has put himself into the highest pressure situations and squeezed out diamonds.
Conor McGregor arrived in The City with a pointed swagger that was both arrogantly self-congratulatory and ruthlessly dismissive of the rest of his colleagues filling out what is objectively an excellent card. Which is to say, he was on his A-game.
“I …
Conor McGregor arrived in The City with a pointed swagger that was both arrogantly self-congratulatory and ruthlessly dismissive of the rest of his colleagues filling out what is objectively an excellent card. Which is to say, he was on his A-game.
“I run this whole s–t. I run New York,” he said during the UFC 205 media conference call last week. “I’m the reason we’re even here in the first place. I’m the reason this whole thing is happening. If I wasn’t here, this whole s–t goes down. And that’s the truth. That’s facts. There’s no one else out there. There’s no one else but me.”
Since he’s not running for office, there’s no need to fact-check him, but just know it’s not all factual, even if it’s truth-y.
The fact is, McGregor is the show, both before, during and after UFC 205.
And in some ways, the question of what he will be doing on the morning after UFC 205 is just as interesting as the results of his fight Saturday night against Eddie Alvarez. That’s the kind of intrigue he has built up for himself over the years and the amount of power he has in the fight game. Depending on what he’s going to do, McGregor’s next move may leave two divisions tied up in knots, fans in a rut and the new ownership in a panic.
McGregor is already the best featherweight in the world, and after Saturday night, he could lay claim to the lightweight crown as well. Never in the 20-year-plus history of the UFC has a two-division champion reigned, and such an accomplishment will most certainly make McGregor the most powerful fighter in MMA history and maybe even the most powerful individual in the sport.
That might sound like hyperbole, but at this point, McGregor may already have the former tag. His success has allowed him to call his own shots, picking his opponents, divisions and timelines. When the UFC actually tried to rein him in by dumping him from the UFC 200 card, McGregor returned a month later and, along with Nate Diaz, pumped up a pay-per-view that easily outsold the card he was originally supposed to be on. In fact, it set a single event pay-per-view record, according to MMA Fighting.
In some ways, that result was the best and worst thing that could have happened to the UFC. If McGregor had any remaining questions about his worth, they were answered that night when he headlined an event that sold absolute gangbusters for no good reason. It wasn’t a title fight, and the undercard wasn’t particularly strong.
Through sheer force of business alone, McGregor is officially a one-man movement, but on top of it, he won, giving him the ultimate in leverage. For a new ownership team desperate to maximize every cent of profit to recoup its massive $4 billion investment, that meant McGregor is slicing into its cut. Beyond that, he’s going to have a say in putting together the biggest events, because it’s pretty difficult—nearly impossible, really—to create them without him.
To be blunt, everyone knows this truth: Right now, no one has the pull McGregor has.
“Everyone in this game does what they’re f–king told. Everyone but me because I run the game, so I don’t give a f–k about all that,” McGregor said. “If I tell you you’re on the prelims, you’re on the f–king prelims. If I tell you you’re on Fight Night, you’re on f–king Fight Night. No one has no say in this but me. I’m the only one that can say anything about anything. Everyone else does what they’re told, and rightfully f–king so.”
He’s not really wrong. In an organization that has been controlled by oligarchy—first the Fertitta brothers and Dana White, now WME-IMG and White—McGregor has inserted himself into the equation and flipped the power structure on its head.
In doing so, he’s the first fighter to penetrate the dividing line between fighter and management. Right now, he’s the only fighter actually in control of his own fate.
Of course, that is one of the stakes of UFC 205 as well.
Regardless of his increased power, a loss may be enough to send him back to the featherweight division, where he’s been champion in absentia for close to a year.
That’s the thing about his place on high. One slip and there will be plenty of people waiting to push him down further. Because of that, the importance of winning at UFC 205 cannot be overstated, even if he downplays the possibility of failing at anything.
“I’ll just continue changing the game,” he said. “Continue breaking records, continue striving to put this game onto that next level like I have been doing since day one. So that’s my plan.”
The business of McGregor, Inc., does stand to gain exponentially from UFC 205.
The UFC-in-New York subplot has woven its way through the sport for so long that many have drowned it out, but with its location in the media capital of the U.S., there will be more eyeballs on McGregor than ever, not just from fans but also from media, celebrities, tastemakers. The opportunities that may come out of this for him will be dizzying.
From the beginning, he has been the type to seize the moment.
It took just a few seconds for him to establish himself as a potential superstar. Just 67 of them, in fact, or exactly the time it took him to knock out Marcus Brimage in his UFC debut. The next time out, McGregor’s walk to the Octagon in Boston felt like the arrival of a rock god. Despite his fighting in the prelims, the UFC blacked out the arena, and when his music hit, the 14,000 fans reacted like Larry Bird discovered the fountain of youth and suited up in his old Celtics “33.”
That’s the kind of star McGregor is. He seems to suck everything into his vortex and change the course of events at his whim.
The continuation of this kind of existence is predicated on winning. The UFC has never been an organization that has taken well to athletes flexing their power, but in McGregor’s case, it has little option but to give him room to pose.
When and if he loses, that relationship is certainly liable to change. Maybe. With McGregor, anything seems possible. He is, after all, a man who told the UFC after he first lost to Diaz that, no, he wouldn’t be defending his featherweight belt and would in fact be fighting Diaz in a rematch. The UFC balked at first, but we all know how that game of chicken ended.
As McGregor continues to consolidate his power, other threats will arise, but so far he has shown himself to be an excellent fighter and shrewd businessman.
On Saturday night, one of two things will happen: Either he will win and go home with two belts, another pay-per-view record and more power than any UFC fighter has ever seen; or he will lose and be forced to regroup while the new UFC ownership team tries to pull back some of the slack it’s been forced to hand him.
For McGregor, these are heady days, but he can come crashing down from his prolonged high in a blink. As Ronda Rousey discovered when she was knocked out by Holly Holm, invincibility is an illusion that often shatters instead of merely being chipped away. The higher you rise, the more crushing the fall. You know all the platitudes.
For McGregor, it’s real life. Swagger, after all, only works when the audience is willingly along for the ride. So far, no one’s found a reason to get off. At UFC 205, at The World’s Most Famous Arena, in one of the world’s greatest cities, the eyeballs watching will represent both pressure and opportunity, but McGregor can’t talk his way through Alvarez or the moment. For us, that makes it fun.
For McGregor, that makes it the edge of everything he’s earned and chased, with a mighty fall below.
When UFC 205 hits the bright lights of New York, the promotion’s biggest star will fittingly stand in the spotlight as both the headliner and the main attraction. The latter designation is true for both fans and the rest of the fighters within th…
When UFC 205 hits the bright lights of New York, the promotion’s biggest star will fittingly stand in the spotlight as both the headliner and the main attraction. The latter designation is true for both fans and the rest of the fighters within the second division he’s attempting to lord over.
If McGregor can defeat Eddie Alvarez on Nov. 12—and he’s a favorite to do so, according to Odds Shark—he’ll become the first UFC fighter ever to simultaneously hold belts in two divisions.
Back in his original featherweight class, McGregor is mostly just a shadow. He hasn’t defended the belt a single time since knocking out Jose Aldo last December and shows little inclination to do so.
Coming soon: matching lightweight turmoil?
Several reporters, including Barry Moran of major UK newspaper The Sun, have reported McGregor will take a lengthy break after this fight, meaning the UFC could have a two-division champ putting both belts on ice for the foreseeable future.
Should everyone panic? Fire up the interim belt-making machine? Joining me to discuss the development is Bleacher Report’s MMA lead writer Chad Dundas.
Mike Chiappetta: Chad, I have to start this off by admitting I enjoy a little chaos from time to time. If McGregor wins and goes on a sabbatical, we get two-division chaos. The featherweight division has already gone a little bit nuts. Jose Aldo has basically retired out of frustration, Frankie Edgar is pissed and Max Holloway is pissed, too.
Meanwhile, the 155ers have barely gotten a taste of McGregor, and KhabibNurmagomedov is out here telling Luke Thomas that if the UFC bypasses him for another title shot, he’ll flex his political muscle to keep the promotion out of Russia.
That kind of threat is one hell of an escalation, so I’d say we’re off to a pretty good start as far as the chaos goes.
Let’s try to look into some of the possible scenarios, going on the assumption of a McGregor win. Even if he decides to take off a few months, literally everyone on the roster from 170 pounds down will want a crack at him. But what seems like the most likely path?
To be blunt, he’ll chart his own path. Whether he wants Nurmagomedov, Aldo or decides, Hey, why not go for that 170-pound belt because I’ve won a fight there, it’s going to be his call. The UFC has ceded that power to him.
While there are plenty of options, I think he goes back to the well and squares up with Nate Diaz one more time with the trilogy and a belt on the line.
Diaz has made him the most money and will again. With a championship in the balance, it’s an easy sell. Sure, you can argue about whether Diaz deserves it, but in today’s UFC, that’s an exercise in futility. The booking philosophy is in money matchups, and nothing burns hotter than McGregor-Diaz.
Chad, what do you think? Is there anyone else out there who makes dollars and sense for McGregor? Does Alvarez’s profile get raised enough for a possible rematch? Does Nurmy’s trash talk move him into the conversation?
Chad: Mark this down as the fourth or fifth McGregor fight in a row where I honestly have no idea what’s going to happen. All I can say with any certainty is that win, lose or draw, he’s going to have some decisions to make when it’s over.
It’s a big leap to just flatly assume McGregor will wrench the 155-pound title away from the current champ. Short of Aldo, Alvarez stacks up as the Irishman’s toughest competition to date inside the Octagon. Regardless of what the odds say, I think McGregor is going to wind up having his hands full.
For the purposes of this discussion, I suppose I’m willing to assume Mystic Mac’s magical march through the UFC continues. As you correctly surmise, a McGregor victory might make the vaunted lightweight division a different place than we’re used to seeing.
The thing we can definitively say is that McGregor will promptly wad up any notion of standard UFC rankings and toss them in the nearest trash bin. This guy is going to chase the biggest money fight he can get, always and forever. That would probably be bad news for Nurmagomedov. It would probably be bad news for Tony Ferguson. And yeah, probably bad news for Alvarez in defeat, too.
To answer the question of who McGregor would fight next, we just need to answer the question of which opponent will make him the most money. Nate Diaz? Great possibility. Nick Diaz? Maybe if they could agree on a weight. Georges St-Pierre? If he and the UFC can come to terms, sure. Robbie Lawler? Maybe an outside chance.
I’ll tell you what would surprise me, though: the UFC letting McGregor take an extended break from the cage without a significant struggle. Considering all we’ve leaned about how important people like McGregor and Ronda Rousey are to the UFC’s bottom line and how much the fight company’s new owners will have to increase profits during the next year, it seems impossible they’d let him cool his heels for much of that time.
What say you, Mike? Is this the last time we see McGregor in the cage for a while? Or will a mutual love of money between fighter and a promoter keep…pulling…him…back…in?
Mike: If he wins, McGregor is going to do whatever McGregor wants to do.
Let’s be blunt: He’s basically called his shots over the last year of his career. The UFC can try to corral him or steer him in a direction, but the only time it tried to take a stand—when it booted McGregor from UFC 200—what happened? It still eventually gave in to his demand to fight Diaz, and he ended up breaking UFC’s all-time pay-per-view event record, per MMAFighting’s Dave Meltzer.
This is a man with growing clout, and a victory over Eddie Alvarez in another fight that is likely to sell huge is only going to increase that.
Part of the fascination with this possible scenario is that the UFC has never had someone with this kind of bargaining power. The new UFC ownership has some truly aggressive earnings numbers to meet. Any extended absence for McGregor would only hurt its chase of those goals.
The interesting thing is McGregor knows that. He knows his worth and importance, so would you really put it past him to publicly announce a hiatus and put two belts on ice while privately telling the UFC there is a number that might pull him back in a little quicker than he originally planned? Could it be a negotiation ploy?
Because let’s face it, even if the UFC acknowledges his worth, that doesn’t mean it’s going to willingly hand over every dollar he requests. There is still an often-painful back-and-forth that goes on behind the scenes before those monster paydays, and while some athletes are loathe to go through that kind of scenario, McGregor seems to relish his ability to play his hand and cash in.
But to circle back to our original question of what happens to the lightweight division in the case of a McGregor win, I think the top five fighters should take a good long look at what’s happened to their featherweight brothers and know that same thing might be coming their way. The best thing they can do is to angle for McGregor in both words and actions and hope he looks their way. If McGregor wins, we’re moving into unprecedented territory, and the division might be in for an unprecedented wait.
Chad, what do you foresee?
Chad: I guess we ought to at least consider the possibility that McGregor is a human being who might legitimately need some time off.
This bout against Alvarez marks his fourth UFC appearance in 11 months. That’s a lot for a championship-level competitor, and it includes two exhaustive press tours leading up to his rescheduled bout with Aldo at UFC 194, the back-to-back blood feuds with Nate Diaz and the ordeal of getting pulled out of UFC 200—that last one ostensibly for reasons of fatigue and/or simple annoyance.
With the news of the UFC’s $4 billion sale to WME-IMG still so fresh in our minds, we’re all focusing a lot on this business’ bottom line financially. Rousey said during an appearance on The Ellen DeGeneres Show last week that her upcoming return against AmanadaNunes at UFC 206 is “definitely one of my last fights” (via MMAFighting), which only intensifies that focus. If Rousey is truly living out her last days as a UFC fighter, it only makes McGregor more important and more valuable.
But we’re sort of doing everyone a disservice here if we don’t also point out how grueling and emotionally taxing this sport can be—especially for someone participating at McGregor‘s level. He’s still just 28 years old, but it would be tough to blame him if he felt like he needed some R&R after spending the last three-and-a-half years building himself into the biggest pay-per-view draw MMA has ever known.
He’s also nothing if not a prescient and self-aware businessman. These days, McGregor seems to be spending a noticeable amount of time trying to establish and promote his new lifestyle brand. Like Rousey, is he already plotting his escape from the world of active professional fighting?
We won’t know. Not for a while. What we do obviously agree on, however, is that if McGregor can pull off a victory over Alvarez and capture the lightweight title on Nov. 12, he’ll continue to be the master of his own destiny. It’ll still be his world, and the rest of us—including the UFC itself—will merely continue to live in it.
On Saturday night in Mexico City, Tony Ferguson broke a UFC record. He defeated Rafael dos Anjos—outdueled him, really—and in doing so, became the first UFC lightweight ever to win nine straight fights.
In most sports, nine straight v…
On Saturday night in Mexico City, Tony Ferguson broke a UFC record. He defeated Rafael dos Anjos—outdueled him, really—and in doing so, became the first UFC lightweight ever to win nine straight fights.
In most sports, nine straight victories is, you know, nice. In MMA, it’s damn well epic. In the 20-plus-year history of the UFC, streaks of that length have been accomplished less than 10 times. Some of the names who’ve done it: Anderson Silva, Jon Jones, Georges St-Pierre, Royce Gracie. Legends, mostly, and now Ferguson has joined them.
While his achievement came somewhat quietly, it is fairly awing to consider that no 155-pounder—not B.J. Penn or Frankie Edgar or Benson Henderson—had ever gotten there before.
Ferguson is the first and the only, and given that historic accomplishment, along with the win over former champion dos Anjos, you might think he would be a shoo-in for the next lightweight title shot. Of course, he’s nothing of the sort.
Instead, his prize is waiting. Instead, he’s just another fighter sucked into the ever-expanding vortex of ConorMcGregor, forcing him to wait and see what happens at UFC 205 and its aftermath before the cloudiness around his future will lift.
While Ferguson (22-3) didn’t help himself by whiffing on his post-fight interview—“Thank you for the fight and Viva Mexico,” were his sole comments to the live audience before walking away from interviewer Jon Anik—his performance firmly stamped him as a threat to whoever might have the belt at the end of next weekend, whether it’s McGregor or current champ Eddie Alvarez.
Using a wide mix of both conventional and unorthodox strikes to go with hellacious pacing, Ferguson earned the most meaningful win of his career by matching and exceeding the pressure of one of the division’s highest-pressure fighters. According to FightMetric, Ferguson landed 157 of 327 strikes, easily outpacing dos Anjos (100 of 232). This in a fight that took place more than a mile above sea level.
Indeed, it was a showcase performance, yet his award is…well, nothing aside from his win bonus. At least not yet.
To be sure, the upcoming week will have just as much bearing on Ferguson’s career as his performance in Mexico City. The only difference is that now he has no say in the outcome.
McGregor’s power in the sport has become so extensive that he has the fate of several peers in his hands when he faces Alvarez next Saturday in New York. If he wins, all bets are off. The division can go in any number of ways, from an immediate rematch with Alvarez to a trilogy bout with Nate Diaz to a faceoff with actual top contender KhabibNurmagomedov. McGregor could also head down to featherweight to defend that belt, take a break altogether or vacate one of the belts.
Anything is possible, though the smart money is betting on the money fight between McGregor and Diaz. The new WME-IMG ownership team has shown a propensity to book based on profit ahead of merit. And there’s not a UFC fight under the sun that would draw more interest and eyeballs than a third bout between the two rivals, particularly given the excellence of the the second matchup between them.
If Alvarez wins, it’s an open field. And that’s where Ferguson erred in declining to raise his hand and demand a title bout when he had the fight world’s attention turned on him. The UFC wants fighters who are going to speak up and promote and build an event. Ferguson can fight like a demon but does it under a low profile, and when the UFC is weighing pros, cons and intangibles, it could be the difference between the opportunity of a lifetime and running in place.
From a skills standpoint at least, Ferguson is right there. He has length and power, boasts an artful striking game and exceptional wrestling, and has an unpredictability about him that makes him a joy to watch. He switches stances and tries unconventional techniques in dangerous spots, has the guts to fight in the pocket and the smarts to work from the outside.
Beyond that, he has an indomitable spirit nearly every championship-level fighter possesses. Fighting at 7,380 feet above sea level, Ferguson never slowed down to take an extra breath. It was all go, all in, all night.
If you were looking for a difference between Ferguson and dos Anjos, that was it. Just a few short months ago, dos Anjos had the reputation as one of the most relentless lightweights walking the planet. Ferguson walked right into the fire and proved he burned hotter and brighter. It was a great result, and hopefully it won’t be a meaningless one. Because how valuable is a streak without a title shot to go along with it?
On a night where elevation was a common topic, Tony Ferguson’s record-breaking performance was enough to move him to the top of the division. Instead, his reward is a spot on the waiting list. At least the line is short, and next week the queue begins moving.
In late March 2016, the UFC was riding as high as it ever had. Coming off a hastily constructed event starring Conor McGregor and Nate Diaz that organically generated a box-office and pay-per-view bonanza, another boon came when, after years of stallin…
In late March 2016, the UFC was riding as high as it ever had. Coming off a hastily constructed event starring Conor McGregor and Nate Diaz that organically generated a box-office and pay-per-view bonanza, another boon came when, after years of stalling, the New York State Assembly finally passed a bill that legalized mixed martial arts.
At UFC headquarters in Las Vegas, the development was viewed as such a watershed moment that company CEO Lorenzo Fertitta led the entire office in a champagne toast.
But what seemed like the beginning of a new cycle of prosperity quickly spiraled into something else entirely. Within weeks, ESPN.com reported that the UFC’s owners were in advanced talks to sell the promotion. Shortly after that, Fertitta and his brother Frank were out as majority owners, taking a multibillion-dollar payday in selling to a consortium led by Hollywood talent agency WME-IMG.
With that, everything changed. The family shop officially became what it had quietly been for years: big business.
It may or may not be a coincidence that in the time since the $4 billion sale, the UFC’s athletes have become more vocal about perceived management slights, pay concerns and injustices than ever in the promotion’s history.
Its detractors are numerous and diverse.
Just days ago, longtime welterweight champion Georges St-Pierre, who is largely viewed as the linchpin of the promotion’s success in Canada and a reliable pay-per-view star, declared himself a free agent, setting in motion the near certainty of pending legal action between the two sides.
In a lengthy and candid interview with MMA Fighting’s Ariel Helwani, St-Pierre said an inability to reach a new deal over the course of several months contributed to his public disenchantment.
“Most fighters in the UFC, they are starving,” he said. “And for UFC, it’s very easy when you keep a lot of your staff starving, they are easier to control.”
St-Pierre’s case recalls that of former UFC heavyweight champion Randy Couture, who attempted a similar maneuver in 2007 before scrapping his attempt at free agency in favor of signing a new deal with the UFC.
In the past, most dust-ups involved only the biggest names on the roster, as those with less seniority or promotional value saw little good in publicly criticizing the organization and facing potential repercussions.
That attitude has changed drastically.
Over the last few months, many members of the rank and file, from bona fide superstars to mid-level athletes to relative newcomers, have gone on the record with issues that as recently as a year ago they discussed only in private among teammates and close confidantes.
Take, for instance, the case of Al Iaquinta, a lightweight who began competing in the UFC in 2012 and reached as high as No. 12 in the rankings before going under the knife for knee surgery in December 2015.
Weeks ago, Iaquinta blasted the UFC on The MMA Hour, saying management had stripped him of the ability to earn post-fight bonuses for three bouts, denied him a chance to renegotiate his contract and originally declined to pay for surgery on the knee he injured while competing for the promotion.
Iaquinta, a native New Yorker, was so incensed that he eventually turned down the opportunity to fight in his home state at Madison Square Garden. He then took it a step further, saying he had retired and moved on to a career in real estate.
There are plenty of others.
Women’s featherweight standout Cris Cyborg has openly and repeatedly questioned the UFC’s approach toward her, saying on Fox Sports’ Speak for Yourself she would have her own division if she had “blond hair and blue eyes,” a swipe at the UFC’s treatment of star Ronda Rousey.
A few weeks ago, interim featherweight champion Jose Aldo asked for his release and promised he would never again fight in the UFC—a move prompted, he told Combate (h/t MMA Fighting), by his distrust in UFC President Dana White after being passed over for a unification bout with Conor McGregor. Aldo met with UFC brass Wednesday, and although he suggested the meeting was productive, he seemed to leave with the same plans he arrived with, telling MMAjunkie, “I think we need to go our own ways.”
There are others. Lightweight contender Khabib Nurmagomedov recently lashed out after saying he felt like a pawn used to set up UFC 205’s McGregor vs. Eddie Alvarez main event. In the aftermath, Nurmagomedov told The Luke Thomas Show that if he didn’t get a title shot after fighting (and presumably beating) Michael Johnson in November, he’d not only leave the UFC but also flex his influence to make sure the promotion never held an event in Russia.
Women’s bantamweight contender Julianna Pena told MMA Fighting she too was considering leaving the promotion after disagreeing with its handing Rousey a title shot upon her return.
Heavyweight veteran Mark Hunt has been at loggerheads with the promotion since after his UFC 200 opponent Brock Lesnar failed a drug test, which marked the third time he fought an opponent who tested positive for performance-enhancing drugs in competition.
“People are scared for years because the company is going to get them,” Hunt told MMA Fighting in July. “Well, f–k the company. They don’t give a s–t about you or anyone else.”
Even welterweight Lorenz Larkin got in on the act, telling Fox Sports of his frustrations in getting marketed despite an exciting style that jibes with the promotion’s usual preferences.
“There’s no push for me,” he said. “Everything I’ve done, I’ve done by myself or with my team as far as on my side. On the other side, I’ll take any fight and I bring it every time I step into the cage, but as far as me getting pushed as an athlete, that’s not happening.”
Adding to the frayed nerves, the new ownership recently purged the UFC’s employee rolls, laying off a number of key executives and support personnel. In total, about 15 percent of the workforce was let go, according to MMAjunkie. There have also been rumblings that ownership will trim down the athlete roster next. All this is taking place under the evolving fighter rights movement, with the new Professional Fighters Association working to organize UFC athletes into a united front.
All things considered, for new management it’s been a wobbly beginning at best and an inauspicious one at worst.
That couldn’t contrast more from the results on paper.
As 2016 goes, it has been something of a banner year. More specifically, the final six months of the year may well break every revenue record for a comparable time frame.
During that time, the promotion is likely to boast four pay-per-view events that surpass 1 million pay-per-view buys.
According to Dave Meltzer, both UFC 200 and UFC 202 passed the 1 million mark. UFC 205, featuring McGregor headlining the UFC’s New York arrival, is a near-lock to blow past that number and has a reasonable shot to set a record for event buys. The next month, Rousey returns in a show that is also likely destined to shoot into the seven figures.
To contextualize how rare a stretch like this is, the UFC went a span of over three years without a single one million PPV seller from August 2010 to December 2013, according to numbers compiled by MMA Payout through the Wrestling Observer.
For the new ownership, these are heady days but tricky ones. From the outside, the UFC may have seemed like an obvious and winning investment, but things have sure gotten difficult fast.
Back in the mid-2000s when investors were throwing money at MMA startups, White had a go-to spiel about promoters who thought they could waltz into the space and immediately make a fortune. It went something like this: “These guys have no clue what they’re doing. We’re in the fight business. We live and breathe this thing.”
Now, aside from White, that’s no longer true. He’s one of the last remaining fight-business purists, the livers and breathers. All of the new WME-IMG people around him are businesspeople, the kind he used to rail about. And all of them will be the ones who determine the UFC’s future.
On paper, the promotion is riding high. Events are selling, and stars are generating more attention than ever before. But just below the surface, the discontent is simmering.
Anything under that kind of pressure can only have two outcomes: Either the new ownership finds a way to cool off its aggrieved parties, or things move to a boil and, eventually, an explosion.
It may be a bit of an exaggeration to say that Georges St-Pierre and the UFC are at war, but the two sides are certainly bracing for a potential legal battle after the events of the last 24 hours. First, the decorated former UFC welterweight champion w…
It may be a bit of an exaggeration to say that Georges St-Pierre and the UFC are at war, but the two sides are certainly bracing for a potential legal battle after the events of the last 24 hours. First, the decorated former UFC welterweight champion went on The MMA Hour to proclaim himself a free agent, telling Ariel Helwanithat his lawyer, James W. Quinn of New York firm Weil, Gotshal and Manges, “terminated” his existing contract with the UFC.
That declaration sounded dubious. After a few hours of silence, the UFC made its stance known, releasing a statement to media including Bleacher Report that St-Pierre remains under contract. The short statement concluded with this ominous note: “Zuffa intends to honor its agreement with St-Pierre and reserves its rights under the law to have St-Pierre do the same.”
Uh-oh.
The contrasting stances effectively and immediately put St-Pierre in legal limbo. After essentially declaring his independence, it appears a lawsuit is imminent.
To unpack the ramifications of these developments, I’m joined by B/R MMA Lead Writer Chad Dundas.
Mike Chiappetta: I don’t think any of us who’ve been watching this develop are too surprised with what’s happened. For months, GSP has spoken about returning, only to hear UFC President Dana White question his true desire to fight again.
In doing so, you had to wonder what White’s motives were. Here, St-Pierre was publicly saying he wanted to compete, and somehow White knew better? Of course not. White was mostly playing out the battle publicly as a sign of things to come. After all, the UFC wouldn’t be asserting its rights to St-Pierre if it really believed he didn’t want to fight. To White, if you don’t want to sign for what the UFC thinks is fair, then you’re not a real fighter. That’s how he sees it, but St-Pierre deserves to negotiate for every penny he thinks is fair.
The problem was, in this new world with new ownership, things are just different.
In purchasing the UFC, new parent company WME IMG took on over $1 billion in loans to fund the deal. In a recent Bloomberg story, it was reportedthat when the deal was marketed, prospective investors were shown estimates that stated the UFC’s earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization were double the actual number.
That effectively means the new ownership will have to work twice as hard to reach projected earnings and revenues targets. While St-Pierre could certainly help the bottom line, the new UFC brass likely sees his contract demands as slicing into its piece of the pie rather than taking an equitable share.
Now we’ll have to wait and see how long they’ll be willing to fight this battle. St-Pierre is a beloved figure, a true pro who represented the sport as an ambassador and with professional aplomb. The UFC has always aggressively protected its contract rights, but with the ongoing antitrust lawsuit, and the Federal Trade Commission constantly snooping around, this could be a public relations debacle for the UFC if it chooses to plow forward. In some ways, this battle is not quite as unwinnable as it may seem.
Chad, what do you think GSP’s true motivations are? Is he just trying to get paid what he’s worth, or do you think he has grander ideas in mind?
Chad: I’ve always considered St-Pierre to be a reasonable and forward-thinking fighter. Not long after his promotional debut back in 2004, it became apparent he was a next-gen talent—the prototype for what it would take to be successful in the future UFC. Already a phenomenal athlete, he worked tirelessly to transform himself from a pure kyokushin karate stylist into perhaps the most effective wrestler the sport has ever seen.
Why? Because he knew that’s what would be required to succeed.
Along the way he became the UFC’s biggest pay-per-view draw and a modest crossover star years before Ronda Rousey and Conor McGregor ever showed their faces. He was among the first high-profile fighters to advocate for stiffer drug testing and one of the first to start landing big-name sponsors like Under Armour and Gatorade.
So I suppose it shouldn’t surprise us that now St-Pierre is trying to drag the UFC kicking and screaming into the future once again.
Because, make no mistake, free agency is the future of MMA. Free agency is destined to become as common in our sport as it is in professional football, baseball or basketball. It’s only a matter of time. It’s just going to take someone willing to do the heavy lifting.
Perhaps that person is St-Pierre.
For that reason, there are bigger things going on here than merely whether we’ll see GSP fight inside the Octagon—or anywhere else—ever again. Give credit to the man for having the strength and foresight to take on this fight even though it could potentially cost him the remainder of his own MMA career.
Judging by this quote during his appearance with Helwani, St-Pierre knows exactly what’s at stake, not just for himself but for everybody currently under contract to the UFC.
“Most fighters in the UFC, they are starving,” St-Pierre said. “And for UFC, it’s very easy when you keep a lot of your staff starving, they are easier to control … It’s up to guys like me, Conor McGregor, Anderson Silva, Jose Aldo, guys that are big names to stand for these guys that [don’t] have these options.”
It would be a very big deal if a legal battle between St-Pierre and the UFC resulted in even part of the standard UFC contract being struck down by a court. That fighter contract, after all, has been the UFC’s primary tool in fashioning almost total control over the MMA industry dating back some 15 years.
And you know what? St-Pierre might be the guy to see this kind of legal action through.
What do you think, Mike? Are these two sides actually destined for the courtroom? Or is this just ploy by St-Pierre to get the fight company to bend to his demands? And isn’t the UFC taking a tremendous risk if it does go to court to try to retain GSP’s services?
Mike: Part of what makes this a fascinating struggle is the different levels this fight is being waged on. St-Pierre is certainly interested in his own rights, but as you said, he may also be dragging the rest of the UFC roster along for the ride.
St-Pierre’s attorney, the aforementioned James Quinn, has an expertise in high-stakes commercial disputes, trying cases with billions of dollars at stake. It seems clear to me that he believes he has found something in the UFC’s contract that will allow St-Pierre to void it.
St-Pierre previously mentioned the Reebok dealas one stumbling block. He was not on the UFC’s active roster when it was signed, and he likely feels that the deal would negatively impact his earnings potential due to his ongoing relationship with Under Armour.
Essentially, the UFC’s changing of the terms and conditions harmed him. This seems like a logical argument, but St-Pierre will have to be willing to play the long game to prove it in a court of law. It will be stressful, messy and costly, but if any fighter has the constitution to go through with it, it’s St-Pierre. Remember, he has spoken openly about his obsessions, and if he really feels a need to prove that certain terms of UFC contracts violate basic law and are therefore unenforceable, he would be exactly the type to take on this fight.
For once, the bigger question is, will the UFC choose to engage him? For now, it’s a game of chicken, but if St-Pierre doesn’t fold, the UFC will be risking more than just a battle with him. A court decision in his favor in regards to contract terms may free scores of fighters who faced the same problem but chose to sign—some might say under duress—rather than take a legal route.
There have been plenty of contract and labor lawyers who feel the contracts are ripe for such a situation. A few years ago, for instance, when St-Pierre was last active, B/R’s own Jonathan Snowden did a deep dive into contracts. One labor and employment expert, Dr. Zev Eigen, called some of the existing UFC contract terms “unconscionable and unenforceable.”
Notably, in that same feature, Eigen said he believed things would get worse before they get better. Three years later, here we are.
All we know is that St-Pierre is in a state of limbo, similar to ones faced in the past by Randy Couture, Quinton “Rampage” Jackson and Eddie Alvarez. Both sides have dug their feet in. This will be heading to a courtroom soon, but the bigger question is, will it stay there? The UFC is notoriously litigious, so will St-Pierre have the drive to match its efforts? Will he be willing to sacrifice both time and money to make a point? I think he will. What do you think, Chad, how does this ultimately end?
Chad: In any courtroom drama between fighter and promoter, the company has the upper hand. This is true not only due to the resources necessary to wage such a battle, but because of time. Athletes have a short window in which to monetize their skills. The longer they spend waiting for the wheels of justice to turn, the tighter and tighter that window becomes.
The reality is, most UFC fighters—for precisely the reasons St-Pierre outlines in the quote I used above—don’t have that option.
But that’s also why I think GSP might be especially well suited for this fight. He really has nothing left to prove in MMA, and we have every reason to believe he is financially set for the rest of his life. He still has the itch to compete, but if this disagreement goes from staring contest to all-out legal war, I think he has the patience and the wherewithal to see it through.
On Tuesday, things took their unavoidable next step. After the UFC released its terse statement saying St-Pierre still belongs to it, the fighter’s attorney fired back, making it seem as though Team GSP is more than willing to go to court.
After roughly nine months of negotiating, Quinn told ESPN’s Brett Okamoto that the UFC has yet to tender an official bout agreement to St-Pierre. The former welterweight champion and his legal team believe that gives them the right to terminate his contract.
Whether this claim stands up in court, whether it’s just part of a strategy designed to more broadly attack the UFC’s contract or whether that’s where we’re even headed remains to be seen.
The only thing we know for sure is that this a battle between two heavyweights—and one that could be more interesting and far more influential than any GSP fight we’ve seen inside the cage.
For as long as Conor McGregor has made noise—which is to say, as long as he’s been in the UFC—he has drawn critics. Those who said he’s all talk, those who said his wins were hollow, those who said he’s paved his own soft road.