Still unpaid from apparel company Fear the Fighter, Bellator MMA featherweight contender Georgi Karakhanyan isn’t happy.
Fear the Fighter, a mixed martial arts apparel company, continues to gain more and more controversy as the days go by.
A few years ago, several fighters including Michael Bisping, Gegard Mousasi, and Cub Swanson all claimed Fear the Fighter, an official sponsor of theirs, hadn’t paid them for their fights. And, at the time, the more fighters who spoke out against the company, the more exposure — bad exposure, that is — the controversy received. The fighters involved wanted everyone — promoters, media, and fans — to know what was going on. They wanted to expose Fear the Fighter.
But who exactly is, or was, behind Fear the Fighter? That information is still somewhat unknown. UFC lightweight John Makdessi was listed as the company’s president, but last year he denied most of his involvement with the company.
Bellator MMA featherweight contender Georgi Karakhanyan is another fighter who publicly spoke out against Fear the Fighter for not paying him his sponsorship money. The Fear the Fighter controversy has died down as it has been over a year since its initial major exposure, but Karakhanyan gave an update on the situation on a recent episode of BloodyElbow.com’s The MMA Circus.
“They haven’t paid me,” he said. “F-ck those motherf-ckers. They haven’t paid me. If I see anyone that represents that company, I’m going to f-ck them up. That’s something f-cked up that you don’t do to fighters. I put your sh-t on the banner, I put your sh-t on the shirt, I put your sh-t on the shorts and you don’t want to pay me? It’s bull sh-t. A lot of fighters — we make money from sponsors. That was a good pay day for me. I don’t know who controls that company, I know they’re from Canada. I’m going to fly up there and find those motherf-ckers. They haven’t paid me. I know they haven’t paid some of the other fighters.
“It’s been three years. I had this guy, Julian from Upgrade Management, helping me get sponsors. He’s been trying to call them, and they’re just giving us the run down. I have all the emails but they give us the run down. ‘Oh, call this guy.’ We call that guy and they’re like, ‘Oh, call this other guy.’ And then they’re like, ‘Okay, don’t call this number again.’ It’s really messed up what they do. The window of opportunity for fighters is small. The sponsors, the paycheck. They still owe me $3500.”
Despite Karakhanyan’s lack of sponsorship money due to Fear the Fighter denying him payment, he says finding and having his own sponsors is better than being a part of the UFC’s sponsorship deal with Reebok.
“I feel bad for UFC fighters,” he said. “They’re making some ridiculous amount of low money. When I was sponsored by Reebok, I made way more than what Alistair Overeem made last fight. When I look at those numbers, I’m like, ‘Man, I feel bad for all these UFC fighters.’ Now that UFC doesn’t have them wearing all that, they all look like robots when they wear those uniforms. I’m glad Bellator doesn’t have that policy, and I’m glad we can wear anything, like all the other sponsors. It looks to be pretty good for us, all the Bellator fighters, but it sucks for all the other fighters in the UFC.”
Some fighters could argue against Karakhanyan’s opinion by saying that a low amount of guaranteed money from the UFC’s sponsorship deal is better than a larger sum of money that isn’t guaranteed when you’re signed to another organization. Either way, Karakhanyan is still fed up with the notorious Fear the Fighter.
“If you look at it that way, with the Reebok you’re guaranteed $2500. If you look at it that way, yeah (I agree UFC sponsorship could be better), but if you look at the other way… You know what, f-ck Fear the Fighter, or whatever they are.”