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Mark Hunt Blasts MMA Unions For Being All Talk

In the days leading up to his main event bout withDerrick “The Black Beast” Lewis at tonight’s (Sat., June 10, 2017) UFC Fight Night 110 from Auckland, New Zealand, Mark Hunt is as vocal as ever in his quest for a level playing field for fighters competing in the UFC. While already engaged in a lawsuit against […]

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While already engaged in a lawsuit against the Lesnar, Dana White, and the UFC surrounding his UFC 200 loss to the hulking former champion, who failed his drug test for performance-enhancing substances, Hunt recently criticized fellow fighters for not backing a union. Several attempts to organize, such as the apparently defunct PFA and the shockingly quiet MMAAA, have proven to be ineffective at best and nonexistent at worst.

This week, the heavyweight knockout specialist discussed his ongoing issues with the promotion, and revealed his thoughts on the importance of fighter representation.

“I’m never confident about anything, especially with law,” Hunt said on Monday during The MMA Hour. “All I’m trying to do is get a fair go at fighting. I’m sick of fighting these juicers, and like I said before, if they didn’t do enough to keep me happy, I’ll just do it myself. You guys put me in this position. I didn’t put myself in this position. I didn’t do anything wrong here. So you need to fix what you did wrong and change things, because like I said before, someone’s going to die.

“But I’m glad that the judge allowed it to go through to discovery, which is good.”

I don’t really care. If they want to fire me, go right ahead,” Hunt said. “It doesn’t do anything, I’ll just find a new contract. Like I said, if that’s the case, then why even want to be a part of the UFC? I’ve done nothing wrong here. All I’ve done is been a good company man, [fighting] all the time. You want me to fight? Yeah, when’s the date and where? Look, I’m just sick of fighting these juicers. They just keep giving me f*cking cheaters, so that’s all I’m trying to do is make it fair so that I can get a shot at fighting here for a title. And every time I start getting a run on, I get a f*cking juicehead because that’s all they have. So like I said, if they want to fire me now, go right ahead.”

When the subject of a fighters union was brought up, Hunt remained cynical. He has a large project on his hands in his court case, and overall, “The Super Samoan” doubts the resolve, ironically enough, of a bunch of fighters’ ability to truly stand up to their powerful employer:

“I’m just focused on fighting and on the court case,” Hunt said. “Like I said, with the union, I don’t know what’s going on. All the fighters need to band together for that, but there’s a lot of scared puppies out there.

“I hope a union starts or something happens, but it’s all big talk, big talk, but that’s all it is at the moment. Just talk. Right now, it’s nothing.”

Hunt is set to take on Lewis this Saturday in his native New Zealand. The former kickboxer sports a 13-12 record in MMA, most recently suffering a knockout loss to Alistair Overeem in March.

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Donald Cerrone Is Ready To Be ‘Front Face’ Of UFC Fighters’ Union

When news broke last night that nine UFC fighters would be named to a Professional Fighters Association (PFA) interim executive board in order to work towards the oft-discussed fighters’ union, it served to emphasize the current climate amongst UFC competitors after the company’s record-breaking sale and restrictive sponsorship deal with Reebok. None of the top

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When news broke last night that nine UFC fighters would be named to a Professional Fighters Association (PFA) interim executive board in order to work towards the oft-discussed fighters’ union, it served to emphasize the current climate amongst UFC competitors after the company’s record-breaking sale and restrictive sponsorship deal with Reebok.

None of the top names were revealed in the announcements described by Lucas Middlebrook, but Donald Cerrone – one of the UFC’s most popular fighters – unveiled his willingness to spearhead a union during a recent media lunch scrum via MMA Fighting, and as usual, ‘Cowboy’ held nothing back:

“I’ll gladly put my head on the chopping block and say I’ll be the front face of this mother f*cker. I’ve paid my way, man. I’ve earned the right to sit here and speak. I think there’s a lot of people that are scared and not willing to step up and do it. It’s gonna take a couple of us and it needs to be done.”

Much of the backlash among fighters revolves around the massive amount of money that new owners WME-IMG were willing to pay for the promotion, a harsh reality that finally woke them up to their true relative value. The owners have only served to further an uneasy feeling by laying off ‘less than 15 percent’ of the total staff, including several top executives last week and more layoffs this week.

‘Cowboy’ wants to be the head man of the union, and it’s no surprise to hear him say it. Often a honest critic of what he earned to put on some of the most exciting bouts in the Octagon, Cerrone stated it is simply time for a union now that there are new owners:

“I’ll be the guy,” Cerrone said. “I’m not scared. All I’m saying is we need a fighters union 1,000, million percent, especially with the new owners coming in and I think now is the time. I want to know their point of view and how they want to attack the whole situation,” Cerrone said. “Because I don’t know. There’s a lot of things that I don’t know.”

It’s understandable why fighters want more certainty as a new regime takes over by cutting costs in a major way at first, something that fighters like Cerrone most likely don’t look upon positively. After a failed title bid at his usual lightweight last year, Cerrone has won three straight by stoppage a division up at welterweight, providing highly entertaining fights suggesting he deserves to get paid what he provides.

‘Cowboy’ then moved focus to the perceived lack of organization amongst fighters, who nearly always stick to their own respective inner circles in an often self-centered sport. With so much fighters lack in the way of benefits in competition where the health is on the line in a big way, the streaking welterweight voiced his stance for fighters to finally fight for themselves:

“We have no direction,” Cerrone said. “We have no one to stand up for the fighters’ rights. If something bad were to happen, no one backs him and it’s just him alone and everything gets washed out. We need people to stand up and fight for it.”

In closing, Cerrone, a thrill-seeking adrenaline junkie who is considered the most risk-taking fighter outside the Octagon, stated something that none of us would ever doubt about him; the only difference it was now all about his bid to head the pending union:

“I’m not afraid,” Cerrone said. “I’m not scared to put my neck on the line.”

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Report: Nine Fighters Will Be Announced As Executive Board In Next Step For UFC Union

A vital step in solidifying a potential fighter’s union in the UFC is on the horizon. The Professional Fighters Association (PFA) started recently by former baseball agent Jeff Borris and attorney Lucas Middlebrook is expected to form an interim executive board made up of nine current UFC veterans within the month, with the board being

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A vital step in solidifying a potential fighter’s union in the UFC is on the horizon.

The Professional Fighters Association (PFA) started recently by former baseball agent Jeff Borris and attorney Lucas Middlebrook is expected to form an interim executive board made up of nine current UFC veterans within the month, with the board being announced during fight week for November 12’s anticipated UFC 205.

Middlebrook, who infamously went to bat for popular UFC welterweight Nick Diaz last year, told MMA Fighting today that these nine fighters would form a foundation of making policy decisions for the potential union:

“Those nine individuals are going to be responsible for making policy decisions. As the union starts to collect more authorization cards and gets closer to potentially filing with the NLRB (National Labor Relations Board), or asking for voluntary recognition, there’s certain things that you have to do both from an administrative end and from a legal standpoint.”

Middlebrook also elaborated on how the fighter executive board would serve to galvanize a fighter’s union for the betterment of UFC competitors’ careers overall:

“Obviously I’ll be there to counsel them on any legal points and answer any questions they have,” Middlebrook continued. “But it’s going to be a union of the fighters and run by the fighters, so the sooner we can get some sort of executive board in place, really, I think the more genuine and the more realistic that the union is, because you have fighters already making decisions for the profession and their career.”

With the overall climate in MMA certainly trending towards the formation of a union or at least some other organized board, fighter pay and treatment has been at the center of many discussions surrounding the sport after the UFC was sold to talent giant WME-IMG for a record-setting $4.2 billion this July.

Part of the new owner’s introduction to running the company was reportedly to remove a deal offered to longtime welterweight champion Georges St-Pierre for his return, a move that has only served to spark more backlash towards a company that is appearing more cold and cruel towards it athletes. Middlebrook believes a union could help St-Pierre argue his case:

“The way I think it would help him is, typical amongst collective bargaining agreements is you have a grievance and arbitration process,” Middlebrook said. “So if you have contractual disputes, and this could even relate to individual fighter agreements because that would be something that would be negotiated — you would have a standard fight agreement and then obviously fighters could negotiate for different things upward, but you couldn’t go below that — so if you had a situation like this where the parties weren’t seeing eye-to-eye, then GSP could file a grievance through the union process. And the union, if they wanted to, could what’s called ‘fund that grievance.‘

“The union would then be essentially paying for it to be processed through the grievance and arbitration procedure, which is a much faster and cost-effective way to resolve these disputes than going to court and litigating for a year or two and spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on legal fees. And if the parties can’t resolve it, you go in front of an independent arbitrator or a panel of arbitrators, and you lay out your case. And typically you’re looking at a solution on those things in anywhere from three-to-six months, as opposed to years in litigation.

“So I think that’s one big area where it would’ve helped him and he would’ve been able to have the backing of the union behind him, which is obviously going to provide more leverage than just a single person trying to take on the UFC.”

There’s no announcement as to whether or not St-Pierre will join or even head the executive board, but Middlebrook’s detailing of the scenario makes it seem like a union would definitely make it easier for fighters to stand up for themselves.

Change – and in no small matter – appears all but certain for a UFC roster of fighters disenfranchised with how they’ve been paid and treated, something that doesn’t seem to be improving under new ownership. A union could perhaps level the playing field for the combatants in many ways, and fans will find out which nine fighters will spearhead this long-overdue movement as early as next week.

Let’s hope it results in positive, lasting change for the sport of MMA.

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