Retired MMA legend Georges St-Pierre says the UFC’s new broadcast deal with Paramount could be “terrible” for fighters.
The UFC announced on Monday it had signed a seven-year deal with Paramount which would bring most pay-per-views to an end in the US – with events appearing on Paramount’s streaming service or on CBS TV network.
The deal is reportedly worth more than £700m a year, or £5.7bn in total, an incredible increase from the £370m five-year deal the UFC had with ESPN previously.
St-Pierre, a two-weight UFC champion and an all-time great, questioned where the deal leaves fighters – especially those who negotiated a cut of pay-per-view sales.
“It could be good for the UFC, as a promoter, [but] terrible for the fighters because when I was competing I was able to have a great argument to negotiate on my contract,” St-Pierre told Covers.
“I could tell the UFC, ‘hey, if you want me to do all the promotion, I want to become a partner. I want a piece of the pie to negotiate a part of the pay-per-view revenue’.
“Because if I’m doing all the promotion, I’m helping you, but you need to help me. You need to make me a partner.
“So it might be a bad thing for the fighters in a way that they have less leverage [to negotiate more money].”
Jake Paul, who has publicly feuded with UFC president Dana White over fighter pay since swapping YouTube for boxing, said athletes now have a “clear picture” of what the UFC’s revenue is.
“No more PPV excuses. Get your worth boys and girls,” he added.
Speaking about fighter pay, White wouldn’t be drawn into a detailed discussion on Tuesday.
“The fighters are going to get tons of promotion,” White said.
“I’m not going to have any comments on that yet (fighter pay) because we’ve still got to get together and figure this stuff out. It’s August, we have till January.
“The low hanging fruit which is easy to answer, bonuses are obviously going up.”
Fight bonuses are currently capped at £37,000.
The biggest stars like Ronda Rousey, St-Pierre and Jon Jones were often given ‘PPV points’ on top of their fight purse, allowing them to take a cut of the overall sales from any fight night they were involved with.
