Thanks to MMAjunkie.com: WEC 45 Donald Cerrone: $24,000 (includes $12,000 win bonus) def. Ed Ratcliff: $9,000 Anthony Njokuani: $8,000 ($4,000 win bonus) def. Chris Horodecki: $12,000 Joseph Benavidez: $25,000 ($12,500 win bonus) def. Rani Yahya: $9,000 Scott Jorgensen: $14,000 ($7,000 win bonus) def. Takeya Mizugaki: $8,000 Bart Palaszewski: $10,000 ($5,000 win bonus) def. Anthony Pettis: $3,000 Zach Micklewright: $4,000 ($2,000 win bonus) def. Muhsin Corbbrey: $4,000 Chad George: $5,000 ($2,000 win bonus) def. John Hosman: $3,000 Brandon Visher: $6,000 ($3,000 win bonus) def. Courtney Buck: $3,000 Brad Pickett: $6,000 ($3,000 win bonus) def. Kyle Dietz: $3,000 Erik Koch: $4,000 ($2,000 win bonus) def. Jameel Massouh: $3,000 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 that are not disclosed by the organization. They also do not include the WEC's traditional "fight night" bonuses. In other words, the above salary figures are simply base salaries reported to the commission and do not reflect entire compensation packages for the event. SF Evolution Scott Smith: $55,000 (no win bonus) def. Cung Le via: $150,000 Gilbert Melendez: $55,000 (no win bonus) def. Josh Thomson: $30,000 Ronaldo "Jacare" Souza: $65,000 (includes $10,000 win bonus) def. Matt Linland: $50,000 Muhammed "King Mo" Lawal: $20,000 ($10,000 win bonus) def. Mike Whitehead: $30,000 Antwain Britt: $10,000 ($5,000 win bonus) def. Scott Lighty: $5,000 ****** Wilcox: $5,000 (no win bonus) def. Daisuke Nakamura: $200 Alex Crispim: $4,000 ($2,000 win bonus) def. A.J. Fonseca: $2,000 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. In other words, these are simply base salaries reported to the commission and do not represent the total amounts earned by each fighter.
I assume/hope Nakamura actually got 2,000 and not 200. Why no win bonuses for some fighters but win bonuses for others, I wonder.
$200 is not a typo. I understand from the convo over at mmajunkie that it was set up like that for particular reasons i.e. gets taxed less, might still be with M1 so they are paying him etc
Muhammed "King Mo" Lawal, who also competed on the main card and make his promotional debut, earned $20,000, half which came in the form of a win bonus. However, CSAC officials said the fighter was fined 10 percent of his purse for an issue with his sponsor. (Lawal splashed the cage with Rockstar Energy Drink after his win.)
Hopefully when they merge the WEC into the UFC these guys will get paid what they deserve. A lot of these guys are miles better than some of the bigger fighters and get paid far less. It's a disgrace.
UFC really need to merge the organisations. 99% of mainstream fans I know do not have a clue that WEC is a sister company which specialises in the lower weight classes.
Or just promote WEC better. Some of that money they've been pouring into a stupid reality show would do the trick. :deal Seriously, I'd bet the budget for TUF alone eclipses what they spend on WEC (payroll, purses, sanctioning, airtime, advertising...). I kind of like the separate identity and lower-weight focus. It's just grossly underexposed, which is why mainstream fans probably think it's a cheap knock-off promotion and not a complementary organization under the same parent banner as UFC.
I think TUF is brillant and often the mainstream fan likes that sort of thing. Loads of my mates watch the Contender but wouldn't bother if those sames fighters were on a card that was advertised. People want a story, controversy etc WEC and UFC are owned by the same company. I don't understand why they are still seperate entities. The lower weight classes can produce fights just as good as any other weight class so they should be advertised on the top level like the UFC is. Is it worth spending money on promoting a whole new company? If the UFC just added a few weight classes everyone would pick up on that quickly.
See, that's where my opinion becomes colored by my perspective - were I in charge, my inclination would be "screw the casual fan" and to promote the product that is maybe less lucrative but far more appealing to the diehards (which any poll would show you is WEC, not TUF). Simply absorbing it into UFC is certainly food for thought, but think about how hard it is for fighters with very good records in the existing weight classes to keep a contract...let alone get screen time...in the UFC as it is. And that's with them having very frequent events on a monthly (or more!) basis. Throw in all the lower-weight guys currently campaigning (and starring) in the WEC, and something's gotta give. A lot of talent will be pushed to the backburner, and somebody will suffer. If not the WEC guys, then some of the mid-level talents who currently work their tails off to compete for spots on UFC prelim cards. It's an oversaturation of talent, and there's only so many people you can book per event. Spacing it out between two independent organizations is a better fit for the talent as far as exposure...although obviously the WEC talents are getting screwed out of comparable money under the status quo.
