Posted on 2/22/126 by Colin Vassallo
Appearing on The Jim Rome Show, Ronda Rousey criticized TKO
and UFC for no longer having the priority of putting up the
best fights where priority now is spend as little money as
possible.
Talking about her upcoming fight against Gina Carano on
Netflix, promoted by MVP, Rousey said that they did take the
fight to Dana White first and he did give her a deal which
would have made her more money than anyone in history.
“I went to Dana White and said, ‘Dude…you always say that
I’m the best fighter you ever worked with. Like, reward me
for it. Don’t punish me for being easy to work with. Give me
the best deal you ever gave anybody,” Rousey said. “He came
back and he literally brought me a deal where I would make
more per pay-per-view buy than anybody in history!”
But with no PPV model and now just streaming, the way
fighters are paid has changed and Rousey said that they did
not want to set a precedent of giving her the guaranteed
money because once she’s paid for that, then they have to do
it for the rest as well.
“It’s in their best interest actually not to put on the best
fights possible, but to spend as little as money as possible
so that they can keep it,” Rousey continued. “It no longer
made sense for for me to go over there because they didn’t
want to pay us the money that we deserve because then for
the rest of the the time of the deal, they’re going to have
to pay everybody else more. And so then I decided to look
elsewhere.”
In the post UFC Fight Night 267 press conference, UFC
President Dana White was asked about it and quizzed if he’s
disappointed that they’re not promoting but happy that Ronda
is getting back into the sport.
“Yeah, her and I have been talking about this since last
year and, hm, yeah…it just didn’t work out,” White said.
“I’m happy…listen, me and Gina are in a really good place,
we weren’t at one point and I’m happy for both of them.”