Dana White sticks to his word as fighters call for $306,000 bonus at most expensive UFC event ever
Dana White has refused to increase the bonuses ahead of UFC 306.
After every event, the UFC CEO rewards four fighters with a $50,000 performance bonus – but he’s been known to up the ante occasionally.
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In April, he increased the bonuses to $300,000 and ultimately ended up giving away an additional $1.2million at the landmark UFC 300 show.
During a UFC 306 pre-fight press conference on Thursday, the fighters and crowd tried to pressure White into going one better by making the bonuses $306,000.
Flyweight fighter Édgar Cháirez asked his boss, who has vowed to honour Mexico’s great combat sports history at UFC 306, to make things a bit more interesting.
“Listen, I think if we already have an event to celebrate the hardest working people in the world maybe a different kind of paycheque or sort of additional bonus to reward us for such hard work,” he said via a translator.
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“What do you say, Dana?”
Everyone on stage began chanting the MMA mogul’s name and the crowd joined in - but White just silently smiled at the wave of pressure coming his way.
Ultimately, he snubbed Cháirez’s suggestion with five words.
White said: “Who has the next question?”
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The 55-year-old stuck to his guns after recently vowing to never increase bonuses again.
White made them $100,000 for UFC 304 in Manchester in July – but the card failed to deliver, and Paddy Pimblett ended up taking home two of the bonuses for his win against Bobby Green.
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Interim heavyweight champion Tom Aspinall got a bonus for his 60-second win over Curtis Blaydes, and his teammate, Mick Parkin, was rewarded for his first-round knockout.
Overall, the card was lacklustre. Seven consecutive bouts went to the judges’ scorecards and the main event between Leon Edwards and Belal Muhammad bored people to sleep.
“I think tonight’s show that we should not. Upping them doesn’t change anything," White angrily said during his post-fight press conference.
"It doesn’t make anybody fight any harder. It doesn’t change anything. I’m not doing this again. Ever.
"Today was the last, the last day that I’m doing that. I’m not saying that in the future, the bonuses couldn’t get up, but I’m not gonna be at a press conference, say, ‘200, 300’.
"F****** never again. You can thank everybody on this card for that.
“Nobody fought any harder. There was no sense of urgency. ‘Holy s**t! I want the $100K!’”
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