Former UFC welterweight contender Jon Fitch has been under the media spotlight ever since he was released from the organization.
Fitch is set to make his World Series of Fighting debut at WSOF 3 this Friday evening against another former UFC fighter, Josh Burkman.
Leading up to his debut, Fitch has been making comments on the UFC’s “hostile work environment.” UFC President Dana White came out with a rebuttal to Fitch’s comments this past week stating, “we paid him $302,000 in discretionary bonuses – $302,000. That’s money that me and Lorenzo decided to give him above and beyond the deal that he signed.”
While Fitch says he is not focusing on his past – on Monday he took to his official YouTube.com account to put out a video to discuss UFC finances.
“There’s been some talk involving money matters and me and some bonuses I’ve made over my career with the UFC. So I wanted to shine some more light on my financial matters to give the fans a better idea the type of money a fighter like me actually makes.
In my 18 fights with the UFC, I was paid $1,020,000 – that was show money and win money. I also made about $300,000 in bonuses. Two of those bonuses were Fight of the Night bonuses. One was Georges St-Pierre, a $60,000 Fight of the Night, and the Erick Silva fight, that was a $70,000 bonus. So in total I made $1,322,000.”
This is fairly close to what White mentioned last week. However, Fitch took it a step further and broke down the logistics of the money.
“Sounds like a lot of money, but lets look at that a little bit closer. Out of the 18 fights out of that $1,020,000, I paid 20-percent of that to management and the gym. So if you take that number, $1,322,000, divided by seven and a half years, I was roughly making just over $176,000 a year. Now remember, that’s before management and gym fees. You also have other expenses you have to pay for, equipment, stuff like that.”
He finished off the video by stating that money was never the problem and that he “never complained about money.”
“I’ve never complained about money, I’ve always loved the money that I made from fighting with the UFC, and organizations before I fought with the UFC.”
