UFC champion Israel Adesanya has called for the promotion to increase their $50,000 performance bonuses.
Adesanya is no stranger to receiving a UFC performance bonus as the middleweight king has racked up eight $50,000 checks in 15 appearances for the organisation. The UFC typically hands out two or three 'Knockout of the Night' bonuses and one 'Fight of the Night' bonus for each event they host, with all fighters who receive the bonus being awarded $50,000.
UFC boss Dana White has increased the bonus in the past as fighters who competed at UFC 100 in 2009 were granted $100,000 if they won a bonus. Fighters who competed at UFC 262 in May 2021 were also given $75,000 if they won a bonus after a public campaign from Tony Ferguson to increase the figure.
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Adesanya has now called for bonuses to be permanently increased as he said on a recent episode of Impaulsive: “The UFC and WWE merger, $21.4 billion dollar company. I’m like, ‘Yo, they can go up.’ It’s been a few years, inflation has been going up. The bonus got to go up, that’s how I feel. I've told them this and I’ve said this publicly, it’s not crazy.
"My knockouts alone are worth $50,000. That’s knockouts alone. I’ve said this, the UFC, sometimes they bump it up to $100,000 for certain cards. UFC 200 or UFC 100 I think they did, the bonuses were worth like $100,000. When I knock someone out, I normally get a bonus, so I’m like my knockouts are worth $50,000.”
UFC fighters are also sometimes given discretionary bonuses that are not made public. White has previously admitted that if an event has several highlight moments and fighters miss out on bonuses because of that, he often gifts the fighter a cheque behind the scenes.
“There will be a night where some crazy s*** happens throughout the whole card, and then we have to pick what we thought were the $50,000 bonuses, but somebody else was right in the running. They could have got it too and it depends, I’ll write them a cheque for anywhere from $10,000 to $25,000," White told The New York Post.
