Miesha Tate discusses comeback fight payout after expenses, ‘You cannot set out to do this for the money’

Miesha Tate needed to make a successful comeback in July – not only for her title hopes but her bank account.

The former UFC bantamweight champion returned after a five-year retirement to take on Marion Reneau. Looking sharper than ever, Tate managed to outstrike and outgrapple her opponent en route to a third-round TKO and earn a $50,000 Performance of the Night bonus.

Regardless, fighter pay remains an issue even for legends in the sport.

“My whole fight purse was gone; show and win, for this fight,” Tate told said on MMA on Sirius (h/t Bloody Elbow). “I at least spent, it had to be about 98 percent at least. So, maybe I walked away with a little bit. But, out of $200,000? Yeah, I’m just lucky I made a bonus, to be honest.

“I’m serious, that’s how much it costs. Because you take taxes off the top. 70 percent of my fight purse is gone immediately, right off the top. So I have 30 percent to work with. And that 30 percent I take to buy my organic foods, to get my – whatever – training gear, heart rate monitors, whatever other things that I need to invest in to make the camp go well. And it’s expensive. You know, it’s very expensive to eat like that.”

Miesha Tate, 35, captured the UFC title in March 2016 with a huge fifth-round rear-naked choke submission comeback win over Holly Holm. In her fight that followed, she and Amanda Nunes headlined UFC 200 where Tate made $500,000 in defeat – the challenging Nunes made $100,000.

“It’s very expensive to just facilitate the things that I need to do…travel to training different places,” Tate said. “Especially when you have your head coach is remote, is in Spokane, you know? So I fly him down, fly him back. Flying out to Denver to go and train with Trevor Wittman, getting to Southern California to train with Treigning Labs; all the supplements I’ve had to invest in, and things like that as well. It’s just, yeah, it’s a lot more expensive than people would think. It’s not as glorious.

“And that’s why it’s like, you cannot set out to do this for the money. And if you really want to be the best, investing in yourself is pricey. It’s very, very, very pricey. But, I’m doubling down on myself, because I know the money is when you have the belt, when you get those pay-per-view dollars. That’s real money, then we’re talking. The rest of this fighting stuff is just, like, we’re not making a killing, you know? We’re not making a killing. But, I’m investing in myself because I believe in myself, I know I can become a champion again, and I’m doing this because I want to, you know what I mean?”