Jorge Masvidal on UFC pay: “They have to start giving bigger margins”

Jorge Masvidal believes the UFC needs to pay the top fighters more money.

Masvidal, who helped the UFC sell over one million pay-per-view buys for his UFC 251 fight against Kamaru Usman, wants to be compensated more for the number of pay-per-views he sells. “Gamebred,” says he also wants to stick up for other fighters who deserve to make more money.

“I tell you what, if I had took that first original deal, off that 1.3 [million PPV buys], I would have got table scraps,” Masvidal said, speaking with Yahoo Sports. (via TheMacLife) “It’s just not fair. I say this for me, not just for me but all my brothers and sisters that are like, ‘Oh I finally got to pay-per-view’… It’s not what you think.”

Image via @ufc on Instagram (photographer not listed)

According to Jorge Masvidal, he says the entire pay-per-view model needs to change. Gamebred points to boxing and points to the fact the top boxers are making a lot more money than the top MMA fighters because the UFC takes a good chunk of the pay-per-view sales.

“The UFC have to open those doors, they have to start giving bigger margins to guys that are bringing in the pay-per-view,” Masvidal said. “The UFC always say, ‘Well look at an undercard boxer makes compared to our opening card guys’. Yeah, okay, got it. The opening card guy in the UFC makes a lot more than the boxer, but when you get to the top of the levels, versus boxing it’s a huge disparity. I don’t like it and I wasn’t going to stand for it.”

Jorge Masvidal is set to return to the Octagon in the main event of UFC 261 when he rematches Kamaru Usman. Given there are two other title fights on the card, it is likely this fight will do big business for pay-per-view sales.

What do you make of Jorge Masvidal and his thoughts on pay-per-view sales?