I felt confident in my work product last November and I feel confident that it holds true today.
With that stated, Team UFC should not get too cocky. They are their own worst enemy here. The post-settlement behavior by Endeavor has been revealing. I don't think the Roku docu-series has done them any favors, even if it's gotten a massive amount of attention.
Ari is nothing, if not legally savvy. He must've made sure that those contracts are iron-clad.
In the NFL's past - Dave Meggesy sued to force collective bargaining rights, when his protest against the Vietnam War, resulted in him being "blackballed", by all the owners and teams in the league.
It sounds like a "Fighters' Union" is what's needed here - to keep Management honest and accountable, and the fighters well compensated. I mean - the 'Bonuses' offered by the UFC to the fighters (for exemplary performances) - haven't even kept up with inflation, or the cost of living. $50k in 2007 or 8 is worth how much now, based upon Purchasing Power Parity? $75k? $100k? Hearing a fighter call out dana during the last "Fight Night" show, for a $100k bonus - really got me to thinking...
the nature of fighting -- the ultimate individual sport -- makes unionizing incredibly difficult. The main thing is all the champs and top contenders need to lead the effort and it's just way too easy for management to buy off one or two.
You could create guaranteed minimums, like they have in the NFL, and then Tiers - and the ability for hot commodity fighters to negotiate for even more, based on the draws they provide to any given event.
I feel like Endeavor and the UFC can afford to adequately compensate all of their fighters - and still make huge profits. They're selling ads all over the cage. Fighters can't come in decked out like NASCAR drivers, like they used to... UFC has huge contracts to broadcast their free fights - and makes even more on Gate and PPV.
Fighters are always risking permanent and/or career ending injury. Dana hates cautious fighters, rightly understanding what's exciting to the audience. Personally, I appreciate a fighter who avoids damage while imposing his will. But Dana wants these back and forth battles, that put heavy mileage on the fighters and their careers. Well - pay the fighters, so they can afford to fight like that, without worrying about the future.
It doesn't take much legal savvy to write iron-clad contracts, especially when the UFC has been doing it for 30 years. Thankfully, even with within a "business uber alles" judicial system, a signed contract isn't unassailably sacrosanct. Unless you're in federal court, and a single juror decides it is.
That said, I doubt Ari is the genius he perceives himself to be, and makes plenty of mistakes. Frankly, his attempts to min/max every transaction could well prove a liability, especially as he seems to revel in it. When providing fighters with a reasonable wage - and all the accompanying goodwill - won't substantively cost him anything, his business acumen starts too look more like either naked greed or mental illness.
Not to mention his political support for the far right. Were he a true believer (i.e. religious fanatic), I'd understand. But not only is an impulsive, capricious, and none too bright President a potentially unmatched liability, the theocratic regime that could very well follow is surely undesirable. Is pretending that climate change is some sort of libtard boogeyman really going to make it go away?
Mind, Speaker of the United States House of Representatives Mike Johnson - second in line to assume the Presidency should Biden and Kamala Harris become incapacitate - believes that abortion shouldn't even be available to save a pregnant woman's life (let alone in cases of rape and incest), and that offenders should be executed. He also believes in family unit voting (fathers/husbands vote for their entire families), that contraception should be illegal, and that female adulterers should go to prison. And these are just the tip of the iceberg.
Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito - two of the most powerful idiots in America - wholeheartedly agree.
That Ari supports this absurdity makes me question not only his savvy, but his goddamn sanity.
The cynicism I've seen from Democratic insiders is pretty bottomless -- I remember freaking out when the Supreme Court stole the election for Bush in 2000 and wondering why Dem insiders weren't more upset. When I realized it was because their cushy lifestyles were untouched, it all made sense.
Someone like Ari thinks he is immune to consequences and that it is all a game.
I don't disagree about Democratic insider cynicism, but compared to the recent GOP lunacy (and the accompanying cynicism from the GOP old guard - Mitch McConnell etc. who surely knows better), only the latter presents an immediate existential threat to democracy and its associated freedoms.
If Ari does think this is a game, or that he's immune from consequence regardless, such shortsightedness - not to mention lack of imagination, seems embarrassingly misguided.
I think you're deluded if you think the only threat to democracy is coming from the MAGA/GOP. They're some of the craziest but the epic-scale gaslighting from the Biden admin on things like the Gaza genocide is a serious threat to all of humanity.
For those wondering about the possible make-up of a Las Vegas jury pool, I intensely profiled the situation last November:
https://www.themmadraw.com/p/the-one-fight-ufc-should-have-never
I felt confident in my work product last November and I feel confident that it holds true today.
With that stated, Team UFC should not get too cocky. They are their own worst enemy here. The post-settlement behavior by Endeavor has been revealing. I don't think the Roku docu-series has done them any favors, even if it's gotten a massive amount of attention.
Ari is nothing, if not legally savvy. He must've made sure that those contracts are iron-clad.
In the NFL's past - Dave Meggesy sued to force collective bargaining rights, when his protest against the Vietnam War, resulted in him being "blackballed", by all the owners and teams in the league.
It sounds like a "Fighters' Union" is what's needed here - to keep Management honest and accountable, and the fighters well compensated. I mean - the 'Bonuses' offered by the UFC to the fighters (for exemplary performances) - haven't even kept up with inflation, or the cost of living. $50k in 2007 or 8 is worth how much now, based upon Purchasing Power Parity? $75k? $100k? Hearing a fighter call out dana during the last "Fight Night" show, for a $100k bonus - really got me to thinking...
the nature of fighting -- the ultimate individual sport -- makes unionizing incredibly difficult. The main thing is all the champs and top contenders need to lead the effort and it's just way too easy for management to buy off one or two.
You could create guaranteed minimums, like they have in the NFL, and then Tiers - and the ability for hot commodity fighters to negotiate for even more, based on the draws they provide to any given event.
I feel like Endeavor and the UFC can afford to adequately compensate all of their fighters - and still make huge profits. They're selling ads all over the cage. Fighters can't come in decked out like NASCAR drivers, like they used to... UFC has huge contracts to broadcast their free fights - and makes even more on Gate and PPV.
Fighters are always risking permanent and/or career ending injury. Dana hates cautious fighters, rightly understanding what's exciting to the audience. Personally, I appreciate a fighter who avoids damage while imposing his will. But Dana wants these back and forth battles, that put heavy mileage on the fighters and their careers. Well - pay the fighters, so they can afford to fight like that, without worrying about the future.
"It's never enough" really is Ari Emanuel's motto.
It doesn't take much legal savvy to write iron-clad contracts, especially when the UFC has been doing it for 30 years. Thankfully, even with within a "business uber alles" judicial system, a signed contract isn't unassailably sacrosanct. Unless you're in federal court, and a single juror decides it is.
That said, I doubt Ari is the genius he perceives himself to be, and makes plenty of mistakes. Frankly, his attempts to min/max every transaction could well prove a liability, especially as he seems to revel in it. When providing fighters with a reasonable wage - and all the accompanying goodwill - won't substantively cost him anything, his business acumen starts too look more like either naked greed or mental illness.
Not to mention his political support for the far right. Were he a true believer (i.e. religious fanatic), I'd understand. But not only is an impulsive, capricious, and none too bright President a potentially unmatched liability, the theocratic regime that could very well follow is surely undesirable. Is pretending that climate change is some sort of libtard boogeyman really going to make it go away?
Mind, Speaker of the United States House of Representatives Mike Johnson - second in line to assume the Presidency should Biden and Kamala Harris become incapacitate - believes that abortion shouldn't even be available to save a pregnant woman's life (let alone in cases of rape and incest), and that offenders should be executed. He also believes in family unit voting (fathers/husbands vote for their entire families), that contraception should be illegal, and that female adulterers should go to prison. And these are just the tip of the iceberg.
Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito - two of the most powerful idiots in America - wholeheartedly agree.
That Ari supports this absurdity makes me question not only his savvy, but his goddamn sanity.
The cynicism I've seen from Democratic insiders is pretty bottomless -- I remember freaking out when the Supreme Court stole the election for Bush in 2000 and wondering why Dem insiders weren't more upset. When I realized it was because their cushy lifestyles were untouched, it all made sense.
Someone like Ari thinks he is immune to consequences and that it is all a game.
I don't disagree about Democratic insider cynicism, but compared to the recent GOP lunacy (and the accompanying cynicism from the GOP old guard - Mitch McConnell etc. who surely knows better), only the latter presents an immediate existential threat to democracy and its associated freedoms.
If Ari does think this is a game, or that he's immune from consequence regardless, such shortsightedness - not to mention lack of imagination, seems embarrassingly misguided.
I think you're deluded if you think the only threat to democracy is coming from the MAGA/GOP. They're some of the craziest but the epic-scale gaslighting from the Biden admin on things like the Gaza genocide is a serious threat to all of humanity.