At UFC 259, Dominick Cruz returned from a long layoff, defeated Casey Kenny via Split Decision, and then called out Hans Molenkamp, director of Monster Energy for combat sports. Cruz alleged that Molenakamp was using the prospect of continued Monster sponsorship money as leverage to get fighter involvement in content on the social network that cast him in a good light.
Now a clearly disgruntled photographer named Courtney Henderson has released a long video on his personal YouTube page that he titled The Untold Truth: Exposing Hans Molenkamp!! Henderson alleges that through Molenkamp he landed a well-paying gig as a photographer for Monster Energy, that, in his telling, resulted mostly in following Molenkamp around to create content for the social own social media brand. Henderson further says he tired of Molenlamp’s constant demands, and quit; the photographer alleges that Molenkamp then blackballed him.
He has supporters, but you gotta understand the way he’s marketing himself, said Henderson, as transcribed by Zane Simon for BE. So, what he does—he’ll go to, like, online. If you look at his social media page or Instagram page, he’s the cool guy, the fun guy. He’s around all these elite fighters, you know. He’s the cool guy. But behind the scenes, these guys are forced to interact with him. They’re forced to do all the antics, do the ‘Monster hand’ – get the Monster can kicked out of their hand – do all this stupid, funny stuff, these crazy videos. They’re forced to do that. But, if they don’t do that, then what will happen is they lose their contract. They’re pretty much held hostage.
You gotta understand what he’s doing. It’s not Monster, it’s Hans Molenkamp. So what he’s doing is, he’s forcing these fighters to do antics. Like, I witnessed it all the time. Every fighter that you see under their roster, they’re forced to spar with him, act like he’s beating them up, do mitts. They’re forced to do that. It could be a BJJ – somebody who’s the best in the world at what they do – and he’s forcing you to act like he’s tapping you out, act like he has a black belt. All this—bro, everything you see is all a facade.
Everything is fake. Everything. I’m talking about, like, he would douse himself with water before he’d do mitts with fighters for his social media content—like he made a video for social media. So he’ll act like he put water all over, and then act like he’s sweating. And then he’ll go do mitts with a high ranking UFC fighter and act like he’s beating them up or something, or whatever it is. But for me, like I said, I witnessed it all the time. He’s not really doing it for Monster, he’s doing it to boost his clout to his Instagram followers, to market himself. And I don’t understand that. They’re forced to do it. Like I said, if they don’t do it then they’ll lose their contract.
The situation is Monster is pumping millions and millions and millions of dollars into these organizations. They’re giving the UFC millions, they’re giving Bellator millions. These contracts are millions. I can’t disclose how much money it is, but let me tell you, it’s a lot of money. A LOT of money. And like I said, not just the UFC and Bellator, you got Glory. So they’re controlling a whole market. A whole market is controlled by one person, the director of Monster Energy for combat sports, Hans Molenkamp. He’s managing that sector, so he has control of a whole industry, plus the fighters. Essentially, these checks are so powerful, that money is so powerful, he has control over everybody. So, he dictates what’s going on in that industry, by the money.
These people are making so much money, and they need this money, they can’t speak out. They can’t say anything. They’re forced to be quiet. And I will go even a step further. All these allegations came out with Dominick Cruz and everything like that, now I can guarantee you what’s going to happen is, he’s going to contact everybody that’s on the Monster roster, or whoever’s in connection with him, and he’s gonna force them to be like, ‘Okay, yeah Hans does this, Hans is a good guy. Hans treats me really good.’ Watch, I’m trying to tell you guys, watch, you’re going to see a lot of people be like, ‘Oh yeah, Hans is a good guy. He’s a good guy.’
This is not the first investigation, just to let you know. There’s been multiple, two or three, investigations, just like what’s going on now. There’s been multiple investigations on Hans Molenkamp, with Monster, from fighters coming to Monster and saying he’s treating them this way. Dominick Cruz is just the first person to go public with it. Because he took that chance, for everybody else.
