UFC Fight Night 89 purses have not been released, but Donald ‘Cowboy’ Cerrone made 79/79 in base salary defeating Alex Oliveira in Feb, and income escalates with a win in the UFC. So he made more than that in defeating Patrick Cote at welterweight on Saturday. Cerrone also made a $50,000 performance bonus, his 17th, a record. And he made $20,000 in Reebok money. And he may have received a “locker room” bonus. His total compensation at a minimum was over $250,000, which is good money, particularly given that Cerrone is on track to fight four times a year, for the fourth year in a row.
However, it is not Conor McGregor or Ronda Rousey money, which landed them at #85 with $22,000,000 and #3 with $14,000,000 on Forbes’ list of the 100 highest paid athletes in the world.
At the post fight press conference, Cerrone said ” according to my pay I don’t mean s*** to the UFC. But we’ll see – going to talk to Dana after this and figure that out.
UFC president Dana White offered a response on the new UFC Unfiltered with Jim Norton and Matt Serra” podcast.
Cerrone is as fan friendly a fighter as can be imagined, but even going back to his WEC days, he has come up short in the peak fights. Cowboy lost to Jamie Varner? for the WEC lightweight title. Then he lost to Benson Henderson for the interim title. Then he lost to Henderson again for the title. Then in an 18 month stretch he lost to Nate Diaz, Anthony Pettis, and Rafael Dos Anjos. Last year he lost to RDA again, with the UFC lightweight title on the line.
We talked, said White, as transcribed by MMAjunkie. We’ve talked, me and Cerrone. He absolutely agreed. What he said to me was, ‘I was half joking.’ I love him. He looked phenomenal, and the thing is with Cerrone is, Cerrone is so inconsistent. Cerrone will come out and look like a world beater, then come out and get stopped in the first round by a body shot.
I think the thing that’s frustrating, especially for a guy like ‘Cowboy’ Cerrone, is he has the personality. Everybody loves the kid. His fighting style is f***ing exactly what I like. It’s right up my alley. Everything I love about a fighter, ‘Cowboy’ Cerrone is. And he’s a couple fights away from having that big fight. You’ve got to win them all. Every fight is the most important, and you’ve got to work your way up and you’ve got to win those big fights.
‘Cowboy’ – again, a guy that I love – hasn’t always taken everything so serious. You can’t be f***ing rock climbing two days before your fight or wake boarding the day of your fight. Some of the stuff that this guy does – you want to make that serious, big money, you have to get in the right mindset. The way he looked the other night against Patrick Cote is the way you have to fight when you fight dos Anjos or Diaz or any of the big guys. When you get to that big fight, you have to win.
I love the kid. I love him. Professionally and personally, I love ‘Cowboy’ Cerrone,. Everyone once in a while, this day in age, every fighter on earth, especially when you look at the money that Conor and Ronda and some of these people are making out there, it gets crazy. Everybody wants to make a million dollars. Everybody wants to make a million dollars, but some people get there and some people don’t.
H/T Hikikomori
