Stipe Miocic last fought at UFC 203 in his hometown of Cleveland, where he defended his heavyweight title against Alistair Overeem. Yet, despite the win, his challenger ended up taking home a bigger amount of money.
The disclosed salaries for the the October 10th fight had Miocic bagging $600,000. Overeem, on the other hand, was paid $800,000, after he lost via first round knockout. Understandably, Miocic felt insulted by it.
“I just felt like I was kinda crapped on a little bit,” Miocic said during Monday’s edition of The MMA Hour (via MMA Fighting). “I try to do things right and work with them, and they just didn’t give me a great deal.”
“That’s my own fault, but also they knew what they were doing. They took my kindness for weakness. They told me it was the best deal they could do, and I said, oh okay, great. And then come to find out, it wasn’t.”
Miocic says he came forward to speak to the UFC management about his sentiments, which only turned out to be futile efforts. And like many of his contemporaries, he is calling for a change in the system.
“Blah, blah, blah, blah. They just made up some excuse, like that’s the contract you signed. You’re making money off me in my hometown, and you’re giving the man that’s a challenger who’s never won the title in the UFC, you’re giving him more money?”
“It definitely should change,” Miocic said. “But the fact that my challenger made more money than me in my last fight was just kind of a slap in the face.”
Miocic’s interview begins at the 2:54:03 mark of the video.
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