Just a couple of days after UFC Fight Pass Invitational 10 (UFC FPI 10) concluded, Dana White revealed more details on their plans to completely “take over” the Brazilian jiu-jitsu (BJJ) scene. The UFC CEO revealed a monetary figure they’re planning to spend in 2025 for their expansion efforts.
Dana White: UFC ‘to go big,’ invest millions in BJJ in 2025
“We’re going to invest like $10 to 12 million into jiu-jitsu over the next year,” Dana White said at the UFC 313 post-fight press conference. “So we’re going to go big on (jiu-jitsu). We’re obviously going big on boxing, and we’re going to continue to do what we do with the UFC.”
A BJJ star might have unintentionally leaked early that some of that money will not just go to FPI events, but likely also into an “Ultimate Fighter” type of reality show for jiu-jitsu. According to Kade Ruotolo, that reality show will feature BJJ superstar Gordon Ryan and UFC’s first exclusively signed grappler, Mikey Musumeci.
Outside of the reality show, the $10-12 million White mentioned will include production costs, so the remaining money for athletes won’t exactly be groundbreaking figures compared to their MMA — and especially boxing — counterparts. That said, the competitive jiu-jitsu scene is still pretty small, with even long running BJJ organizations still paying very little or nothing at all, so UFC’s investment would still be a big step into further growing the sport.
UFC FPI contracts have ‘finish bonuses’ instead of ‘win’ money
UFC veteran Claudia Gadelha, who does matchmaking with UFC FPI, also revealed contract details for grapplers that differ vastly from the promotion’s typical “show + win” pay structure in MMA.
“For us in the business side, we pay them almost the same amount of money to finish, than we pay for them to show,” Gadelha revealed after UFC FPI 10. “There’s only show money and finish money, there’s no win money. So you go out there, and you got to get a finish. So they kept fighting for their finish bonus.”
It would be hard to discuss total pay without seeing specifics, but that structure could conceivably help with the entertainment side of things as they try to make jiu-jitsu a better spectator sport. In theory, paying bonuses for every submission could push people with a big lead to still look for a finish, instead of fighting not to lose.
Penalizing stalling also helps, and it’s still obviously a small sample size, but there were many instances in UFC FPI events that grapplers didn’t sit on a lead. Points don’t count at UFC FPI events during regulation, and at UFC FPI 10, three bouts still ended in submission late into overtime.
While a bit off-topic, the MMA side of things could also benefit by moving away from their traditional $50,000 performance bonus structure to a similar “finish bonus” system. It would add clarity and remove the arbitrary decision making involved, ending how fighters have to rely on the mood of UFC executives, or beg for $50,000 on live TV.