Fighter pay is a major point of discussion among fans, fighters, promoters, and the media in the MMA world. Constant debates on forums, media events, and interviews take place over the pay scale in MMA compared to other sports, more specifically regarding the UFC.

There's a general consensus among most hardcore fans that most fighters on the UFC roster are underpaid. Major sports like the NFL, NBA, MLB, have it worked out where the players split roughly 50% of the revenue with the league.

Now, comparing something like the NFL to the UFC is not something I'd normally say is fair. A single major team in the NFL rivals the worth of the UFC. But since Dana himself loves comparing the UFC to other major sports organizations, why not try and determine how much fighters would be making if the revenue split was similar?

First, let's discuss the guidelines.

Since things like backroom bonuses and PPV points exist, disclosed pay is, unfortunately, unable to tell us the full picture of how much is being paid out. That being said, there's only disclosed numbers to go on, so that's what we will be using. In addition, not all cards have the payouts disclosed. So for those, I was forced to use MMA-Manifesto (except for the most recent card, which I calculated using the same method they do). I have also not included the Reebok sponsorship payments in the numbers either though I did make a fanpost talking about how the money was distributed (shameless plug).

With that out of the way, let's dive into all the numbers.

28 UFC events between UFC 195 and UFN 94 as of 9/22/16.

673 fighters received payment for fights on these cards (one fight was scrapped for a USADA flag and the opponent got show money).

9 UFC PPV's took place with a total reported amount of buys totaling 6,535,000 (as per Wikipedia).

With an average of $55.00 per buy (SD is 49.95 and HD is 59.95), the PPV revenue (before cable company cut) totals

$359,425,000.00

Total gate for all 28 events (minus UFC 198 which was is N/A) totals

$53,819,029.00

Total reported salaries (and un-reported which were estimated as per MMA-Manifesto) paid out totals

$53,333,857.00

Note, these numbers are not the UFC's only revenue streams or expenses. Cable companies, employees who are not fighters, taxes, etc. all come into play. There is also income from Fox, sponsors, Reebok, and other ventures which surely bring income in as well.

So, the first thing that should be noticed is that the total income from the gates alone covers the salaries of all the fighters (with a bit to spare) and that's not even including UFC 198.

The total revenue, as it stands now, has the fighters receiving $53,333,857.00 compared to the $413,244,029.00 the UFC pulled in.

This means the fighters received a whopping 13% of the revenue.

Now, I am not sure if the major leagues revenue split is from their net profits or their total revenue, so let's include the percentage after the cable companies get their cut.

The UFC, after cutting the PPV revenue in half, would come away with $179,712,500.00.

Add to this the gate and you get $233,531,529.00.

Congratulations fights, you're getting 23% of the revenue.

So how much would fighters be getting with an even split? Well let's see.

If the fighters got half of the total revenue, in reported salaries, that would bring the total up to $206,622,014.50.

To put that into perspective, if split evenly among the fighters who fought during this time period, each fighter would receive a pay bump of $307,016.37 dollars.

Obviously even distribution would not happen but that really puts things into perspective. It's highly unlikely we'd hear stories of fighters needing part or full time jobs just to get by, or fighters not being able to afford camps or fly their corners to their fights.

I'll include the tallying table I put together below for anyone who'd like to see it as well.

This picture I painted is likely not happening anytime soon, but just looking at the numbers, and seeing how much of an impact could be made, even a bump from the current amount of revenue distribution to something like 30% would make an incredible difference in the salaries these fighters would be getting.

I hope someday soon we will see the revenue be split more evenly between organization and fighters. They put everything on the line for our entertainment, and fighters who are finally speaking up about getting what they are owed should be supported, not berated.

Please feel free to tear down all the work I put in and tell me why everything I said is wrong.

Seriously though, I don't have insider knowledge on how these things work so any education on the matter would be lovely.

Thanks for the read and enjoy!