Who knew that such a tiny piece of material could cause such a big uproar? We of course are talking about Dennis Hallman’s itsy bitsy teenie weenie bikini he wore at UFC 133 as punishment for losing a bet. Hallman’s choice of wardrobe so horrified UFC head honcho Dana White that he paid out a $70,000 “getting those horrifying shorts off TV as soon as possible” bonus to Brian Ebersole for finishing off Hallman in the first round.
However, the big financial winners of Saturday’s festivities were the main event participants, who split a $1 million between them. Tito Ortiz’s big paydays in 2011 (over a $1 million earned in reported salary) has also propelled him into second place overall in our UFC Career Fighter Earnings list. Before we go any further, we should note that Pennsylvania’s Athletic Commission doesn’t release fighter pay info, so none of the following salary data for the event is official. However, you can get a fairly accurate picture of a fighter’s pay based on official purse info released from past fights. So, based on that info, here is the estimated pay breakdown for the 24 fighters that traded blows at the event (but please remember – this is only an estimate, not official info, especially for any fighters that made their UFC debuts at the event). These numbers obviously also don’t include any PPV revenue, undisclosed bonuses and/or sponsorship money any of these fighters may have made.
Tito Ortiz: $520,000 ($450,000 to show, $70,000 Fight of the Night bonus)
Rashad Evans: $515,000 ($250,000 to show, $195,000 win bonus, $70,000 Fight of the Night bonus)
Vitor Belfort: $345,000 ($275,000 to show, $70,000 Knockout of the Night bonus)
Brian Ebersole: $82,000 ($6,000 to show, $6,000 win bonus, $70,000 “getting those horrifying shorts off TV as soon as possible” bonus)
Mike Brown: $46,000 ($23,000 to show, $23,000 win bonus)
Yoshihiro Akiayami: $45,000
Johny Hendricks: $44,000 ($22,000 to show, $22,000 win bonus)
Matt Hamill: $32,000
Mike Pyle: $28,000
Rory MacDonald: $26,000 ($13,000 to show, $13,000 win bonus)
Chad Mendes: $26,000 ($13,00 to show, $13,00 win bonus)
Alexander Gustafsson: $24,000 ($12,000 to show, $12,000 win bonus)
Jorge Rivera: $18,000
Mike Pierce: $18,000
Nam Phan: $16,000
Dennis Hallman: $15,000
Constantinos Philippou: $12,000 ($6,000 to show, $6,000 win bonus)
Ivan Menjivar: $12,000 ($6,000 to show, $6,000 win bonus)
Rafael Natal: $12,000 ($6,000 to show, $6,000 win bonus)
Rani Yahya: $12,000
Paul Bradley: $8,000
Nick Pace: $4,000
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