2010 Year in Review: UFC Fighter Salaries

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Another year is almost in the books which means it’s time to recap a wild and wacky year in the mixed martial arts world.  All week The MMA Manifesto will bring you the best that 2010 offered to fight fans.  Next up: UFC Fighter Salaries.

Was 2010 a good year financially to be a fighter?  Well, that depends on what your name is.  If it is Georges St-Pierre, then yes, it was a very good year.  On the other hand, if you happen to be Tyler Toner, you might want to consider keeping your day job.  While the average UFC fighter made $99,630 in 2010, 49 fighters (18%) made $10,000 or less.  A few more stats that you might find interesting:

– Michael Bisping is not a typo at #2 – he barely was edged out by GSP for top earning fighter honours.  He earned $175,000 for his loss to Wanderlei Silva at UFC 110, $325,000 for beating Dan Miller at UFC 114 and $385,000 (including a $60,000 Fight of the Night bonus) for outpointing Yoshihiro Akiyami at UFC 120.  Money, and Michael Bisping, talks.

– The average household income in the U.S. is around $45000 per year, yet almost half of the UFC’s fighters (49%) made less than the average American in 2010.  Sometimes it doesn’t pay to get punched in the face.

– If it wasn’t for the UFC end of night bonuses, Carlos Condit’s pockets wouldn’t be so fat.  Of Condit’s $249,000 earned in 2010, a whopping $190,000 (76%) of it came from end of night bonuses.  He made $85,000 for participating in the Fight of the Night at UFC 115 (versus Rory MacDonald) and another $65,000 for Knockout of the Night for making Dan Hardy go nightie-night at UFC 120.

Now, for the salary results.  It is worth noting that these are only the reported salaries plus Fight of the Night, Knockout of the Night and Submission of the Night bonuses that have been made public.  Many top performing fighters get additional bonuses paid out to them that aren’t reported, plus the top guys get a cut of the pay-per-view buys for events that they headline (not to mention every fighter makes sponsorship money).  Also, many athletic commissions don’t report fighter’s salary info, so for those we’ve estimated a fighter’s purse based on what they have earned in their other recent fights.  Fighters with some estimated purses are marked with a * in the database.  This data should still be considered very close to accurate, as most fighters’ purses remain rather steady from fight to fight (unless they ink a new contract in the meantime).

 

So, without further ado, here’s the salary of each UFC fighter for 2010.  To check out 2011’s fighter salary info, click here.

1 Michael Bisping*  $     915,000
2 Georges St-Pierre *  $     900,000
3 Brock Lesnar  $     875,000
4 Rashad Evans  $     785,000
5 B.J. Penn *  $     680,000
6 Matt Hughes*  $     560,000
7 Anderson Silva *  $     520,000
8 Chuck Liddell  $     500,000
9 James Toney  $     500,000
10 Rampage Jackson*  $     500,000
11 Randy Couture  $     500,000
12 Mirko Cro Cop*  $     460,000
13 Cain Velasquez *  $     410,000
14 Lyoto Machida*  $     400,000
15 Frank Mir *  $     375,000
16 Mauricio Rua*  $     320,000
17 Chris Leben  $     316,000
18 Matt Serra*  $     300,000
19 Josh Koscheck *  $     287,000
20 Antonio Rogerio Nogueira*  $     275,000
21 Junior dos Santos  $     260,000
22 Carlos Condit*  $     257,000
23 Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira *  $     250,000
24 Tito Ortiz  $     250,000
25 Demian Maia *  $     244,000
26 Joe Lauzon*  $     242,000
27 Nate Marquardt*  $     240,000
28 Jon Fitch *  $     228,000
29 Kenny Florian *  $     225,000
30 Rich Franklin  $     225,000
31 Yoshihiro Akiyama*  $     225,000
32 Diego Sanchez  $     220,000
33 Chael Sonnen  $     219,000
34 Jim Miller*  $     218,000
35 Mark Munoz*  $     213,000
36 Mac Danzig*  $     212,000
37 Stephan Bonnar*  $     212,000
38 Chris Lytle *  $     206,000
39 George Sotiropoulos *  $     202,000
40 Wanderlei Silva*  $     200,000
41 Paulo Thiago  $     196,000
42 Nate Diaz*  $     192,000
43 Sam Stout*  $     187,000
44 Shane Carwin*  $     185,000
45 Thiago Alves*  $     180,000
46 Kendall Grove *  $     178,000
47 Dennis Siver *  $     175,000
48 Ricardo Almeida*  $     175,000
49 Gerald Harris *  $     167,000
50 Cheick Kongo*  $     165,000
51 Takanori Gomi*  $     160,000
52 Evan Dunham*  $     157,000
53 Clay Guida  $     156,000
54 Jake Shields  $     150,000
55 Sean Sherk*  $     150,000
56 Vladimir Matyushenko*  $     149,000
57 Frankie Edgar *  $     148,000
58 Marcus Davis  $     145,000
59 Joe Stevenson *  $     144,000
60 Cole Miller*  $     142,000
61 Stefan Struve*  $     141,000
62 Kurt Pellegrino *  $     140,000
63 Jon Jones  $     136,000
64 Phil Davis*  $     136,000
65 Keith Jardine *  $     135,000
66 Matt Hamill  $     135,000
67 Gabriel Gonzaga  $     134,000
68 C.B. Dollaway*  $     128,000
69 Yushin Okami*  $     128,000
70 Krzysztof Soszynski *  $     125,000
71 Jared Hamman*  $     123,000
72 Martin Kampmann  $     123,000
73 Rafael dos Anjos*  $     123,000
74 Charles Oliveira*  $     118,000
75 Jeremy Stephens *  $     111,000
76 John Howard*  $     106,000
77 DaMarques Johnson *  $     105,000
78 Rory MacDonald  $     105,000
79 Daniel Roberts  $     104,000
80 Melvin Guillard*  $     104,000
81 Alan Belcher *  $     103,000
82 Paul Daley*  $     102,200
83 Matt Mitrione*  $     102,000
84 Ben Rothwell  $     100,000
85 Joey Beltran *  $     100,000
86 Dan Miller*  $      98,000
87 Mike Pyle*  $      97,000
88 Ryan Jensen  $      97,000
89 Mark Bocek*  $      95,000
90 Jason Brilz  $      94,000
91 Brian Stann  $      91,000
92 Gilbert Yvel  $      90,000
93 Mike Russow  $      89,000
94 Tyson Griffin*  $      88,000
95 Gray Maynard  $      86,000
96 Amir Sadollah*  $      85,000
97 Karlos Vemola*  $      84,000
98 Johny Hendricks*  $      82,000
99 Aaron Simpson*  $      78,000
100 Spencer Fisher*  $      78,000
101 Rodney Wallace*  $      77,000
102 Pascal Krauss*  $      76,000
103 Ross Pearson*  $      75,000
104 Roy Nelson*  $      75,000
105 Paul Sass*  $      72,000
106 Court McGee  $      71,000
107 Brian Foster *  $      70,000
108 Ryan Bader*  $      70,000
109 Tom Lawlor*  $      70,000
110 Nik Lentz*  $      69,000
111 Mark Scanlon*  $      68,000
112 Rick Story*  $      68,000
113 Efrain Escudero  $      65,000
114 Dong Hyun Kim  $      64,000
115 Leonard Garcia  $      62,000
116 Brandon Vera  $      60,000
117 Brendan Schaub  $      60,000
118 Dennis Hallman*  $      60,000
119 Mark Coleman  $      60,000
120 Gleison Tibau *  $      57,000
121 Kyle Kingsbury*  $      56,000
122 Dustin Hazelett*  $      55,800
123 Thiago Silva  $      55,000
124 Matthew Riddle*  $      52,000
125 Paul Kelly*  $      51,000
126 Dan Hardy*  $      50,000
127 Tim Boetsch*  $      50,000
128 Duane Ludwig*  $      48,000
129 Jon Madsen *  $      48,000
130 Paul Taylor*  $      48,000
131 Cody McKenzie  $      46,000
132 Nam Phan  $      46,000
133 James Wilks*  $      45,000
134 Mike Massenzio  $      45,000
135 Thiago Tavares*  $      45,000
136 Jake Ellenberger  $      44,000
137 Mike Swick  $      43,000
138 Alessio Sakara  $      42,000
139 Patrick Cote*  $      42,000
140 Andre Winner *  $      40,000
141 Caol Uno *  $      40,000
142 James Irvin  $      40,000
143 Karo Parisyan*  $      40,000
144 Mike Pierce  $      40,000
145 Paul Buentello  $      40,000
146 Rich Antonito  $      40,000
147 Jacob Volkmann *  $      38,000
148 Pablo Garza  $      38,000
149 Jorge Rivera *  $      36,000
150 Rob Emerson*  $      36,000
151 Dave Branch*  $      34,000
152 John Hathaway*  $      33,000
153 Chris Camozzi  $      32,000
154 Chris Tuchscherer  $      32,000
155 Kyle Noke*  $      32,000
156 Dan Lauzon  $      30,000
157 Frank Trigg  $      30,000
158 John Salter *  $      30,000
159 Matt Brown*  $      30,000
160 Nate Quarry*  $      30,000
161 Nick Osipczak*  $      30,000
162 Rafaello Oliveira*  $      30,000
163 John Gunderson*  $      29,000
164 Igor Pokrajac*  $      28,000
165 Matt Wiman  $      28,000
166 Rob Kimmons*  $      27,000
167 Brad Blackburn *  $      26,000
168 Jason MacDonald *  $      26,000
169 Mario Miranda  $      26,000
170 Mike Guymon  $      26,000
171 Kimbo Slice *  $      25,000
172 Ben Saunders *  $      24,000
173 Charlie Brenneman*  $      24,000
174 Claude Patrick*  $      24,000
175 Rousimar Palhares*  $      21,000
176 Aaron Riley  $      20,000
177 Darren Elkins  $      20,000
178 Seth Petruzelli*  $      20,000
179 TJ Grant*  $      20,000
180 Travis Browne*  $      20,000
181 Luiz Cane  $      19,000
182 Alesander Gustafsson*  $      18,000
183 Cyrille Diabate*  $      18,000
184 Greg Soto*  $      18,000
185 Sean McCorkle*  $      18,000
186 Waylon Lowe*  $      18,000
187 Brad Tavares  $      16,000
188 James McSweeney*  $      16,000
189 Jonathan Brookins  $      16,000
190 Kris McCray*  $      16,000
191 Kyle Watson  $      16,000
192 Ricardo Romero  $      16,000
193 Yves Edwards*  $      16,000
194 Goran Reljic *  $      15,000
195 Rolles Gracie  $      15,000
196 Jesse Lennox  $      14,000
197 Nick Catone  $      14,000
198 Tim Hague*  $      14,000
199 Tomasz Drwal*  $      14,000
200 Eric Shaefer  $      13,000
201 David Loiseau  $      12,000
202 Edson Barboza*  $      12,000
203 Fabio Maldonado*  $      12,000
204 Forrest Petz*  $      12,000
205 James Te-Huna*  $      12,000
206 Jesse Forbes  $      12,000
207 Joe Doerksen*  $      12,000
208 John Makdessi*  $      12,000
209 Julio Paulino*  $      12,000
210 Maiquel Falcao*  $      12,000
211 Mark Holst*  $      12,000
212 Pat Audinwood*  $      12,000
213 Rafael Natal*  $      12,000
214 Rob Broughton*  $      12,000
215 Sean Pierson*  $      12,000
216 TJ Waldburger*  $      12,000
217 Pat Barry  $      11,000
218 Chase Gormley  $      10,000
219 Elliot Marshall  $      10,000
220 Fabricio Camoes *  $      10,000
221 Ian Loveland  $      10,000
222 Phillipe Nover  $      10,000
223 Terry Etim*  $      10,000
224 Shannon Gugerty  $        9,000
225 Aaron Wilkinson  $        8,000
226 Alexandre Ferreira*  $        8,000
227 Carlos Eduardo Rocha*  $        8,000
228 Dong Yi Yang  $        8,000
229 Gabe Ruediger  $        8,000
230 James Hammortree  $        8,000
231 Jamie Yager  $        8,000
232 Josh Bryant  $        8,000
233 Justin Bucholz  $        8,000
234 Kyle Bradley  $        8,000
235 Michael Johnson  $        8,000
236 Peter Sobotta*  $        8,000
237 Ronys Torres*  $        8,000
238 Savo Chivitchian  $        8,000
239 Seth Baczynski  $        8,000
240 Todd Duffee  $        8,000
241 Yoshiyuki Yoshida*  $        8,000
242 Jonathan Goulet*  $        7,000
243 Mustafa Al Turk*  $        7,000
244 Amilcar Alves  $        6,000
245 Anthony Perosh*  $        6,000
246 Christian Morecraft  $        6,000
247 Curt Warburton*  $        6,000
248 David Mitchell*  $        6,000
249 Jason High*  $        6,000
250 Jay Silva  $        6,000
251 Jesse Bongfelt*  $        6,000
252 Lucio Linhares*  $        6,000
253 Mark Hunt*  $        6,000
254 Mike Lullo*  $        6,000
255 Rory Markham*  $        6,000
256 Steve Lopez*  $        6,000
257 Steve Steinbeiss  $        6,000
258 Todd Brown  $        6,000
259 Vinicius Queiroz*  $        6,000
260 Nicholas Pace  $        5,400
261 Joe Brammer  $        5,000
262 Matt Veach*  $        5,000
263 Ricardo Funch  $        5,000
264 Fredson Paixao  $        4,000
265 Will Campuzano  $        3,300
266 T.J. O’Brien*  $        3,000
267 Tyler Toner  $        3,000

 

 

Insufficient Data Available to Predict Salaries: 

Dan Hardy
Renzo Gracie
Mark Hunt

Year in Review: UFC PPV Buyrates.

 

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