John Dodson will not be compensated for traveling to Brazil, making weight and being ready to fight Pedro Munhoz Saturday after the Sao Paulo native did not make weight.
MMA Fighting’s Guilherme Cruz confirmed with UFC officials that Dodson will not be compensated. Munhoz was unable to make weight for his fight at 135 pounds. According to ESPN’s Brett Okamoto, the hotel that Munhoz was staying at ran out of hot water which prevented him from cutting the necessary weight.
A professional sporting event has been canceled, and a primary reason may be the athlete’s hotel ran out of hot water he needed to drop weight. This is real life. https://t.co/aEbcCVZHwH
— Brett Okamoto (@bokamotoESPN) February 2, 2018
Regardless of the reason why Munhoz missed weight, the issue of the other fighter has surfaced once again. Last month Vitor Belfort was not paid due to the fact Uriah Hall had to go to the hospital due to complications with weight-cutting. The UFC did not compensate him. It was noted that they attempted to get him a replacement or a fight on a card the next weekend.
Here, Dodson traveled to Brazil for the fight, had to pay for a fight camp and perhaps some of his coaches. You might recall that UFC heavyweight Tim Johnson set up an online fund so that his full coaching stuff could travel to Brazil. So, it’s a huge financial undertaking for the fighter if they are to fight in another country.
Payout Perspective:
I’ve always wondered why UFC contracts do not allow for the fighter that makes the weight to obtain their show money. It could be that the contractual language allows the UFC to terminate the contract if one side fails to fight for whatever reason. If that were the case, it would create a huge issue for fighters since the contract would favor the UFC who may unilaterally pull the plug on a fight and not have to pay anyone. Also, if another fight were to be offered, it would seemingly force the fighter to make weight to have to take the match even if they did not want to do it. We will see if the UFC addresses it from a PR standpoint and compensate Dodson for traveling to Brazil.
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