Khabib Nurmagomedov is (arguably) the best UFC lightweight champion of all time. But he did not get an actual pay bump on his fights until he faced off against Conor McGregor. The greatest rivalry of all time in the UFC might have also led to the biggest pay increase for ‘The Eagle’. The details on his salary before and after the McGregor fights were recently disclosed by a Twitter account named La Sueur.
The account recently posted an image with Nurmagomedov posing with his belt and his earnings on the left side. Here are the details:
Khabib Nurmagomedov Before and After Conor McGregor
Before ‘The Eagle’ went gloves up against ‘The Notorious’ he averaged $114,911 in earnings per fight. His bout with Al Iaquinta got him a considerable bump up at $530,000. That’s almost a 5 time increase on his previous fight earnings. But this is nothing compared to what he got for McGregor.
$2,400,000 – that’s a 4-time increase from his Al Iaquinta earnings and a wowzer 20-times increase on his average base pay!
The era-defining fight enthralled millions of viewers worldwide and earned one of the top PPVs in UFC history. In fact, some argue that ‘The Eagle’ would not have achieved the kind of near-everlasting fame he can speak of if he hadn’t faced ‘The Notorious.’
Before he fought McGregor, Nurmagomedov was only known by hardcore fans and critics. Meanwhile, McGregor was the UFC’s first Bonafide champion-tier superstar. Even GOATs like Jon Jones, George St Pierre and Anderson Silva did not have that kind of crowd-pulling power.
Bigger Hauls and Better Results
So, ‘The Eagle’s’ fight against McGregor opened him to the possibilities of earning top-sums that would not have been his to get otherwise. Nurmagomedov earned a colossal $6,090,000 for his fight with Dustin Poirier and also for his final match against Justin Gaethje.
Not bad for a boy from Dagestan earning $20,000 for a fight, even one with the pedigree of the legendary Abdulmanap Nurmagomedov behind him.
Now the question is how much of his legacy he can cement with his protege Islam Makhachev, particularly as Conor McGregor plans a return to action in early 2023. Time will tell.
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