The month of June was supposed to be an action packed with Khamzat Chimaev and Conor McGregor among others returning to action. Unfortunately, things did not play out as planned and the UFC had to scramble to get Alex Pereira to show up. And boy, he didn’t come cheap.
UFC had to run around quite a bit at last minute fights in order to save the UFC 303 card. They did so by getting Pereira to fight against Jiri Procházka for UFC 303. And according to UFC stars, Gilbert Burns and Renato Moicano, Poatan got a deal of around $5 million to show up and be superman.
In a recent episode of their podcast ‘Show me the Money’, Burns and Moicano discussed how big of a star Pereira had become in the UFC. He believes that the Brazilian had already made $5 million for UFC 300 and is likely to have made the same deal for UFC 303.
“And the 300 bro, the guy make that PPV on 300, ooof. At least 5 ($5 million). And he got good managers because his manager is Jorge Guimarães and this guy used to manage Anderson Silva and all these guys. I think they have a very good relationship with the UFC. So this guy should be making, I think he made more than 5 ($5 million) on UFC 300. And I think he is going to make over another 5 ($5 million) right now for 303.”
Unfortunately at this point in time, there are no concrete reports to verify any of the numbers thrown around by Moicano and Burns.
However, the UFC spent a lot of money on the UFC 303 card since it was supposed to be McGregor. So its very likley that the PPV which has already broken the record gate of all time, will see Pereira get a few million dollars richer.
Regardless, the main event will be fight to remember as the light heavyweight champion defends his title.
A closer look at Alex Pereira vs Jiri Prochazaka
Interestingly, Pereira and Prochazka had also stepped in at the last minute and saved the UFC 295 card after Jon Jones withdrew from the event.
This fight saw Pereira securing a knockout win in the second round to win the light heavyweight belt. So Jiri would be looking to throw some hands of his own. It’s also an excellent striking match up as both ‘Poatan’ and ‘BJP’ are very unorthodox fighters with one punch KO power.
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So, there is a strong consensus amongst fans that the rematch between the two men will not go the distance either. So, this is just another banger in the making, perhaps more worthy of a $20+ million gate than whatever Chandler and McGregor had planned.
