Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) and its president, Dana White, are usually good at compensating certain fighters if their bouts are canceled last minute because of weight-cutting fiascos or other unforeseen circumstances that affected their opponents.
So one would assume Brian Ortega would be compensated something after his Featherweight title fight against division champion Max Holloway was scrapped after “Blessed” was forced out with concussion-like symptoms (or was it water poisoning?).
But, that’s apparently not the case, according to “T-City,” who revealed on Ariel Helwani’s MMA Show that White has initially rejected his requests to receive a portion of his purse for showing up and taking care of his end.
“We had our talk. We agreed to disagree pretty much, I told him if I was going to be compensated for anything, you know, if I would get anything. I told him I showed up, I did everything, my weight was good, did the open workouts, the media and he said, ‘No,’” explained Ortega.
Furthermore, Ortega revealed his first meeting with White was shortly after Daniel Cormier suffered a fall on stage at the UFC 226 presser, which could have had a lot to do with White’s bad mood and the subsequent “tough” meeting.
The 145-pound contender then revealed he had another meeting with White a day later and the brash head honcho told him he was simply “pissed” during their first meeting after Ortega refused to face Jeremy Stephens on a few days notice for the interim belt.
White apologized for the way it went down, according to Ortega.
“So that was that. I was pretty bummed out, heartbroken. After that, we had another meeting yesterday. We talked and he said he was just pissed off. He then said we’d talk again this week and figure things out. So right now, I don’t know what ‘figure things out’ means,” he added.
According to Ortega, he was going to receive a flat rate for his title fight against Holloway instead of the usual show and win money. While Ortega understands he shouldn’t get the entire purse, he feels he should at least get a percentage to cover for his fight camp expenses.
As of this posting, Ortega has not been paid anything and his third meeting with White has yet to go down.
Still, Ortega stands by his decision to hold out for Holloway, but by the sound of it, “Blessed” isn’t in any shape to return anytime soon, which promoted Ortega to call for a title fight at UFC 227 on Aug. 4, 2018, against an opponent of UFC’s choosing.
We know one guy who is more than game.
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