The UFC Being Sued By a Coalition of Former Fighters

Those of you who didn’t see this coming probably won’t understand why this is a big deal. The UFC operates in a bit of a gray area right now, where it is for sure a sport, but is not really comparable to a lot of the bigger team sports out there in how its run or presented. Everyone likes to grasp at those straws to compare the UFC to the NFL, NHL or anything else, but it’s always difficult to categorize them. Professional athletes in most sports leagues have options and competition between teams, which is how these leagues avoid antitrust suits.

See, the NFL is technically considered a “cartel” right now by US Antitrust laws (I’m not making this up) of 32 independent businesses. What I’m getting at here is while Dana White, Lorenzo Fertitta and the UFC might scoff publicly at the idea of the UFC being a monopoly (and while OneFC will try to convince you there is somehow a duopoly, lol), there has to be some concern internally. That concern will now only be amplified as over the weekend the news broke that the UFC was being sued by former fighters in a class action lawsuit because of how the UFC ruined the free market for them.

The plot thickens.

No names have been announced just yet, but the word is that there will be a press conference tomorrow to announce more details and guess what? There are rumblings that Viacom could be involved in this lawsuit. Imagine how much Dana White would hate Tito Ortiz and Randy Couture if they were leading the charge on such a lawsuit?

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<blockquote class=”twitter-tweet” lang=”en”><p>News conference announcing class action lawsuit against UFC set for Tues (12/16) at 1 p.m. PT</p>&mdash; Steven Marrocco (@MMAjunkieSteven) <a href=”https://twitter.com/MMAjunkieSteven/status/544598243259060224″>December 15, 2014</a></blockquote>

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<blockquote class=”twitter-tweet” lang=”en”><p>I have been told some money behind lawsuit is connected to Viacom</p>&mdash; Jason Coles (@MMASun) <a href=”https://twitter.com/MMASun/status/544600222543122432″>December 15, 2014</a></blockquote>

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This could end up being a giant bust or things could take a drastic turn in short order here.

 

Published on December 15, 2014 at 9:18 pm
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