Recently social media star Logan Paul signed a deal with to make his sports drink PRIME (which he co-owns with KSI) the official sports drink of the UFC. Part of that deal is the renaming of the Octagon’s fighter corners as the blue and red PRIME hydration zones.
In the build-up to his younger brother’s fight with Tommy Fury this past weekend, Paul said he would bet his equity in PRIME on Jake Paul winning. Jake Paul would go on to lose that fight by split decision.
Paul then took to Twitter to ask “who wants it?” in reference to his earlier bet.
Former UFC middleweight champion Chris Weidman has reacted to this and explained why he thought Paul should forward his PRIME pay-cheques to fighters.
Here’s what he said on his Won’t Back Down Radio show.
“Logan Paul, who by the way, sounded like a complete buffoon when he got the mic in the fight, he went on Twitter and said he’d bet his equity in PRIME, the hydration energy drink,” said Weidman (ht bjpenn). “We now have hydration corners, the red and blue hydration corners. He said he’d bet his equity in that to anyone who wanted it, that Jake Paul would win this fight.”
“After the fight, he said, ‘Who wants it’. I’m sure he’s just messing around but either way, I know his brother Jake Paul is about MMA fighters being taken care of,” continued Weidman. “He would approve of this: Take your equity and give it to all the UFC fighters, split it all up. Let’s not forget back in the day we had sponsors on our shorts, they took everything away.”
“…Years go by, and there are multiple sponsors in the cage… There’s nobody talking anymore about fighters getting a piece of that pie. As an old-time guy myself, I don’t forget.”
UFC fighters have been frozen out of having independent in-cage sponsors since 2013 and they receive zero share of the majority of sponsorship deals the UFC signs.
About the author: Tim Bissell is a writer, editor and deputy site manager for Bloody Elbow. He has covered combat sports since 2015. Tim covers news and events and has also written longform and investigative pieces. (full bio)
