Johny Eblen doesn’t like how the UFC is handling its fighters. In line with this, he believes the promotion’s attitude toward its financial agreements with its talents almost caused Dustin Poirier’s UFC 299 fight against Benoît Saint-Denis to be canceled.
On Thursday, the No. 3 lightweight shared on X that his upcoming fight against Saint-Denis was “off.” However, hours after posting the announcement, the fighter retracted it and said it was just an error due to lack of communication. No other details were shared about the matter, but Poirier’s training teammate, Eblen, revealed that the issue had something to do with the contract terms.
This is not new, as “The Diamond” faced the same problem when he withdrew from his fight against Tony Ferguson at UFC 254. The fighter reportedly failed to reach his contract terms with UFC, with company CEO Dana White saying, “There’s a lot of different ways to turn down a fight” and “negotiating yourself out of one is one of the ways you can do it.”
Needless to say, this was the same case that almost prevented Poirier’s return.
“They’re trying to generate interest, and generate likes, and, you know, clicks,” Eblen said on SHAK MMA. “I think that was not a good move on them because, I mean, I know Dustin pretty well, and I actually spoke with him about it today, and they just didn’t come to terms, man. Like, the things that Dustin laid out for them, that they need to provide for this fight, they were not willing to do it, so- and Dustin’s in a position where he’s like ‘Motherf***er if you want me to fight, you got to do this, this, and this for me, if you’re not going to do this, this, this for me, I’m not going to fight.'”
It is common in the UFC to announce a fight without even giving fighters a contract to sign first or reaching an agreement. This puts fighters in a difficult situation, with fans ending up disappointed in case the match is canceled. For Eblen, this is all inappropriate just because the promotion chooses to be ungenerous in settling a deal with its talents.
“I just think it’s kind of horses**t because I know how much money the UFC makes,” Eblen said. “And they can make that fight happen, but they’re choosing not to because they’re being stingy in a way, and the fact that they- no contract was signed and they were willing to f***ing announce it is f***ing beyond me, man.”
