If it was up to Dana White, Chuck Liddell and Matt Hughes would still be on the UFC’s payroll.
Since WME-IMG purchased the UFC in the largest franchise sale in sports history, there has been a considerable number of lay-offs in the world’s largest MMA promotion.
Perhaps the most high-profile wave of these lay-offs happened to the Toronto offices with 80% of the department getting let go including Tom Wright, UFC Executive Vice President and General Manager for Operations in Canada, Australia and New Zealand. Other notable departures include Garry Cook, Marshall Zelaznik and Jaime Pollack.
UFC president Dana White has reassured everyone that these actions are completely normal following a takeover of this size, speaking on UFC Unfiltered.
“When another company takes over another company, it’s absolutely normal for them to come in and especially at the executive level, to let guys go. They have guys that they are going to bring in that will fill those positions. Some of those people that have been let go, they have their own people ready for those positions. It’s their company, they roll in and they put in their people, it’s absolutely normal. A lot of our executives were let go, a company as big as WME-IMG, they have a ton of people for these positions.”
More lay-offs https://t.co/gSi9NffskK
— SportsJOE (@SportsJOEdotie) December 3, 2016
As for Liddell and Hughes, well, White didn’t really have a say in the matter. White claimed to have promised both men a job at the company for as long as he was able to provide ones for them. However, once the promotion was sold, he lost the power to keep them on the books. They just didn’t figure into the new owners’ plans.
“The Chuck Liddell, Matt Hughes thing, during the ZUFFA era, those were my guys. I wanted them to retire, I respected these guys. They helped build this company when I was growing it and I told them both, I said, ‘Unless I drop dead or it comes to a position sometime where I’m not controlling how much money is being spent and all that stuff, you guys will get a paycheck until that day.’ And that day came.”
“The thing with Matt and Chuck, it was a loyalty thing for me. It was my gift to them or being the guys that they were when me, Frank and Lorenzo, when it was our money.”
