The fighter’s on tonight’s UFC 264 card have even more incentive to put on a show tonight at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas as the post-fight bonuses have been raised from $50,000 to $75,000.
Word of the increase first emerged from main card opener Sean O’Malley, who welcomed the news as he prepares for his fight against late replacement newcomer Kris Moutinho.
It’s not the first time that the bonuses have been raised to this amount recently, as Tony Ferguson managed to talk Dana White into the same increase during a pre-fight press conference for UFC 262, stating that, “everything’s bigger in Texas!”
There there was no such request this, at least publicly, so it’s unclear exactly why the bonuses have been bolstered.
However, it’s safe to assume that it’s been done due to the fact that this is almost certain to be the biggest event of the year due to the Poirier vs. McGregor trilogy fight, with Dana White having already stated earlier in the week that it had registered the most pre-buys ever in company history.
That bodes well for the eventual PPV numbers, especially given that Poirier vs. McGregor’s second fight at UFC 257 in January did 1.6 million buys.
At this stage there’s no indication that the UFC plans to make tonight’s bonus increase permanent, so it’s likely to be back to the traditional $50,000 awards next time out.
