There is one major difference between WWE chairman Vince McMahon and UFC president Dana White according to CM Punk.
Punk is one of the few to have worked under both promoters along with names such as Brock Lesnar and Ronda Rousey. Both organizations have also received major criticism over athlete pay as well as the lack of unionization efforts.
And while Punk certainly believes fighters need to be paid more, he also believes White goes out of his way much more to help his roster than McMahon.
“I think there’s levels to it,” Punk said on Oral Sessions with Renee Paquette when asked to compare the two. “Obviously you can draw that they’re both right wing, the word I’ll use is weirdo, because obviously they vote based on what’s good for their pocketbook.
“If I really had to compare and contrast, I would say Dana is more generous. Dana does a lot of stuff for the fighters behind the scenes. I think there’s a lot of locker room money that people don’t know about and he gets a lot of flak for [not paying fighters enough]. That being said, I do also think fighters need to get paid a whole hell of a lot more.
“But a lot of that time when he lashes out when people are complaining about pay and unionization, it’s because he knows, ‘hey, I just gave that guy $250,000 under the table’ but you can’t talk about it. But he should still pay people more and fighters need to get together and unionize anyway.”
Locker room bonuses are a common feature within the UFC despite some observers previously stating otherwise.
Former UFC featherweight Myles Jury revealed he even earned one in his promotional debut while Daniel Cormier recently stated that he earned a locker room bonus of $1 million after his defeat to Jon Jones back in 2015.
DC says after he lost to Jon Jones, Lorenzo and Dana gave him $1M. #DCandHelwani pic.twitter.com/PKXEfPlwzZ
— Jed I. Goodman (@jedigoodman) August 31, 2020
But as Punk stated, fighters should still be paid a lot more. Especially when one considers the roster was only paid 16% of the revenue the UFC made in 2019.
You can watch the full snippet below: