“The Truth” about Bradon Vera’s contract dispute

March 18, 2008 – 11:56 am by fightlinker

We all remember that long fucking period of time where Brandon Vera did nothing but sit on the sidelines bitching about how his manager screwed him over and didn’t represent him properly with the UFC? Well, the arbitration ruling over that whole thing came back and the verdict is that if there was mismanagement, Vera didn’t do enough to prove it. And now his former manager Mark Dion is firing back with details of the whole situation, painting Brandon Vera with a pretty greedy brush:

The UFC was offering a $100,000 signing bonus to Vera, IF and only IF Vera became a UFC Champion. Brandon was unwilling to settle for these terms given that he received a $100,000 signing bonus on his previous contract. After all, why would Vera want to settle for the same signing bonus he received from his second contract with the UFC, when his stock had skyrocketed after two big wins over Assuerio Silva and Frank Mir and remaining undefeated in the UFC? That would be like A-Rod re-signing with the Yankees under the same terms as his rookie contract with the Seattle Mariners.

The evidence shows that Vera was not interested in a $100,000 signing bonus that was contingent on him becoming the UFC Champion. Vera wanted a $1.5 Million signing bonus upfront.

Not only that, but Vera also turned down a 7 million over 4 year contract, plus the other amounts shown on that post-it note shown above. The whole page is VERY interesting and worth reading from top to bottom. Not only do you get to see the negotiation process work itself out, but you also get dollar amounts, emails, phone numbers, etc etc ect. If I was Mark Dion I’d have gone over these things with a sharpie before releasing em, but hey … it’s more fun for everyone this way anyways.