Jake Paul fired back at Dana White in their latest feud.
It was White who dished out the first verbal spat against Paul during the UFC 261 post-fight press conference. In the conference, White bashed the company Paul and Triller, saying the company lied about its pay-per-view buys and how much money Paul made for facing Ben Askren. “The numbers are there? Nah. I don’t know if the numbers are there,” White said. “Do you know what would happen to this guy? He ain’t fighting in the UFC.” The UFC president continued, “He’s getting hand-picked opponents, and God knows what else is going on with that whole f—ing thing.”
The UFC president did not stop there and further claimed that the sales of UFC were better than Triller and what Paul drew. “What happened tonight is, we sold this place out and it was packed, and the numbers that you’re hearing [Triller] did they’re full of s–t. They’re full of s–t. OK?” White said. “They didn’t pull that kind of numbers at all not even f—ing close.”
Paul did not take the claim too lightly and went on Twitter to fire back at the UFC president. The social media-turned boxer published a note on Twitter with his response to White. “Dana you claimed you would bet $1M on me losing,” Paul wrote. “[You] Set up Askren to train with Freddie Roach … gave him full access to UFCP, and he still got his a-s handed to him.” The social media influencer then said, “Seems like you are the real douche…not Ariel.” This was a reference to when White called out ESPN MMA reporter Ariel Helwani.
“In my third fight, I made more in total pay than any fighter in UFC history,” the boxer said. “Maybe it’s time to pay your fighters their fair share?” The boxer called out White on the low payouts that the company gives to its fighters. “No wonder they all want to get into boxing,” Paul said.
“Dana, you say you make the fights fans want to see…so hurry up and make Jones vs. Ngannou. Pay them their fair share… $10M purse for each guy, plus PPV,” the note read.
The note ended with one final statement questioning the low payouts again. “Why are UFC fighters so underpaid vs. boxers? Why did I make more money in my third fight than all but two [**Khabib Nurmagomedov** and **Conor McGregor**] UFC fighters have in history? I know why …”
