George St. Pierre spoke openly on the Mighty Cast about his frequent clashes with the UFC over athlete pay, contract negotiations, and PED testing policies. According to the MMA icon, many of those battles happened behind closed doors and were never seen by the public.
GSP explained that he often pushed back against the promotion in an effort to improve conditions and perceptions for MMA athletes.
“I went head-to-head with the UFC on many things, for the figh ters’ pay, for the image that we were portrayed, the stereotype. I tried to make us have a better image, go in with a suit in the press conference, for the d**g testing,” GSP said.
Despite the disagreements, he stressed that his disputes with UFC president Dana White were professional rather than personal.
“I was very vocal about it. We bumped heads many times, Dana and I, and it was not personal. Now I’m good friends with Dana. It was business. But I did it for myself. But what I did was also to help other athletes.”
The Canadian legend also recalled difficult contract negotiations with the UFC, saying he and his management team repeatedly fought for better compensation.
“I was behind closed doors. I was figh ting with UFC for my contract,” he said.
“They were trying to make me sign a contract with many matches but not a great compensation. So my agent, we bumped heads with them. We wanted more compensation because we knew who made what. We had inside information.”
GSP believes transparency among athletes is important and said he never hesitated to share information about his own earnings when asked.
“I think it’s important between figh ters to share that information,” he said.
“If an athlete called me, and it had happened in the past, I can’t say names, but a lot of guys have called me to know what I make and I tell them what I make. I don’t hide it because if I hide it, it’s selfish for me.”
PED testing was another major issue where GSP found himself at odds with the UFC. He said he advocated for independent testing through VADA and felt the promotion was reluctant to embrace the idea.
He said, “I was trying to implement VADA, it’s an independent organization that tested the athletes. I believe they didn’t want me to start a movement because it would have kept them in trouble.”
He then shared his belief that stricter testing could have exposed some of the organization’s biggest stars.
“A lot of their champions and big pay-per-view names were che ating. I’m pretty sure they knew that, and they didn’t want that because they’re running a business.”
When discussing pay across combat sports, GSP argued that UFC athletes still receive an unfair share of the revenue generated by the promotion.
“I still firmly believe that MMA athletes are not paid good enough and they have bad conditions,” he said.
“If you look at the way the revenue is shared in different sports, basketball, hockey, American football, baseball, it’s about roughly 50/50. In the UFC, it’s not 50/50. It’s not even close. It’s bad.”
