Outside Source
Rousey (12-2) is scheduled to fight fellow veteran Gina Carano (7-1) on May 16 at the Intuit Dome in Los Angeles, California. The fight will take place on a Netflix card under Jake Paul’s Most Valuable Promotions.
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Rousey revealed that she was originally in talks with the UFC for her return to MMA after nearly a decade. According to “Rowdy,” Dana White offered her the highest percentage of pay-per-view shares in UFC history. However, White wanted more time to confirm the deal. Things permanently changed when the UFC’s ESPN deal ended last year, marking the end of the pay-per-view model as well. The UFC made a multi-billion dollar deal with Paramount, switching to a subscription-based streaming model starting in 2026.
A Shift in Focus
Rousey claims that after the pay-per-view era ended, the UFC did not want to pay her the guaranteed amount that she thought she deserved. According to the former UFC bantamweight champion, the promotion is now leaning toward cost-effective fights as opposed to matching up the best against each other.
“[Dana] literally brought me a deal where I would make more per pay-per-view buy than anybody in UFC history… He just needed more time, and it happened to go to the other side when the ESPN model would be ending, and they would be going to streaming,” Rousey said on “The Jim Rome Show.’ “They didn’t want to set a precedent of giving me the guaranteed money I deserve… They just made a $7.7 billion deal at Paramount. It’s in their best interest not to put on the best fights possible, but to spend as little money as possible so they can keep it… Now that they sold the company, it’s out of Dana’s hands unfortunately, and it’s fallen onto Hunter Campbell and UFC corp. They don’t care about putting on the best fights possible; they care about putting on the most cost-effective fights possible.”
Ronda Rousey says Dana White offered her the largest PPV deal in UFC history before the move to Paramount+, but wasn’t willing to offer a guaranteed amount once the new deal was in place 😬
“They didn’t want to set a precedent of giving me the guaranteed money I deserve… they… pic.twitter.com/W6BqhJnTfv
— Championship Rounds (@ChampRDS) February 21, 2026
This article first appeared at Recent News on Sherdog.com
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