Rousey Made $2.2 Million for 17 Seconds. The Netflix Payouts Just Dropped

The California State Athletic Commission just released the payouts from the Netflix card and the numbers confirm everything we've been writing about all year.

Ronda Rousey: $2,200,000. For 17 seconds. One armbar.

Gina Carano: $1,050,000. She threw one leg kick, got taken down, and was submitted before she could do anything else. A million dollars for zero landed strikes.

Francis Ngannou: $1,500,000. First round KO. The man who left the UFC and made $30 million as a free agent just added another $1.5 million to the pile.

And the lowest paid fighter on the entire card? Still made $40,000. Exactly what Rousey promised.

The Full Payouts

The CSAC disclosed these numbers after the event per California's athletic commission rules. These are minimum guaranteed purses, not total earnings. Sponsorships, bonuses, and backend deals aren't included. So the real numbers are probably higher across the board.

Ronda Rousey: $2,200,000 (W, submission, R1)

Francis Ngannou: $1,500,000 (W, KO, R1)

Gina Carano: $1,050,000 (L, submission, R1)

Nate Diaz: $500,000 (L, TKO, R2)

Mike Perry: $400,000 (W, TKO, R2)

Philipe Lins: $100,000 (L, KO, R1)

Junior dos Santos: $80,000 (L, KO, R1)

Salahdine Parnasse: $70,000 (W, TKO, R1)

And every fighter on the undercard got at least $40,000 guaranteed regardless of result.

What These Numbers Actually Mean

Okay so let me put some context around this because the raw numbers are wild but the comparisons are where it gets really interesting.

Carano made $1,050,000 on Saturday night. Her first MMA fight back in the early Strikeforce days paid her $1,000. Her title fight against Cris Cyborg in 2009, which was the first women's bout to headline a major MMA event, reportedly paid her $120,000. Seventeen years later she came back, lost in 17 seconds, and made almost ten times what the Cyborg fight paid.

Rousey claimed before the fight that she was getting paid "multitudes" more than the $5 million she earned for the Amanda Nunes fight at UFC 207 in 2016. The disclosed purse is $2.2 million but the actual number with backend deals is almost certainly way higher than that. Court filings from the UFC antitrust lawsuit showed Rousey earned between $15 and $17 million during her entire UFC career. One night on Netflix might have gotten her close to matching that.

And here's the one that should stick with you. Philipe Lins got knocked out in the first round by Ngannou. Lost. Got flatlined. His disclosed purse was $100,000. A debuting UFC fighter who loses their first fight walks out with $12,000. Lins made more than eight times that for getting KO'd on the Netflix undercard.

The $40K Floor Held Up

Rousey told the world at the press conference that every fighter on the card would make at least $40,000 win or lose. Kenny Cross said he was making five times what a debuting UFC fighter would earn. Nakisa Bidarian confirmed it publicly. And now the CSAC numbers prove it.

Not a single fighter on the card made less than $40,000. Wins and losses didn't matter. Main card and prelims didn't matter. Forty grand, guaranteed, across the board.

For comparison. The UFC's standard entry level pay is $12,000 to show and $12,000 to win. If you lose your UFC debut, you walk out with $12,000 before taxes, before paying your coaches, before covering the training camp that probably cost more than what you earned.

On the Netflix card, a debuting fighter who lost still took home at least $40,000. That's more than three times what the UFC pays for a debut loss.

Rousey called the UFC "one of the worst places to go" for fighters trying to make money. These numbers are the proof.

The CEO Math

I keep coming back to this comparison because it honestly never stops being absurd.

Ari Emanuel, the CEO of TKO Group Holdings which owns the UFC, made $67 million in 2024. Sixty seven million dollars. One man bro made all that in one year.

Rousey made $2.2 million disclosed for headlining the most watched MMA event of the year on Netflix. And she's the HIGHEST paid fighter on the card. The woman who built women's MMA. The biggest female combat sports star in history. Her disclosed purse is 3% of what the UFC's CEO made sitting in an office.

Now think about the undercard fighters. The guys making $40,000 on the Netflix card, which is already more than triple what the UFC pays debutants. Those fighters would need to fight 1,675 times at $40,000 each to match what Ari Emanuel made in a single year.

That's not just a pay gap. I don't even know what you call that.

Rousey Then Retired

After armbarring Carano in 17 seconds, Rousey grabbed the mic and said "there's no way I could've ended it better than this. I want to have some more babies and I've got to get cooking."

Joan Jett's "Bad Reputation" was playing. The same walkout song from every Rousey fight since the beginning. The crowd was standing. And the woman who spent the last three months going to war with the UFC, revealing pay structures, recruiting Paddy Pimblett, calling out Hunter Campbell, and building the loudest case for fighter pay reform in MMA history walked away for good.

She retired in 17 seconds with the same armbar that made her famous. In a promotion that pays its fighters more than the one she left. On a platform that reaches more people in one night than most UFC cards reach in a month. And she did it with a smile on her face.

That's how you close a chapter man.

What Happens Now

Jake Paul said after the event that MVP will host more MMA cards on Netflix. He said they're "taking over MMA." Whether that's true or not is a conversation for another day. But the payouts from Saturday night just set a standard that every fighter in the UFC is now going to measure their contracts against.

$40,000 minimum. $100,000 for getting KO'd on the undercard. $1.05 million for losing in 17 seconds. $2.2 million for winning.

Every UFC fighter who looks at those numbers and then looks at their own contract is going to have a conversation with their manager this week. And every manager who has that conversation is going to be thinking about what Ngannou said a few weeks ago.

"They don't have the balls to stand on their own and claim that freedom."

The receipts are in. The California State Athletic Commission put them on paper. And the conversation about fighter pay in MMA just got a whole lot louder.

Thanks for riding with CageLore. Stay locked in!

Frequently Asked Questions

How much did Rousey make for the Netflix fight?

The CSAC disclosed Rousey's minimum purse at $2,200,000 for her 17 second armbar win over Gina Carano. The actual total with backend deals is likely significantly higher. Rousey claimed before the fight she was getting paid "multitudes" more than the $5 million she earned for the Amanda Nunes fight in 2016.

How much did Carano make?

Carano's disclosed purse was $1,050,000 despite losing in 17 seconds without landing a single strike. It was the biggest disclosed payday of her combat sports career. Her first MMA fight paid her $1,000 and her Cris Cyborg title fight reportedly paid $120,000.

How much did Ngannou make?

Ngannou's disclosed purse was $1,500,000 for his first round KO of Philipe Lins. This is in addition to the $30 million he has reportedly made since leaving the UFC in January 2023.

Was the $40K minimum real?

Yes. The CSAC payouts confirmed that no fighter on the card made less than $40,000 in disclosed purse money. This was verified by MVP co-founder Nakisa Bidarian and matches what Rousey promised at the press conference.

How does MVP pay compare to the UFC?

The UFC's standard entry level pay is $12,000 to show and $12,000 to win for debuting fighters. MVP's $40,000 minimum for all fighters regardless of result is more than three times what a UFC debutant earns for a loss.

What were the full disclosed payouts?

Rousey $2.2M, Ngannou $1.5M, Carano $1.05M, Diaz $500K, Perry $400K, Lins $100K, JDS $80K, Parnasse $70K. All undercard fighters received at least $40K. These are minimum disclosed purses and do not include sponsorships, bonuses, or backend deals.