A few days after UFC 226 took place last July 7th in Las Vegas, supposed co-headliner Brian Ortega revealed that he had not been paid for his pre-fight efforts and obligations. And by the looks of things, it does not seem like “T-City” will be getting a dime.
During his recent appearance on Brendan Schaub’s Below the Belt podcast on Showtime, the undefeated Ortega spoke in detail about how his conversation with UFC president Dana White went down.
“I told him ‘Listen, I showed up, I’ve been cutting weight, I did all media, even the media in Spanish that you guys – I had to do double the work and do all that in Spanish,” Ortega said. “Every fighter left, and I’m still stuck there doing everything in Spanish.”
“I’ve been showing I’m a company man, I’m down to promote the hell out of this fight, I’m taking extra hours while I’m hungry, starving to keep doing media. And I’ve been cutting weight, did the open workouts, ready for media. I showed up. Don’t you think that’s worth something? That’s worth something, even if I didn’t take the fight. I go ‘I did my end of the deal.’”
As a Plan B, the UFC decided to have top contender Jeremy Stephens step in as Max Holloway’s replacement, which Ortega turned down. Because of this, Ortega says the UFC used his own decision against him.
“Then he came back and said ‘Well, our deal was to see if we can find you a fight, and we found you a fight, and you turned it down.’” I was like ‘Unless it’s for a title, I’m not going for it.’ He goes ‘Well, I did my job, you didn’t do yours. Your job is to show up and fight.’”
Ortega asserts that he only wants to fight for the belt, and if Holloway would be stripped due to inactivity, he is willing to face anyone for the vacant title at UFC 227 this August.
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