You would be a fool to believe anything Dana says.
Luke Thomas, hate him or love him is inconsequential, had a great point. The UFC is unlike most promotions in that there is no Show and Win bonus like most of us think. All contracts clearly state no money will be exchanged until bout completion.
As ruthless as this sounds, Dana isn't even obligated to pay Show money if a fighter makes weight and sprains an ankle entering the Octagon. I would love see fighters unionize and slowly try to regain some leverage against the UFC and WME as a whole. But with each passing year with no progress that seems less and less likely.
Let's break this down. The UFC and Thompson have a contract agreeing to a fight at a certain weight. The UFC tries to change the terms of the contract to get him to accept a higher weight opponent last minute, and when he refuses to agree to the change, they back out of their agreement. Seems like this would be clearly and obviously a breach if pursued in court. Maybe Wonderboy doesn't want to burn bridges by taking that route, but I can't help but think that the UFC would be tougher on chronic weight missers if they still had to pay out in cases like this.
