Khabib Offers Ferguson $200K to Fight

Tony Ferguson vs. Khabib Nurmagomedov is the fight to make in 2017, but there have been some hurdles keeping it from happening. Ferguson is holding out until he is paid the same purse as Khabib, which UFC President Dana White said isn’t happening. Now, Nurmagomedov has resorted to offering Ferguson money to make the fight.

Nurmagomedov took to Twitter to offer Ferguson $200,000 of his own money to make up for the discrepancy in their pay.

Khabib appeared on Monday’s edition of the MMA Hour — as did Ferguson, who predictably declined Khabib’s offer.

“I said, let’s go,” Nurmagomedov said. “I want to fight with him. I don’t want to talk with him, I want to fight with him. It’s why I said, let’s go, I’ll give you $200,000 and you have to take this fight and we have to fight March 4, UFC 209.”

One reason that Nurmagomedov is paid more than Ferguson is that Khabib has a massive following in his home country of Russia. The UFC is planning on expanding into Russia, and Khabib will play a massive role in those plans.

Now that he has offered Ferguson money from his own pocket, Khabib does not understand why the fight isn’t getting made.

“Why you need to make money like this? Why?” he said. “You need to shut up and take this fight. This is what you need to do. I am tired about this. I don’t know. I ask Tony about $200,000. It’s good money. Why not? His contract he makes maybe $100-200,000, and I give him $200,000. That’s good money. He has to take this fight.

“With me [is] all of Russia. With me, USA. Who’s with him? California? I don’t think so.”