Whole UFC class-action antitrust lawsuit story !

The class-action antitrust lawsuit filed on 12/16 in federal court in San Jose, seems to come down to a line of what constitutes building a strong business, and what constitutes attempting to crush opposition, which can be argued are at times one and the same thing.
The Ultimate Fighting Championship over the last eight years, with the fall of the Japanese-based rival Pride Fighting Championships, has emerged as the dominant force in the mixed martial arts business. While there have always been dozens, and now hundreds of promotions, including many that have national television exposure, UFC has in recent years has had a dominant market share, and controlled most of the sport's top fighters.
During that period, a number of companies attempted to be competition. Almost all failed, many of which then had their intellectual property, which included contracts and videotape libraries, purchased by Zuffa, LLC, the parent company of the UFC.
In doing so, there were less options for the elite level fighters. And in recent years, with the implement of the sponsor tax, fighters themselves had seen a onetime lucrative market dry up, both from the tax and from market conditions. Some companies found, over time, that it was not economically worthwhile to spend the level of money that they had in sponsoring fighters. And with more shows, and smaller audiences, the value of sponsoring a UFC fighter, unless it was a major champion, wasn't as strong as in what some would call the period of the sport's greatest mainstream popularity, from roughly 2006 through 2011.
The lawsuit, filed by current UFC fighter Cung Le, and former UFC fighters Nathan Quarry and Jon Fitch, is being handled on contingency by lawyers representing five major law firms.
Le said that while he is still under contract with the organization, he would not fight for the UFC again. But he said if given a release, he would be open to fighting for another organization.
This will likely be a slow process that the plaintiffs hope will change the structure of the sport. But at the press conference announcing the suit, nobody spoke in any specifics of what they wanted or expected the end result to be. The only thing said was about creating an environment where there was more competition for fighters services and likenesses for merchandising endeavors, thus increasing the revenue going to fighters.
Le, 42, who was one of the main stars of Strikeforce, has been a UFC headliner since Zuffa purchased Strikeforce in 2011. He had major recent issues with the promotion concerning an announced drug test failure and suspension for allegedly using Human Growth Hormone in a test taken at his 8/23 fight, in Macau, China, where he lost to Michael Bisping.
Due to irregularities in the testing procedure, the results were later ruled invalid and UFC rescinded his suspension. Le had publicly asked for an apology, which didn't happen. He then asked to be released from his contract, which also hasn’t happened. This coincided with Scott Coker, the former head of Strikeforce, a promoter he had worked for from 1998 to 2010 as both a San Shou fighter and later an MMA fighter, taking the job as the head man of Bellator.
Le said his involvement in the suit had nothing to do with the bad publicity stemming from the drug test story.
"Not at all," he said. "My involvement is more for the fighters, past, present and the future. That's why I'm involved in this lawsuit."
"It's about how we were treated, how we're paid, and what we have to go through. If it wasn't for us, there would be no MMA, and there would be no UFC. What's fair is fair."
Quarry, also 42, is a retired fighter who was part of the cast of the first season of The Ultimate Fighter reality show in 2005. The show was a key building block of the modern success of UFC. While he didn't win the show, as he was injured during the competition, he was one of the most popular fighters in the cast. Later in 2005, Quarry had a shot at middleweight champion Rich Franklin, which he lost. He remained with the UFC, last fighting in 2010, due to back injuries, that resulted in spinal fusion surgery. He retired officially in 2012.
"I think, more than anything, it (taking part in the suit) was to see current, former and upcoming fighters recoup some reward for their hard work," said Quarry, who co-hosted the TV show MMA Uncensored on Spike TV, in 2012. "Now, it's such a monopoly that the fighters have no real options, and that's not the American way."
Quarry, who has always been very popular with his fellow fighters, said fighters who have known about the suit have been quietly behind him. He also noted that for fans who think this will hurt the sport, that historically in major sports when athletes filed suit for free agent rights, that the end result of the enhanced competition for the athletes is that it ended up benefitting both the athletes and the fans. They led to the sports becoming more lucrative for everyone.
“Competition is good for the sport, good for the fighters, and good for the fans," he said.
Fitch, 36, who just competed three days earlier for the World Series of Fighting, losing to Rousimar Palhares in a match for their welterweight title, was not at the press conference. While he was there via phone line, he never spoke during the proceedings. He fought for UFC from 2005 to 2013. For almost that entire period, he was considered one of the top ten welterweights in the sport.
In 2008, he faced Georges St-Pierre for the welterweight title, losing via decision.
He was released by UFC in what may have been the most controversial firing in company history, since he was still listed in the company's top ten contenders.
His career was hurt because he was viewed as not being an exciting fighter, which likely cost him a second shot at the title. He had come off one of the most exciting fights of his career in a win over Erick Silva, but then lost to Demian Maia in a lackluster showing, and was let go. Dana White cited Fitch's salary and that he felt at his age, he was declining as a fighter, as reasons for letting him go. Fitch has since gone 2-2 in the World Series of Fighting, although both fighters who beat him, Josh Burkman (who has since been signed by UFC) and Palhares (who was fired by UFC in 2013 because he had injured fighters by not breaking heel hooks after tap outs and ref stoppages, and also had failed a steroid test in 2012), were clearly UFC-level competitors.
Fitch's name came up in a dispute years back when Zuffa required its fighters to, with no compensation, assign their likenesses in perpetuity for video game usage when the company signed a deal with THQ, Inc. Fitch attempted to negotiate a fee for his likeness, as did other fighters under the management of DeWayne Zinkin. UFC President Dana White terminated Fitch, although that termination only lasted a few days.
For a time, White claimed any fighter who appeared in a competing video game produced by EA Sports (which years later acquired the UFC license when THQ had financial problems) would never be allowed in the UFC. However, when top fighters who were in the EA Sports game became available, that provision was quickly forgotten about.
Former UFC welterweight champion Carlos Newton, who is not a plaintiff, was also at the press conference expressing support for the fighters. According to Robert Maysey, a longtime MMA fan and writer, and one of the lawyers involved in the case, Newton had been a strong supporter from day one.
The legal team involved is a strong heavyweight panel.
Eric Cramer has been listed since 2011 as one of the country's top antitrust lawyers. Michael Dell'Angelo is one of the top lawyers at Berger & Montague. That firm won a $100 million cash settlement from JP Morgan Chase & Company, from the bank's role in the collapse of commodities broker MF Global, which forced MF Global to distribute about $1 billion to former commodities customers who Dell'Angelo represented in a class action suit.
He was also one of the lawyers involved in a $163.5 million settlement in the Titanium Dioxide antitrust litigation. Benjamin Brown is a leading class action antitrust attorney. Joseph Saveri has specialized in antitrust law and class action litigation for more than 25 years, and has been involved in cases in dozens of industries that involved monopolistic business practices. Joshua Davis of the Saveri Law Firm has more than 15 years experience in antitrust class action suits. Maysey is the MMA business expert on the panel, a name familiar to most MMA industry insiders from his writing about topics that this lawsuit encompasses for many years.
However, it was claimed unionization is not what this lawsuit is about.
There is little doubt that more competition is the best thing for the athletes. But the question is whether the UFC's domination of the MMA business comes from having the right name brand, getting on strong television first and them building an organization to a level that the others who tried to compete couldn't make it work profitably, or did UFC engage in anti-competitive practices that stifled competition and put rivals out of business?
A key aspect of the suit is that the competition for top fighters ceased when a number of organizations, including Pride, Affliction and Strikeforce were purchased by UFC. But in all three cases, the purchase was because the promotions were looking to get out of the business. Pride and Affliction were about to cease existence anyway. Strikeforce was losing money and its parent company wanted to divest itself of its MMA brand, Zuffa made the best offer. According to those with Silicon Valley Sports, the Zuffa offer was the only truly serious one made.
It wasn't a good thing for fighters at the time. But the FTC investigated UFC on antitrust charges on the Strikeforce purchase in 2011 and 2012, and found no unlawful activity had taken place and did not pursue the matter.
But since the Strikeforce purchase, Bellator was purchased by Viacom, a far stronger financial entity than had backed Strikeforce.
While nobody would argue that Bellator is equal to UFC, nor from a quality of fighters standpoint, even equal to Strikeforce at the time of the purchase, it appears to be very much a competitor. On 11/15, when the two companies went head-to-head, with Bellator on Spike TV and UFC on Fox Sports 1 and pay-per-view with its first show ever in Mexico, Bellator captured the lion's share of viewers and seemed to generate more public interest.
However, the lawsuit dismisses Bellator as competition, even though there were two very public examples, Gilbert Melendez and Eddie Alvarez, where the competition between the two sides led to each fighter getting far more lucrative and beneficial deals, including
potential title shots specifically written into their deals. But those incidents are the exception rather than the rule.
"Another potential competitor, Bellator, is viewed within the MMA Industry--and by the UFC itself--as a minor league, a training ground for future UFC fighters, or as a place for former UFC fighters to compete after they have been released by the UFC," stated the lawsuit. "Bellator athletes lack significant public notoriety, in part because it is a `minor league,' and in part because UFC refuses to co-promote with any of Bellator's fighters regardless of talent or merit, leaving Bellator unable to promote MMA events of relative significance. Bellator's bout purses, gate revenues, attendance figures, merchandise sales, television licensing fees and ad rates are minimal compared to those obtained by the UFC."
The question becomes whether vigorous competition crossed over into anti-competitive practices. This is one of those struggles that is expected to take years to play out, and little in the way of details past the basics of what the key arguments will be, were talked about in the press conference.
The lawsuit addresses issues of exclusive fighter contracts, UFC decisions that they claim have restrained fighters from making as much as they could from both the sponsorship market and the merchandise and licensing market.
Dell'Angelo said that the domination of the market by UFC and ability to extend the contracts indefinitely, since the UFC has the rights to match outside offers when the contracts expire, prevents rival promotions from garnering the best talent and makes real competition in the marketplace virtually impossible.
"That gives UFC all the leverage to drive fighter compensation down and its own profit margins up," said Dell'Angelo.
There are fundamental issues here regarding what share of revenue the athletes deserve. While the major team sports' athletes can get 50 percent of total revenues, largely due to unions and collective bargaining, neither of which MMA has, nobody really knows exactly what the UFC percentage truly is. One of the things this lawsuit is likely to uncover in discovery is the real percentage. When ESPN did a story on this same subject, there were people claiming the percentage is less than ten percent, which would clearly not be the case because that would take the athletic commission payoff records as the real numbers and not figure in the PPV bonuses, which are substantial on a successful show, and locker room bonuses. Lorenzo Fertitta said on ESPN a few years back that the revenue going to the athletes isn’t far from 50 percent. From a business standpoint, the closest comparison to the UFC business is not the boxing business, which at the secondary level pays terribly little and at the top level is propped up by HBO and Showtime where the few big stars receive the lion’s share. Entry level fighters in UFC make far more than their boxing counterparts, and the biggest boxing draws make multiple times more than their UFC counterparts. But the people putting up the money for the big fights are HBO and Showtime, not the boxing promoters. With WWE, it’s a similar business structure.
In fact, the fundamentals of this case when one looks at it, one company controlling the U.S. market share to a great degree, no true free agency because of the lack of a viable alternative even though there are others on television, that if this case ends up favorably for the plaintiffs, WWE would be sitting ducks for something similar.
WWE pays talent based on set salaries, as does UFC, that are artificially low compared to the revenues the sport generates. There is little negotiating power. While there are no champions clauses to maintain talent, nor rights of first refusal, there is also nobody out there for the most part willing to guarantee most of the talent anywhere close to what they earn in WWE, with the exception of if that talent already has a name in Mexico or can fight, in which case the true competition for those few talents are UFC, Bellator or another MMA group, and not TNA, Lucha Underground or even New Japan Pro Wrestling.
The big difference is WWE wrestlers get a cut of video game revenue and merchandise revenue. WWE wrestlers are not allowed to do outside deals without first clearing it with the office. UFC fighters have no such restrictions. For all the decrying of the Reebok deal and sponsorship taxes hurting outside revenue, in the major sports, while you can get outside endorsements, and in UFC you still can, you can’t go on the playing field and be a billboard for non-league sponsors in the NHL, NFL, NBA or Major League Baseball. WWE talent can’t be either, unless you’re Brock Lesnar who has a special deal.
WWE performers were earning a base salary, but the highest number on the base, unless you are a specialty performer like Dwayne Johnson or Lesnar, is $1 million per year. But the biggest stars earn multiples of that, with the lion’s share previously being PPV bonuses and merchandise revenue.
With the Reebok deal, UFC is attempting to set up a more structured situation when it comes to marketing apparel and fighters getting a percentage. Whether this will end up for the better or worse is too early to figure out because nobody knows who is getting what. But the champions, who were able to make individual deals, have mostly already signed up, although they did have little leverage in the sense they couldn’t go to Under Armor or Nike and let the free market determine their worth.
Like UFC fighters, at least for the big names, the talent is also paid on revenue derived from 30 percent of the after-tax house show gates, and a similar percentage of company revenue from PPV. But WWE essentially, with no input of talent, talent reps, or a union process (which UFC also has), essentially killed PPV. However, to keep the top guys who would complain happy, they are being paid based on a percentage of more than what they would have gotten for pay-per-view given the decreases in the buy numbers. But that’s only the top people.
But based on the key revenue stream, television revenue, web site revenue, network revenue, the talent doesn’t share in that. In UFC, that is similar, in that talent is not paid a percentage of the very lucrative worldwide television deals, or any Fight Pass Revenue, or revenue from UFC’s Latin American television network. They are not even paid a percentage of the live gates directly in their contract (although the same could be said for WWE as any money above the downside and merchandise side is listed as discretionary money determined by the company). There are pay-per-view bonuses, different for talent, which kick in at a certain point. Of those bonuses that we are aware of, many kick in at a higher number than most of the recent shows have done, and some kick in at about that level. But aside from those in UFC, nobody really knows what percentage of revenue is going to the fighters.
The UFC, from the late 90s through probably 2005 or 2006, was losing significant money on virtually every event. Zuffa went $44 million in the hole before starting to turn things around.
In its fiscal year that ended on September 30, 2013, Zuffa grossed $483 million and had EBITDA in the $110 million range. Of that revenue, roughly $256 million came from live events (live gates and pay-per-view revenue) and $227 million came from television, licensing, merchandise, sponsorships, advertising and digital revenues. For WWE, they took in $508 million during 2013, of which was $213.4 million from live events and $294.6 million from television, licensing, merchandise, sponsorships, advertising, digital revenue and movies.
The UFC’s 2014 number, as least as far as EBITDA goes, is estimated at being down 40 percent due to all the injuries that have lead to weaker pay-per-view main events and a huge drop in buys from the previous years. But even during a year that was almost a disaster, devoid of any truly huge fights and some of the weakest marquee pay-per-view main events in company history, the company is still profitable. And, barring another catastrophic year of injuries, the company would be expected to be significantly more profitable in 2015.
The lawsuit states that the fighters are paid a fraction of what they would make in a competitive marketplace. One could argue that’s the case if there was a competitive marketplace and there was a company like Affliction spending like crazy to bid for certain top talent, and then going out of business two shows later. But the reality of the marketplace is that right now, no company is generating the kind of revenue where they could lift the salary structure of the sport significantly to be the strong competition. And in the case of a Gilbert Melendez, he was a free agent, and did benefit from this. But an opening match fighter, who one could argue is either underpaid, based on the amount of training and expenses required to get ready for a UFC fight, and the punishment; or argue isn’t because aside from the top tier names, most on the roster mean nothing when it comes to adding revenue to an event; it’s not like in an open market there would be bidding wars to up the $8,000 and $8,000 guys (who not that many years back were $3,000 and $3,000 guys, so things have gotten significantly better and that’s not with larger live gates or larger PPV revenues, but due to other aspects of the UFC business increasing) to where their market value would be appreciably higher. They are men and women filling out cards, in some cases future prospects, in some, people who were once stars, and in some, just guys.
Lawyers, and fighters, were generally vague on questions, stating they didn't want to get into details or that aspects, such as if other fighters have talked about joining in, or more specific complaints about UFC business practices. They either referred to the suit itself, or said the information would play itself out in the future. Lawyers involved noted this will likely be a lengthy process. Zuffa will likely respond in some form to the suit, and it will go into discovery. In the end, the case will likely be settled in some form, and the information will likely end up sealed. The lawyer’s leverage in discovery is that how much the real percentage of revenues the fighters earn would be the first thing that would come out, as would payouts of headliners and more details of how the UFC business runs, which UFC wouldn’t want out, because that’s one of the reasons they haven’t gone public.
A jury trial here would be a risk, because so much could be determined by sympathy and not logic. The plaintiffs could have that sympathy factor, the rich owners and fighters who comparatively, didn’t make much. Quarry, who headlined a PPV against Rich Franklin in 2005, before the company made money, earned $10,000 on a 200,000 buy show. That was during the period when UFC was swimming in red ink. That would look sympathetic to a jury, but there are no modern examples of anything like that, because pay has increased greatly, as have revenues, since that time. Fitch earned about $162,000 for his title fight with
St-Pierre in 2008, which was considerably more than what his contract indicated he should have been paid for that fight, but one could argue that it is still a low amount for the challenger in a high-profile title match on what Lorenzo Fertitta said was a 625,000 buy show. But one could argue the real main event on that show was Brock Lesnar vs. Heath Herring, and without question that PPV number was drawn by the combination of St-Pierre and Lesnar.
On the flip side, UFC paid for Quarry’s back surgery late in his career, which they didn’t have to, but to a jury, that could be considered something expected given his injuries occurred from competing in the sport. And today, UFC does offer insurance to its fighters, whether the injury took place in or out of the sport. WWE performers have their in-ring injuries taken care of by the promotion and are required to purchase health insurance.
Cramer detailed what is likely to happen next.
"Zuffa will be served formally, and they will have an opportunity to respond," he said. "They can either answer, or move to dismiss. We don't know what they will do. If they answer it, we begin a period of discovery. We expect it to move forward."
The end of the line, in the event there isn't a settlement, would be a jury trial in San Jose.
Maysey, who has attempted to unionize wrestlers in the past, although the lawyers here said that unionization was not one of the goals of this action, was emotional with the filing of the suit, seemingly the culmination of years or work.
He said the difference between this and the major sports leagues, which also control virtually all the top talent and have the stadium and television deals to where it would be a virtual impossibility to compete with them, is that the leagues have teams with individual owners, and the teams are in competition, plus the biggest leagues have players associations. Even in individual sports, like golf, he argued that each tournament is not owned by the same owner, even if the major league tournaments for the most part fit into the same organizational banner.
Newton, who said almost nothing, tried to differentiate this from boxing by saying that the championship belts in UFC are owned and controlled by the promotion, not by an outside sanctioning body. But as much as we like to think otherwise, the boxing of another generation with eight real world titles and all the promoters bid for the title matches isn’t really the case. Boxing does have outside sanctioning bodies, but the belts these days are almost worthless, and the drawing power is the name value of the fighters and the fight. The Arena League and Canadian League champions in football, or the Mexican or Japanese League champions in baseball, really can’t compete for the NFL or Major League baseball championships.
The lawyers said that they are not filing a lawsuit about the fairness or unfairness of the Zuffa contracts.
However, a point made in the suit mentions the exclusivity clause, which prohibits fighters from playing their trade with rival promotions, and UFC's decision to not co-promote events with other organizations. Again, it’s hard for me to conceive of why UFC should legally have to promote an event with another organization. It also mentions the champion's clause, which
allows the UFC the right to extend a fighter's contract as long as they hold a UFC championship. This blocks rival promotions from bidding for the person generally considered best in the world in their specific weight classes. They also bring up UFC's right to match any outside offer given to a fighter whose contract expires, making it difficult to sign up a fighter whose deal has ended.
They also note that UFC has the ability to merchandise fighters in perpetuity worldwide, which would lower the fighter's leverage to garner merchandising or video game deals for the fighters themselves after leaving the organization, since the company negotiating with them wouldn't even get exclusivity on the rights of the fighter they had signed in the marketplace. If I was to sign GSP or Rampage Jackson up for a video game deal, his value would be mitigated because UFC could still put him in their video game. If I wanted to produce Rampage Jackson action figures and cut a deal with him, the value of exclusivity wouldn’t be there for him to sell, because UFC could market a rival product with Jackson’s likeness. They also note that if a fighter loses and is cut, the UFC still can merchandise the fighter when no longer with the organization, or even after retirement. It also notes a fighter can't even sit out the terms of his contract, because if a fighter refuses to fight, like Randy Couture did years back, the UFC can freeze the contract length. This is because the contract would also call for a certain number of fights to be fulfilled. A fighter doesn’t have to fight to complete his contract. He can retire when he wants to. But he can’t go elsewhere and fight without fulfilling his contractual dates unless it is UFC that didn’t offer him fights. UFC has some power to starve guys out by not offering fights, but it is minimal because within the time terms of the contract UFC has to offer the number of fights on the contract.
But a fighter can’t, in mid contract, like Couture attempted to do, announce he was retiring as champion, while still having fights remaining, and then try to take bidding as a free agent for an outside fight with Fedor Emelianenko, as Couture attempted to do.
They also note that UFC not allowing certain sponsors on its broadcasts cuts back on potential income for fighters. They note that sponsors not only have to pay sponsorship tax, but UFC bans a number of companies from sponsoring if they compete with companies UFC has existing deals with.
Also mentioned was that in or about January 2014, UFC had added in contracts a provision that allowed them to lower the pay of fighters during the contract period if they lose fights.
It claimed UFC had exclusive deals with key venues on the Las Vegas strip, which wouldn't allow rival promotions to run in those key arenas. I’ve had those within the industry suggest that in particular is not the case. Promotions have run shows at venues like The Hard Rock Hotel and Casino (on the strip) , The Orleans Arena (off the strip) and the Thomas & Mack Center (off the strip) in Las Vegas.
It also noted that Quinton "Rampage" Jackson had negotiated an action figure deal with Round 5 and a Reebok deal, but UFC blocked both deals and entered into deals of its own with both companies.
There was also a claim that UFC had threatened sponsors that if they work with rival promotions, the UFC would ban them from being part of UFC events or sponsoring UFC fighters. The suit mentioned in particular that Fedor Emelianenko, according to his manager, Vadim Finkelchstein, had a potential seven-figure one-year sponsorship deal with Tapout that
fell through with Finkelchstein claiming Tapout was told to either dump Emelianenko or lose access to UFC events.
Mentioned also in the suit was a claim that UFC embarked on a campaign to monopolize or monopsonize the industry, claiming the purchase of WEC in 2006 was to block rivals from getting television on Versus (now NBC Sports). Versus at the time was negotiating with the IFL. UFC had an exclusive television deal with Spike, and did purchase WEC with the specific goal of getting onto Versus, and blocking IFL was part of the goal, perhaps a major part. But it also opened up new fighters and new weight classes. In the end, the IFL was able to get television on MyNetwork TV, which ended up being a stronger distribution platform than Versus. But the IFL's TV show ended up canceled due to declining ratings. The purchase of WFA was of a promotion that was essentially done, and UFC got the videotape rights and contracts with some key fighters, notably Jackson and Lyoto Machida, who eventually became UFC light heavyweight champions.
Pride was essentially done when UFC purchased it. Affliction had also lost millions of dollars and was looking for a way out when UFC made a deal with them, accepting them back as a sponsor, and they shut down operations and in the deal, UFC got the videotape library of their two events. They claimed UFC forced Mark Cuban to shut down HDNet Fights, but that was more a business decision with Cuban feeling it was more cost-effective to pay fees to broadcast shows other promoters did, and they have aired events regularly for years, first on HDNet, and to this day, after the name change to AXS TV.
The claim was that UFC regularly counter programmed against Strikeforce, claiming it as a means to prevent Strikeforce, due to UFC being the stronger company, from promoting successful events and pressured sponsors to withdraw from Strikeforce by threatening to ban them from UFC fighters and broadcasts if they didn't.
But counter programming has been part and parcel of competitive sports businesses since the beginning of time. Given most major shows are on Saturday nights, as UFC and Strikeforce each expanded their schedules, it was a given there would be Saturdays with both companies running.
In the end, Bellator’s existence and its recent success, and the fact there has been bidding for certain talent, tells me this is not a monopoly. And even if UFC controlled an even higher market share in North America than it does, much of that has been because the other promotions were not able to economically make it work. Competing against the big dog, whether it’s the NFL, NBA, NHL or WWE or UFC head-on, is extremely difficult (in fact, I’d say the one most susceptible to potential competition from that list would be the UFC) because of the economic differences. It is because those businesses have grown to the point that the fan base on those sports or entertainment forms for the most part aren’t that interested in spending money to support rival versions over the long haul.
However, there are points, such as fighters not getting revenue for their likenesses being used in the video games that will have a good chance of not looking good to a jury. The champion’s clause could also fit into this. But the reality of the champion’s clause is that while it exists in contracts, UFC has not used it one in the modern era, and has always made sure to have a new deal with a champion signed before he went into his final fight of his contract as champion. So, even if that aspect of the contracts don’t fare well under legal challenge, it will not appreciably change the UFC business.
But aside from points like that, what this case will come down to is the line between natural competition in an industry, and anti-competitive practices, and if it ever gets to a trial, how a jury will view those points.