Whether he wins or loses at UFC 271 against Robert Whittaker, the UFC will not have to worry about of middleweight champion Israel Adesanya for the foreseeable future. It was revealed that Adesanya signed a new, multi-fight contract with the UFC.
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Paradigm Sports, who represents Adesanya, as well as Conor McGregor and Cris Cyborg, announced the deal via a press release. Adesanya’s new contract is considered “one of the most lucrative multi-fight deals in company history.”
An interesting aspect of this deal is that Adesanya officially agreed to sign the bout agreement to fight Whittaker this week. Paradigm has stated that Adesanya’s new deal will make him one of the “top paid athletes in the history of mixed martial arts.” To put that into perspective, he made $640,000 when he moved in weight to face then-UFC light heavyweight champion Jan Blachowicz at UFC 259.
Contract negotiations appeared to have taken months before this week.