If reaching the summit is tough, staying there is a lot tougher.
There's no denying that the UFC is one of the greatest star-makers in MMA. It is the platform some of the sport's biggest superstars, including Conor McGregor, Ronda Rousey and Georges St-Pierre, used to achieve their fame.
That's what gives the promotion a certain draw for hot prospects testing the free market. Sure, selling your
sole to Reebok will more than likely screw you out of some sponsorship money and there is a huge jump up in the level of competition from the regional scenes, but temporary struggles would be more than worth it if you win that lottery.
After its record sale to WME-IMG in 2016, the amount of money in the sport cannot be hidden from its competitors. Everyone wants a bigger slice of the pie and the newbies want the chance to become the next big draw and book those Red Panty Night bouts.
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Although we saw some extremely talented UFC debutants in 2016, such as Cris Cyborg, Lando Vannata and Marc Diakiese, the statistics show that newcomers had a real tough time in the world's largest MMA promotion.
MMA numbers whizz Mike Bohn and Michael Carroll of FightMetric have crunched all the data throughout the year and have packaged it all together in an excellent piece for
MMAJunkie. Their stat on fighters making their first trip to the Octagon is really telling of how incredibly difficult it is to make it in the UFC.
"A total of 116 fighters made their UFC debut in 2016. Those fighters went 44-68-3 with one no-contest. Debuting fighters who faced an opponent with at least one bout of UFC experience went 32-56-3 with one no-contest."
It's important to note that a lot of debutants accept fights on short notice in order to get their foot in the door of the promotion. For example, it was very unusual that Vannata was handed number one contender Tony Ferguson for his bout.
Despite being finished by El Cucuy, the fight actually boosted his stock as he had some magical moments in that fight, hurting Ferguson badly at several points in one of the most underrated scraps of the year.
