Henry Cejudo not interested in starting a union, says fighters “should be compensated individually”

Henry Cejudo is not interested in starting a union, as he believes fighters “should be compensated individually”.

The former two-division UFC champion, Cejudo (16-2 MMA), retired from mixed martial arts after successfully defending his bantamweight title against Dominick Cruz at UFC 249 in May of 2020.

After flirting with the idea of a comeback for the past several months, ‘Triple C’ officially threw his name in the hat to replace Max Holloway against Alex Volkanovski at UFC 272.

It would have been a huge fight for Henry Cejudo, who not only could have become the promotions first ever three weight champion, but also moved his official status to ‘C4’ with a win.

Image via @ufceurope on Instagram

However, Dana White and company were not interested in allowing ‘Triple C’ to “skip the line” and thus booked the Australian champion to defend his title against Korean Zombie a month later at UFC 273.

White’s explanation did not sit well with Cejudo who pointed to previous champion Georges St-Pierre being given a similar opportunity.

“So if I had blonde hair and blue eyes or if I was a Canadian with a accent, maybe you would give it to me? I defend both my belts unlike GPS. I left on top and retired on that Monday to give the rest of the division’s a chance. You are plain out scared that I will win. @danawhite.”

With a potential featherweight title fight against Alex Volkanovski now out of the question, it remains to be seen if Henry Cejudo will return to the Octagon in 2022.

The former two-division UFC champion recently spoke with MMAJunkie where he shared the following comments on the “peanuts” being offered by his former employer.

“They don’t want to pay, man. It’s plain and simple. They don’t want to pay. Dana doesn’t want to pay. (If) they pay me, they got to pay the rest. And I’m out here. I’m not here to say to start a union. What I’m here to say is like, ‘Hey, man, everybody should be compensated individually.’ The guys are going to sell the fight, the guys that that are proven, like me. You know what I’m saying? So that’s plain and simple. Dana would love to see the fight, but he wants to pay me peanuts in comparison to what I really deserve. I respect the man because it’s his business, what he’s able to do to take this company to a two-billion-dollar company to what it’s worth now seven (to) nine billion and I can’t get a raise. That just seems a little off to me, man.”

Henry Cejudo continued:

“If Conor McGregor is making money and getting paid, and Jorge Masvidal. They’re doing what they’re doing and they’re getting paid more than me and I got two belts and I’m doing the exact same shit and I’m not getting compensated, then you know what? F*ck you, too.”