Randy Couture Sued By Zuffa
Zuffa, LLC has filed a civil lawsuit in Clark County District Court in Nevada against UFC Heavyweight Champion Randy Couture. Zuffa, the parent entity behind the UFC, alleges in the suit that their business has suffered “irreparable damage” as a result of Couture’s resignation in late-2007 and that the is in breach of the contract he signed in late-206.
The Las Vegas Review Journal broke news of the legal action earlier today.
According to the report the lawsuit is seeking upwards of $10,000 in damages. Even more importantly they are seeking an injunction that would prevent Couture from “participating in any way” with the UFC’s competitors.
Here is an except from the report which outlines specific allegations made by Zuffa:
Monday’s lawsuit claims Couture’s negative statements about the company constituted “injurious falsehood and trade disparagement,” that has led to significant financial losses for the UFC.
The lawsuit also alleges conspiracy, stating that several unnamed parties to be identified at a later date worked with Couture to intentionally inflict harm on the UFC.
According to the lawsuit, Couture is also in breach of a stipulation that prohibits him from engaging in “direct or indirect competition” with the UFC for a period of 12 months following the termination of his contract.
Couture’s IFL team, Xtreme Couture, was to debut in the IFL on February 29th though that appearance now appears to be in serious jeopardy.
Check out The Las Vegas Review Journal for more information on the lawsuit and stay tuned to MMAFrenzy.com for more on the situation as it develops.
Tags: Randy Couture
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Two things. First, 10,000?? That’s it?
Second, Randy said he’d fight next in Russia. There’s no chance in hell any U.S. court order is going to stop that. Russia will laugh at that nonsense.
Randy is getting exactly what he deserves.
First he was proven to be a complete liar by Zuffa and now he’ll have to deal with the embarassment of ducking Nog and dealing with a lawsuit.
Randy is setting himself up for a spectacular and embarassing defeat both inside and outside of the ring.
For the record, I was on Randy’s side until the press conference held by Zuffa that proved he was lying about the payments he recieved. That and all of the garbage posted on the Xtreme Coutoure blog by his wife that was suddenly deleted without warning.
I hope he is either made to honour his contract and fight the winner of Nog/Sylvia or retire for good.
I give him all the props in the world for his destruction of Sloth (sylvia) but I still say if he didn’t accidentally break gonzaga’s nose on the takedown in the first round he woulda got his ass handed to him.. look at the fight.. he couldn’t breath and was clearing hurting and was still putting it on randy until the third round.. I always said and will continue to say couture is a good fighter but is WAY overrated
I’m with Randy on this. If he felt slighted then Zuffa should have done something to preempt all this negativity that came from his statements. If he’d been paid anywhere near Liddell this wouldn’t have happened. Not to mention he commentated at almost every UFC for quite sometime.
As for the comments by the wife…I have a wife…and if she’s pissed at a situation that I’m in…there’s no telling what will come out of her mouth…be it truth or nonsense.
I agree but 10,000 is nothing and i think zuffa is going down a bad path they should just boycott him instead of attacking him. no worries either way lets get to what matters the FIGHTS
The most interesting thing I see in the whole situation is….. Zuffa has a “Championship Clause” in almost all of their contracts (one of the main problems Fedors reps had with the contract) which forces a UFC fighter who wins a title into an “extended” contract for up to a year after their initial contact. That is why the Nog/Sylvia fight is for an interum title – to continue the screwing of Couture. I really don’t see how coaching an IFL team is “competing” with the UFC, but lawyers can wrangle some strange truths out of nothing. The UFC has already proven their point about promotion of fighters, and that maybe Randy was “overly sensitive”, but to completely crush him and his LEGENDARY career publicly like this is uncalled for. They have let fighters out of contacts before, the UFC is just trying to prove that they are “BIGGER” than the fighters, which sassly looks to be true.
10,000? That’s gotta be a mis-print. It’s literally only about 20 hours of legal council.
I think Zuffa/Dana have taken a hit on their reputation because Randy has always been a stand up guy (outside the octagon lol). Nevertheless, $500,000 to Liddell in his last non-title fight compared to what Randy was getting even though he has been more of a spokesperson for the UFC is understandably frustrating.
As Joel B says, marginalizing Randy would be more damaging to him than keeping the story alive, so I’m not sure I understand UFC’s strategy.
But on the other hand….I know that Couture and the UFC had a problem early on in their (Zuffa’s) ownership, when Randy wouldn’t sign over rights to his name, and “likeness” for a video game…..which should all play out to Couture’s advantage.
I dont understand the move by the UFC here. The majority of us are Randy fans. I had almost forgot how they dicked him over. Everytime they do this we are reminded how freaking stupid they are. They are actually pushing away MMA fans. Resolve the issue civilally and maybe sometime down the road when Randy is training the next great champion in Extreme Couture he wont sign with another organization. Business is like chess, its better to think ahead three moves. In my opinion they are doing themseves more damage than anyone else.
To address the $10,000 amount. I think this might be the minimum. A lot of times if a claim is under a set amount (in this case $10k) the case is considered small claims. Since this case is obviously much more than that I believe it was trying to convey that it is more than $10,000 with the full amount being proven in court.
i’m standing behind the champ, how many times did dana white make you jump off your couch when you were watching a saturday night ppv, not very often. If they would have paid the man what he was worth there wouldn’t be the mess, anybody in any profession who has been f***ed over due to mergers and buyouts will side with coutures reasons for doing things the way he did. Dana White is the next Don King, out to screw the guys who put the asses in the seats, from a legal standpoint randy should face some reprimand for breech of contract, but to try and destroy the mans credibility and legacy is wrong. And to whomever it was who thinks randy got lucky in the fight against Gonzaga better get off the glue and pull their head out of their ass because there was no luck involved in beating the guy who got lucky against cro cop
Obviously neither side is pure as driven snow here; if you do some reading between the lines there is more going on than any of us will ever know so everyone should just take a breath. Randy deserves better after all he has done for MMA. Dana and the UFC also deserve better; let’s not forget they promoted and bankrolled MMA via the UFC for years while losing millions of dollars. It seems to me that now that the UFC is finally making money ( 2006 was the profitable year ) fighters are starting to hold them up for more money. Every new MMA org out there owes it’s profitability to the UFC and Dana White, I include Dana separately because without him the money brothers would have never stuck it out. And yes I know they made a alot of money in 2006/2007.
Thanks Kris – that makes more sense.
10K IS NOTHING TO RANDY HE COULD PROBLEY PUT SOME OF HIS SIGNED FIGHTING GLOVES ON E BAY AND SOMEONE WILL PAY IT, RANDY HAS MADE HIS MONEY SO NOW HE THINKS HE CAN PICK AN CHOOSE HIS FIGHTS, THATS WHY THE UFC WILL GO DOWN HILL IF THEY START PAYING PEOPLE WHAT BOXERS MAKE, RANDY WAS ONE OF MY HEROS AN PROB STILL IS SO HOPE HE CAN ADMIT HE IS WRONG AN GET BACK TO WHAT HE DOES BEST AN THAT IS FIGHTING.
AN SEAN HOW CAN U SAY RANDY IS OVERRATED THATS OUT OF ORDER! RANDY HAS BEATEN THE WHOS WHOS OF MMA U TELLING ME ALL OV THAT WAS A FLUKE, HES STILL THE GUY PEOPLE WANT TO BEAT LETS JUST HOPE HE CAN SORT HIMSELF OUT!
I personaly think Randy should hold up his end of the agreement or give back the money as simple as that.These guys are making mega bucks doing what they like to do and not holding down a normal.They should be happy they can do it.John
The UFC gave Randy Couture $500,000 to sign a four fight contract. Randy agreed, signed, and shook Dana White’s hand. I believe Dana said they actually hugged after signing the new contract in December 2006. Then Randy all of a sudden decides he’s getting screwed, or as he puts it “I’m tired of swimming upstream”. He bails after fighting two out of four fights on his contract. If I were in UFC’s position I would demand a minimum of $250,000 from Randy because that is half of the signing bonus and Randy only honored half the contract.
Mike-
The UFC doesn’t give 2 pisses about the money. They want their champion, and they want to prove who the boss is. I believe that Chuck was getting favoritism, but I don’t think that Couture saw how much his gym, and personality were getting promoted. It is a real **** deal for us fans on both ends.
Yes it is a big mess. Chuck is the favorite, he draw the biggest crowds, makes the UFC the most money on gate sells and PPV. He deserves to get paid the most. I think I heard after both Liddell and Couture receive their PPV revenues in 2007 they both made over 10 million dollars last year. Randy is not hurting. I really don’t understand his problem.
Of course Randy now has a brand name that will continue to generate him income for the next few years called Extreme Couture. Extreme Couture does not exist without the UFC and Randy should be showing some serious gratitude instead of whinning like a little girl that he didn’t get exactly what he wanted (Fedor). This is seeming more and more like Randy = spoiled little girl.