How much did Brock Lesnar and Randy Couture get paid for fighting each other for the UFC heavyweight championship? They got a guaranteed $250,000 each, plus an undisclosed share of the pay per view revenue. In addition, Brock was given $200,000 for winning. Had Randy won, he would have been given $250,000 for winning.

Heavyweight contender Gabriel Gonzaga was paid $55,000, and his opponent, overmatched Josh Hendricks who I frankly never heard of, was paid $8,000. I think that pretty much says it all. Gonzaga earned an additional $55,000 for winning, so he got six figures for beating up nobody in particular.

Kenny Florian was guaranteed $40,000 and Joe Stevenson $35,000 to fight each other. Florian's win bonus was another $40,000.

Nate Quarry was guaranteed $25,000 and Demian Maia $20,000 to fight each other. By winning, Maia doubled his purse.

Sponsors may be paying some of these guys a lot as well. But there are also a lot of deductions out of these purses, to pay their own expenses. It doesn't all just go to the fighter.

The smallest purses on the card were Matt Brown getting $8,000 and Ryan Thomas getting only $3,000 to fight each other. Brown doubled that to $16,000 by winning.

Dana White paid an additional $60,000 each for KO of the night, submission of the night, and fight of the night. So it really pays to put on a good show. If Ryan Thomas got KO of the night, fight of the night, and a win bonus, he would have changed his $3,000 into $126,000.