Jose Aldo Offered Enough Money By the UFC?

Written by A.G Lee

Jose Aldo has been very adamant about leaving the UFC after Conor McGregor got his fight with Eddie Alvarez at UFC 205. Even though he was promised and told time and time again that he would get a chance for redemption after Conor McGregors fight at UFC 202 against Nate Diaz.

He was stating that he wanted to leave the UFC and not fight anymore not even in another organization if he were to leave the UFC. He stated that he wanted to do other things with his life other than fight which took him off the table for other MMA promotions.

He went as far as saying that he would like to leave the UFC and get out of his contract without having to take the MMA giant to court. Something that would have cost him a lot of money according to the likes of other people who fought the UFC to leave like Randy Couture.

He even went as far as to say that during his next fight he would take a dive and lose on purpose just to finish out his contract and that is saying a lot.

Not too long after talking face-to-face with Dana White Aldo also stated that it wasn't about the money but about being lied to by the UFC. And that even with a huge amount of money that he still would not want to work with them because of how they treated him.

Now the situation has seemed to have changed Jose Aldo has talked with his family and it looks like they are changing his mind off of retirement. And not only that he says that he has been getting the influx of support from an unlikely crowd in his Russian fan base.

Repensando na aposentadoria do MMA, conversei com minha família e vendo os pedidos dos meus Fans coisas boas virao para vocês. Thanks Russia

— Jose Aldo Junior (@josealdojunior) October 22, 2016

Translation : “I've been rethinking my retirement from MMA,” Aldo wrote (translation via BloodyElbow.com’s Lucas Rezende). “I talked to my family, and, after seeing all the requests from my fans, there will be some good stuff coming for you guys. Thanks Russia.”

Do fans really believe that Jose Aldo can turn down a huge amount of money to not fight for the UFC against the wishes and words of his family?

We're pretty sure that Dana White and Company offered Jose Aldo a lot of money to stay with the company and especially to keep fighting as even disregarding the fact that he's not a big pay-per-view draw, he is one of the more legit fighters the company has.

Not only is he one of the more legit fighters that the company has,  he is also their interim featherweight champion and if Conor McGregor were to vacate the 145-pound belt due to him beating Eddie Alvarez at UFC 205 that would make Jose Aldo the de-facto 145-pound champion again.

Sure that would not do very much to market the legitimacy of the 145 pound division in terms of pound-for-pound rankings and weight class power. But it would be enough to stabilize the division so that it can be rebuilt even with the long road that has ahead of it in the scenario of a vacating UFC champion.