Craig Jones didn’t hold back during a particularly fiery segment on Morning Kombat, using what sounded like a reference to Mikey Musumeci to highlight a major issue plaguing the sport – the lack of financial literacy among top-tier Jiu-Jitsu athletes.
Here is what Jones had to say on the topic:
The financial literacy among the athletes in this business is not high.
And you know what? Even the people in the sport that are at the top, that you think are intelligent.
Although Jones didn’t mention names, the clues were hard to miss.
He described a world-class competitor who had previously signed an unusually restrictive contract – strongly suggesting it was with ONE Championship, the same organization Musumeci had a high-profile deal with.
When Jones tried to recruit the athlete for the first Craig Jones Invitational, he was stunned by what he discovered:
I remember I was trying to get him to do CJI 1.
And I said: “Well, what does your contract say?”
And this is a guy that studied law. I believe his sister’s a lawyer.And he’s like: “I didn’t read the contract. I just signed it.”
Jones used the story as a cautionary tale of how even the most accomplished athletes in grappling can fall victim to poor business decisions—ones that can affect not just their careers, but the sport at large:
So, like, when some of the elite level guys, even the guys at the top of the sport don’t read contracts…
I think it’s almost unsalvageable.
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