Just after EliteXC announced that they had added former UFC heavyweight champion Andrei Arlvoski to their CBS event, reports surfaced that Josh Barnett had been offered a fight against Arlovski, however declined. The reason as to why Barnett supposedly turned the fight down was because EliteXC had asked him to take a pay cut from what Affliction Entertainment had been paying him. Barnett was quick to dispel those rumors on his MySpace page.
“I read somewhere that I had declined the fight because I would have had to take a pay cut,” Barnett wrote. “I suppose others may also formulate some story about me declining the fight for other reasons.
“I never (declined) to take this fight. I was never told that I would have any part of my pay reduced since working with Affliction. To my knowledge, no one has been asked to take a pay cut that fights for Affliction.”
Barnett has always been a game fighter, taking on and requesting to fight the best in the world, so it would be shocking that he turned down the opportunity to challenge himself against a former UFC champion, especially one of Arlovski’s caliber.
Arlovski will be taking on former/reigning IFL champion Roy Nelson on the October 4th event.
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