04 October 2023 , 15:03
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Dillon Danis has claimed that he has paid for his lavish lifestyle with Instagram advertisements while spending four years away from fighting before his fight with Logan Paul.
The Bellator MMA star had just begun his cage career with a second professional win at Madison Square Garden in the summer of 2019 when a knee injury ruled him out of his January 2020 return. He was forced to sit on the sidelines for years as he watched multiple opportunities for a comeback in boxing and MMA to pass him by before finally announcing this fight with Paul.
During his time away from the cage, Danis has talked about regularly drinking and partying in luxurious nightclubs with models. When it comes to funding these activities, he says that his social media activity has led to him inking deals starting at five-figures for a post.
“I’m rich now buddy," Danis said during an appearance on The MMA Hour this week, before explaining where his wealth comes from. "I don’t understand why no one understands how I make money when my Instagram account is so popular. I get paid $15k a story, like more than that for a story and tweet.”
When host Ariel Helwani gawked at the claim and asked if it would be his "first lie of the day", he insisted that it was a "more than that" and referred to the claim as a "real lie", and added that "even when I lie I tell the truth." His primary sponsor for the Paul fight is Duelbits, an online casino.
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He also noted that a number of sponsors may have pulled out of backing him for his ring debut after Paul's fiancee Nina Agdal filed a $150,000 lawsuit against him last month. She has been on the receiving end of most of his pre-fight banter, and has made a number of claims against the fighter.
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Danis admitted that he struggled with his mental health during his time away from fighting, telling Helwani: "It got to the point where I didn’t know if I was going to be alive again. There’s a lot of people with a lot more problems than me. You go from training, being so good, and then just sitting there in a cast, can’t move, don’t know if you’re ever going to be the same.
"Twice in the same year, your f***ing leg is up like this. You get into a dark place. You start drinking, you do bad things… And then all you do is just drink all day." He compared his injury to that of Cleveland Browns' football player Nick Chubb who suffered a season-ending injury after just two weeks of this year's NFL season, claiming that he tore even more ligaments.
"You saw that guy that broke his leg, Nick Chubb?" Danis asked. "He tore less ligaments than me, and I had that twice in the same year and most athletes don't come back from that. It was hard because I didn't realise growing up that Jiu-Jitsu was like my zen. I go train and then I feel better after."