No one can question Tyson Fury’s physical gifts or his skill in the ring. A massive 6′ 9″ heavyweight, Fury is best known for his lightening reflexes and his fantastic ability to work behind a powerful jab. There have been, however, plenty of questions asked about his dedication to being a pro athlete.
Despite an Amateur career that saw him win Olympic gold in 2008 and a 34-0-1 unbeaten record, Fury has had notable trouble maintaining his fitness and form over the years—battling substance abuse and depression along the way. Unified heavyweight champion in 2015, the ‘Gypsy King’ left the ring for nearly three years, abandoning his belts, before returning to competition in 2018. Despite a 9-0-1 record since his comeback, rumors that Fury may consider retiring altogether have regularly dogged the WBO champion.
Tyson Fury brushes off retirement talk, lays out future fight plan
For fans who might be extra concerned that Tyson Fury’s recent cancellation of a planned bout with Oleksandr Usyk might mean the end of his career was looming on the horizon, it seems the 35-year-old is hoping to quell his doubters. Despite delaying the Usyk bout twice now, Tyson Fury remains steadfast that he is not only preparing to face Usyk twice in the ring, but has a whole slew of future fights he’s looking to make happen.
“I keep hearing talk of people saying that I should retire or I’m going to retire soon or whatever,” Fury wrote said in a video posted to social media (transcript via MMA Junkie). “I ain’t retiring anywhere, I’ve got two fights with Usyk, for the undisputed twice. Then I’m going to fight AJ at least once. Maybe twice if there’s a rematch, if he wants one after the first battering I give him, and then I’m going to fight Ngannou again and that’s just to start. So there’s five little fights for you to wet your appetite with. I ain’t going nowhere. Nowhere. I’m 35-years-old in the prime of my life.”
Tyson Fury’s revelation has to be good news for Francis Ngannou, who shook the boxing world last year, when he took Fury to a narrow majority decision loss, after knocking down the Fury down early in the bout. For a debut performance that was seen by many as a walkover warmup fight for Fury on his way to fighting Usyk in December, Ngannou’s performance crowned him as an immediate threat to the heavyweight boxing elite.
When Deontay Wilder failed to pick up the win this past December, in a bout that was expected to set the stage for a long teased fight against Anthony Joshua, Ngannou was perfectly placed to step in instead. Ngannou and Joshua will face off on March 8th in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
Despite having talked up a Fury rematch as a top priority, however, and despite Fury’s apparent interest in making that bout happen as well, it doesn’t sound like fans should expect to see Tyson Fury vs. Francis Ngannou 2 in 2024.
“We’ll have another event in the second half of the year, this summer likely, and we expect Francis to return to MMA in the PFL Smartcage,” PFL CEO Peter Murray announced in a recent interview with BBC sport.
Although no opponent for Ngannou’s MMA return has been announced at this time, apparently the PFL plans on making the details of the booking public during their upcoming February 24th ‘Champion vs. Champion’ PPV card. That event will feature elite talents from across Bellator & the PFL facing off in Riyadh, as the first crossover following PFL’s acquisition of the former Viacom MMA promotion. From the sound of things, it seems fans can expect to see another PFL PPV event later this year.
As for Ngannou, it seems he only has one thing on his mind at the moment, and that’s his upcoming bout with Joshua.
“They say never say never. Nothing is impossible, right?” Ngannou said of his chances against Joshua in a recent podcast interview (transcript via MMA Fighting). “We don’t know the strength of Anthony Joshua, but even though I don’t believe he has that strength, but we’re going to find out in two months. We’re going to find out, and I think the reverse is going to happen. I’m going to be the one taking his soul.”
Jake Paul’s slow transition from celebrity meme fighter to honest professional boxer appears to be at something of a midpoint. The man once best known for prank videos and Disney appearances has carved out a surprising career for himself as one of the biggest stars in combat sports. Never mind the fact that most of his bouts exist purely on the low end of pugilistic craft.
Notably, Paul has made his name picking off former MMA/UFC champions and title contenders and other celebrity athletes that want to try their hand in the boxing ring. He may not be a great boxer, but he’s put in more dedicated boxing training camps than the likes of Tyron Woodley and Ben Askren. That’s a path, however, that has left plenty of critics in its wake; fight fans that want to see Paul take on more ‘real boxers’ instead of moonlighting mixed martial artists.
Jake Paul to fight 35-year-old journeyman Ryan Bourland
It’s seemingly in answer to those critics that Jake Paul has selected his last two opponents. Back in December, the ‘Problem Child’ took on 35-year-old 10-1 can crusher Andre August, finishing the fight via KO in round 1. Now he’s announced a bout against Ryan Bourland on March 2nd.
Much like August, Bourland has a record that looks pretty on paper. He’s 17-2 as a pro, stretching all the way back to 2013. A closer look at his career however, provides a lot more evidence as to why he’s been selected for this task. First and foremost, Bourland has only fought once since 2018, a 2022 win against 4-6 Santario Martin. Second, his 17 wins include just four knockouts (never mind the six listed on the poster, which includes two retirement TKOs).
Not one of Bourland’s KO wins had a record over .500, two were debuting fighters that never competed again. Video of Bourland’s fight against Codale Ford in 2018 shows a fairly light-fisted, busy fighter who likes to lead and work in combination. Not un-technical, but much like his record would suggest, not dynamic or dangerous either.
Be careful what you wish for
It’s been said before (especially by Jake Paul to his detractors), but fighting former pro MMA fighters is honestly a lot more of a challenge than most boxers take on early in their journey. Despite the criticism that Paul had been avoiding real competition, relative to his skill level, he actually was picking some tough fights.
Now however, it seems he’s looking for a couple of really big paydays. A chance to step in the ring with a legit top-level boxing draw someday and maybe even fight for a belt. It all has the sound of a pipe dream, especially the parts where Paul starts claiming that he’ll challenge Canelo Alvarez. But if he’s ever going to do it, he needs to pad out his record, get in the rounds and the ring time and the wins. Something he can’t do fighting once or twice a year against whatever name free agent the UFC happens to cut loose.
Essentially he’s giving fans what they want. A chance to see him in action against real, life-long boxers. It just turns out that means fights that are a lot less competitive or interesting than taking on the likes of Anderson Silva and Nate Diaz in 10oz gloves.
Also on the card, Jake Paul client Amanda Serrano will defend her featherweight IBO, WBO, and WBA titles against Nina Meinke. Owner of the IBF intercontinental featherweight title, Meinke (18-3) is on a six fight winning streak. Serrano has won four fights in a row since losing to undisputed lightweight champion Kaite Taylor in a 2022 ‘superfight’ event at Madison Square Garden. Earlier in the night, WBO light flyweight champion Jonathan Gonzalez will take on Rene Santiago.
The ripple effects of Francis Ngannou’s shockingly narrow split decision loss to Tyson Fury continue to be felt around the boxing world. The former UFC champion made a huge splash in his ring debut when he knocked the unbeaten ‘Gypsy King’ on his ass back in October in what was meant to be a walkover fight for the WBC champion on his way to bout against Oleksandr Usyk.
Fury’s struggles in Riyadh appear to have forced he and his management team to reconsider the timing of their planned title unification bout against the masterful Ukranian, pushing back a planned fight date on December 23rd of last year into February of 2024. As a result, however, the Saudis needed another big event for their end of the year plans and enlisted two of heavyweight’s other most notable talents to make it happen.
Anthony Joshua will fight Francis Ngannou next in Riyadh. | Joel Marklund Bildbyran, IMAGO
Francis Ngannou gets Anthony Joshua bout after Wilder falters
Anthony Joshua and Deontay Wilder took to the ring last month as the main and co-main event for a big boxing PPV to wrap up the year of sports-washing efforts for the Saudi Arabian monarchy. Unfortunately, despite long being penciled in as a dream fight for fans, Joshua and Wilder didn’t face off against one another. Instead, they took what were supposed to be their own Ngannou-Fury style warm-up fights that would line them up to square off in 2024.
Anthony Joshua won his, defeating Otto Wallin via TKO when the Swede failed to answer the bell for the 6th round. Wilder was not so fortunate. The American was almost entirely dominated in the ring by his opponent, with Parker taking the ‘Bronze Bomber”s best shots and making him pay for an inherent lack of output and structure in his game.
The result? Not a chance at revenge for Parker—who had already faced and lost to Joshua back in 2018—but instead a major opportunity for Francis Ngannou. The Cameroonian-born Frenchman suddenly stood alone as one of the few big name heavyweight boxers on the market without a fight already booked, with Joshua in need of a viable PPV opponent.
MMA Hour host Ariel Helwani first broke the news.
“Alright, massive breaking news this Friday evening, in the world of combat sports,” Helwani announced in a video released to social media. “I have confirmed, via [Saudi royal advisor] Mr. Turki AlAlSheikh that it is a done deal, it’s going down; Francis Ngannou, ‘Le Predator,’ the former UFC heavyweight champion, is returning to Riyadh Saudi Arabia. Of course, just a few months removed from his incredible performance against Tyson Fury; after an unbelievable year, where he leaves the UFC, he signs with PFL, then he gets the big Tyson fight and shocks everyone.
“He is returning to action, in a boxing match, later on this year; to go up against the former heavyweight champion, the man who had an incredible 2023 in his own right, the man who just won at ‘Day of Reckoning’ on December 23rd, in Riyadh—the one and only ‘AJ’ Anthony Joshua. It is a done deal on both ends. Anthony Joshua, Francis Ngannou, ten-round fight, later on this year in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.”
Breaking:
Francis Ngannou vs. Anthony Joshua is a done deal, per @Turki_alalshikh.
Helwani didn’t have a date for the event, saying that it would be announced later at an official press conference. However, MMA Junkie’s Mike Bohn, confirmed Helwani’s report and announced that the fight would go down on March 9th. Which will put it head-to-head with UFC 299: O’Malley vs. Vera. Although the time difference will likely mean that it airs much earlier in the day.
Francis Ngannou vs. Anthony Joshua boxing match set for March 9 in Saudi Arabia, sources confirm to @MMAJunkie. It’ll be a 10-round fight.
Among the revelations following Francis Ngannou’s first boxing match was the news that with the ‘Predator’ earning a top payday for himself inside the ring, that money trickled down to his coaching staff as well. Most notably, Xtreme Couture head coach Eric Nicksick (who served as an assistant coach for the bout under Dewey Cooper) told MMA Junkie in a recent interview that he got paid more for his assistant role in that fight than he did for either of Francis Ngannou’s UFC title fights where he was in the head coaching role.
“It was the most money I’ve ever been paid by a fighter,” Nicksick said of his cut from Francis Ngannou’s bout. “It was unbelievable. It was more than I expected. I wasn’t expecting—obviously Francis has always taken great care of me, but it floored me. I saw my Wells Fargo account that morning and it literally brought me to tears. That’s a true story; literally brought me to tears. Because, he changed my life.
“Not only from a professional standpoint, but a monetary standpoint; allowed me a lot of financial freedom to be able to enjoy my coaching, enjoy being a dad and a husband… allowed us to buy a new car. There’s a lot of things that just, with Francis moving over to boxing, and the way he takes care of his team? He loves every single one of us and he shows it. He takes care of us, and I couldn’t thank him enough.”
Coach Eric Nicksick says Francis Ngannou "changed my life" with the fee he received for the Tyson Fury boxing match. 🥹
"It was the most money I've ever been paid by a fighter. … When I saw my Wells Fargo account that morning, it literally brought me to tears." pic.twitter.com/BCNM20xLLt
Nicksick added that he’d be “all for it” if Francis Ngannou wanted to continue his career inside the boxing ring. Congratulations, coach, go get yourself a vacation home.
The UFC doesn’t take many weeks off these days. But one thing they’ve made a habit of in recent years is a willingness to let the holidays pass them by. No big New Years Eve cards, no Thanksgiving shows, no Christmas carnage.
In short, this holiday season, the other major players in the combat sports world have a shot at taking over the PPV market. Which should have made for a perfect showcase for Anthony Joshua and Deontay Wilder… if only they hadn’t tried to make boxing work purely for their own self interest.
I’m not going to stand here and say that MMA clearly occupies some kind of moral high ground these days when it comes to matchmaking. Hell, we’re still waiting for Conor McGregor vs. Michael Chandler (which increasingly looks unlikely to even make UFC 300), so there’s hardly room for mixed martial arts fans to talk about how Dana White & Co. make the fights fans want to see.
But for those still stuck in the narrative, then this past Saturday marked exactly the kind of dumb greed that has too often marred boxing’s landscape…
Deontay Wilder vs. Joshua Parker was a stereotypically cynical boxing script
Anyone would have to assume they’d be facing one another. The obvious fight to make for two top heavyweight talents looking to take over right at the end of 2023. They’d be dead wrong.
For assuredly asinine reasons, Joshua decided to take on Otto Wallin in the main event, while Wilder fought Joseph Parker in the co-main. Even the commentary team was convinced that the intention was for both men to pick up a victory before facing one another some time in 2024. A great plan if this had been pro wrestling and the outcomes had been fixed.
Sugar Ray Leonard once famously said “You don’t play boxing.” It was meant to be an admonishment to fans who underestimate the dangers of the fight game. But it should just as easily be a message for boxers themselves, to remind them that for all the gamification they may attempt, ultimately the ring doesn’t lie.
Judging in the squared circle may be famously corrupt, but the fight shows a person’s quality and Wilder absolutely had none of it against Parker in Saudi Arabia.
The ‘Bronze Bomber’ came out, draped in his crown, hoping to rebuild his reputation as the most notable American heavyweight boxer of the last 15 years. Looking the part of a bad, bad man.
A stain on Deontay Wilder’s legacy
Instead, he spent 10ish rounds on the back foot, hoping to one-shot his ultra durable opponent, who simply refused to be cowed by the 38-year-old’s impressive size and power. A miserable unanimous decision loss for Deontay Wilder that may very well spell the end to his time as a top PPV contender.
Our own Mookie Alexander put it best, noting that with the loss Wilder’s legacy seems sealed—both as an incredible, heavy-handed puncher and as “one of the all-time emptiest resumes for a long-reigning heavyweight boxing champion we’ve ever seen.”
Having won the WBC title back in 2015, Wilder defended his belt against the likes of Eric Molina, Johann Duhaupas, Artur Szpilka, Chris Arreola, Gerald Washington, Bermane Stiverne and a 40-year-old Luis Ortiz, before finally facing Tyson Fury in 2018. Outside of Fury it’s a ‘who’s that?’ lineup if ever there was one.
He drew against Fury in their first meeting, winning two more bouts (including a rematch against Luis Ortiz) before losing back-to-back rematches against the ‘Gypsy King’ in 2020-21. A victory over Robert Helenius in 2022 set Wilder up for what will now go down in history as an unfathomably pointless booking more than a year later.
It shouldn’t even need saying, but Anthony Joshua was RIGHT THERE. These men were competing at the same time, on the same card. With the talk being that a victory for both would see them face off against one another. A clear ‘just make the goddamn fight’ moment if ever there was one. But greed and pride ruled the day and now one of the biggest potential boxing bouts of the past decade has gone up in smoke. Nothing more than a mirage in the desert, fittingly.
Francis Ngannou wins again
If there’s any positive side to this entirely unnecessary fumble it has to be in the eyes of former UFC champion Francis Ngannou. Having made a huge splash in the heavyweight boxing market this past October with a heavily disputed loss to Tyson Fury, ever single mistake among the boxing elite can only be a win for the ‘Predator’ and his negotiating leverage.
Anthony Joshua had hoped to have a top drawing opponent in Deontay Wilder all set for his next bout. Wilder had hoped to rebuild his championship reputation with a soft booking on his way to a new title fight. Suddenly Joshua finds himself in need of a man that can get fans excited, and Wilder finds himself badly needing a high profile win.
Even if Ngannou fights neither of them ever, he has to look like a far more enticing matchup right now than he did last week. Especially given how readily Joshua had apparently dismissed the Cameroonian-born Frenchman just a couple months ago. And if that’s the case, then he has just that little be more to lean on when he goes to the bargaining table with Tyson Fury in the coming months. If Fury won’t pay up, there are other bookings to turn to.
Ultimately Wilder and Joshua did the unthinkable, they made Dana White look clever when he talks about how broken and greedy boxing can be as a business. A sorry state if ever there was one, on a weekend all set for both men to shine. The only thing we can hope for, as a result, is that the next time a big fight is staring one of them in the face, they decide to take it rather than betting their future away on a result they can’t guarantee.
We’re back again with another edition of Love/Hate to See It, the weekly editorial column that looks for the best of the best and the worst of the worst fight news each week.
Unsurprisingly, Conor McGregor is still making headlines in early December. The former UFC double-champ recently found himself in a spot of hot water, over anti-immigrant statements he made on social media. Now it seems like he might be preparing for a future political career. We’ve also got some good news though, in the form of boxing champ Amanda Serrano, who is looking to take a stand against at least one corner of her sport’s sexist governance when it comes to rules and regulations. So, let’s get into it…
Love to see it
Boxing champ Amanda Serrano vacates WBC title
In 2023 it seems positively archaic to see actual set policy that delineates treatment of men and women in a non-medical professional setting. Sure, we all know how institutional sexism can work (via wage suppression, maternity leave, hiring practices, etc.) even with the outward appearance of equality. But more than a century of battling for civil rights, feels like it should have rid the US of mandated segregation in the treatment of the sexes at the very least.
Sports, however, remain a notable bulwark against the march of progress.
In part that’s down to ongoing debates of opportunity and physical capacity. Can men and women cross-compete in disciplines that involve significant measure of physical gifts? Are sports more fair when women get to compete on their own platform apart from men?
While there may be room to argue those topics, there are still a few lasting pockets of good ol’ fashioned sexism like your great grandpappy used to make. None more so than women’s boxing.
Women’s boxing is an absolute joke and everyone knows it. An insistence from commissions on 10-round limits and two-minute rounds, compared to men getting 12, three-minute rounds has no medical grounding, no nod to fairness or comparative physicality. It purely boils down to a belief that women are capable of doing less work even within their own competitive arena.
As if the Olympics would hold the 100 yd. dash for men and the 80 yd. dash for women or if women’s soccer were played on a smaller field than men’s soccer just so they wouldn’t have to run as much. It’s patently absurd.
Which makes it great to see (now former) unified featherweight boxing champion Amanda Serrano take a meaningful stand against this kind of systematic double standard, by formally abandoning her WBC title.
“…I am the first undisputed female champion to fight 12×3 minute rounds, Serrano wrote in a post to her Instagram account.
“Moving forward if a sanctioning body doesn’t want to give me and my fellow fighters the choice to fight the same as the men, then I will not be fighting for that sanctioning body.
“The WBC has refused to evolve the sport for equality. So I am relinquishing their title.
“Thank You to the sanctioning bodies who have evolved for Equality!
“If you want to face me in the ring, you have a choice. I’ve made mine.“
Serrano made her 12-round/3-minute boxing debut just this past October, against Danila Ramos—defeating the Mexican fighter via unanimous decision to defend her WBA, IBF, WBO, and Ring title belts.
This latest statement comes alongside recent news that Serrano has signed a deal with the PFL to take part in the MMA promotion’s ‘Superfight’ PPV series. It’s unclear when or against whom Serrano might make her debut in the PFL cage. ‘The Real Deal’ has a 2-0-1 pro MMA record, compiled between 2018-21, under the Combate and iKON FF banners. I’m not at all sure how big a success Serrano’s MMA career will be going forward, but here’s hoping she can keep pushing for change on the boxing side of things.
Impa Kasanganay went from homelessness to $1M PFL tournament
Fighting is a strange thing to do professionally. Even the sport-ified version of it doesn’t tend to support too many pretenders. Some fighters over the years have claimed to hate it, almost all of them talk about the nerves and the anxiety and the low points; but it’s also clearly a bug that, once inside a person’s system is incredibly hard to get out.
Even the most financially well off fighters in the world tend to find themselves returning to the ring or the cage. Floyd Mayweather officially retired from boxing in 2017, he’ll look to return to action for his 8th exhibition booking on Superbowl weekend 2024. Conor McGregor made hundreds of millions of dollars selling whiskey alongside his highly profitable fighting career, but even he can’t seem to let it all go.
Despite long bouts of inactivity over the past seven years, McGregor is back in the USADA system, warming up for some kind of return to fighting on a UFC deal that will, no doubt, fail to net him anywhere close to the biggest fight purse he’s had in his career. It’s not the money, there’s just something about it that drives people.
That makes it especially heartening to see a story like Impa Kasanganay’s—a 29-year-old son of Congolese immigrants who earned degrees in Business Admin, Accounting, and Finance but found his true calling fist-fist fighting men in the Octagon. The result of that drastic and seemingly ill advised life choice? As Kasanganay recently revealed on the MMA Hour, after getting cut from the UFC in 2021 ‘Tshilobo’ found himself living out of his car.
“When I got to that car, it was the only place I could be peaceful, in that front seat,” Kasanganay said. “I would Instacart stuff to the gym, eat, but it was probably one of the best times in my life, too. I’d wake up at 5:30, get into the gym by 6 a.m., I was in the parking lot, so nobody could see me. Hop in the shower, brush my teeth, and I would start [figuring out] how can I reorganize myself. I started working in accounting again, but I made sure I never missed training, and get to stand before you as a champion, I never lost sight of the goal.
“It was just being patient. Being patient and getting reorganized. That’s what got me there, a lack of organization, a lack of patience, and now I’m at one of the better points of my life.”
After a year of living rough—including an apparent stint in a yurt out in the Florida Everglades—Kasanganay got the call to be in PFL’s 2023 light heavyweight season. Nine months later and he’s collected more than a million dollars in prize money with five straight wins to take the tournament crown.
“MMA is my ministry,” Kasanganay explained. “I love what I get to do, and it came down to me saying I’m going to trust God’s plan for my life. I really didn’t have any more money. I spent everything moving to Florida. Got a cool apartment, thought I was going to be in the UFC for the long haul. It wasn’t in God’s plan.
“I’m so grateful the UFC cut me. It became a blessing. Look where we are today.”
The combat sports world is full of tragedies. Fighters who bet it all on the idea that one day they’ll be champion, that one day they’ll win the big prizes, that all the damage and punishment absorbed over the years will pay off in the end. So often, that’s not the case. Always worth celebrating when someone takes the big gamble and walks away a winner.
Hate to see it
Arman Tsarukyan goes full petty
Arman Tsarukyan celebrates his win over Beneil Dariush. | Justin Renfroe / ZUMA Wire, IMAGO
It’s hardly news to any longtime MMA fans that for all their toughness in the cage, fighters can be remarkably thin skinned. After all, one of the main reason these people do what they do is because they actually like to fight. They are, by definition, not the kind of people who are going to walk away from a situation that might escalate to violence.
So it’s not all that surprising that Arman Tsarukyan got a bit hot under the collar when divisional rival Bobby Green had the Russo-Armenian catching strays in a recent interview. Green wanted to explain the kind of bouts he was looking to take at the top of the lightweight division and Tsarukyan’s name came to mind as one of the “boring” grinders he’d like to avoid.
That setup made it almost understandable (if still a little silly) that Tsarukyan got his entourage together and found Green at the fighter hotel for a little chat ahead of this past week’s UFC card. There were some words exchanged, some pushing and shoving—apparently Green and some of Tsarukyan’s teammates may have come to blows later on, although it sounds like nobody was seriously hurt.
This is fighting, these things happen. And they’re going to continue happening all the time. It’s the nature of the game.
If Tsarukyan really did still feel slighted after all that, then Saturday night should have provided the karmic justice he needed. The 27-year-old cemented his place as a top lightweight contender with a violent first round KO over Beneil Dariush and Green fell back to the edges of the lightweight rankings with an exceptionally violent first round KO loss at the hands of Jalin Turner.
Given, then, all the flavor choices and a chance to express a little concern for ‘King’—who ate far too many shots before his fight was stopped—Tsarukyan decided to stay salty in a recent interview on the MMA Hour.
“No. No, no—the referee [should] let them punch more,” Tsarukyan said of Green’s knockout loss (transcript via MMA Fighting). “He should stop maybe five more minutes. Let him be. It was good. I was happy. You can see when fight was like that, I was so happy when I went to the cage. My friend’s asked me, and I was laughing, like, ‘I’m happy. Bobby Green fell asleep.’
“We are fighters. We have different mind. We are killers. We are a little bit different.”
Tsarukyan then went on to say that Green didn’t “deserve” to be talked about, and explain that the only way he would fight the California native would be for the opportunity to “kill him in the cage.”
We get it dude, you’re violent, and there’s no doubt some truth in the whole ‘built different’ narrative. But, we’ve seen plenty of fighters show concern for one another and even for opponents. This is just a man riding a petty grudge for everything it’s worth. It doesn’t make him look tough or dangerous, it just makes him look childish.
President Conor McGregor
He sold the whiskey business, he rarely fights anymore, and the bar’s losing money. What’s Conor McGregor going to do to fill his free time moving forward? Unfortunately, as seems to be increasingly the answer with MMA fighters who have too much time on their hands, the move appears to be politics.
Conor McGregor whipped up a frenzy over the last week or so, following a stabbing attack in Dublin that sent three children to the hospital, where (as of December 4th) one was still battling for their life. With rumors that the incident had been perpetrated by someone not of Irish birth, McGregor took to social media issuing a number of statements about the “grave danger among us in Ireland that should never be here in the first place.”
His actions have reportedly sparked an investigation by Irish police, as a potential incitement to violence. Rather than withdrawing from the public sphere, however, it seems the publicity has only spurred on the former UFC champion’s political aspirations.
“Potential competition if I run. Gerry, 78. Bertie. 75. Enda, 74,” McGregor wrote in a post to Twitter, outlining his potential qualifications for office. “Each with unbreakable ties to their individual parties politics. Regardless of what the public outside of their parties feel. These parties govern themselves vs govern the people.
“Or me, 35. Young, active, passionate, fresh skin in the game. I listen. I support. I adapt. I have no affiliation/bias/favoritism toward any party. They would genuinely be held to account regarding the current sway of public feeling. I’d even put it all to vote. There’d be votes every week to make sure. I can fund. It would not be me in power as President, people of Ireland. It would be me and you.”
Potential competition if I run. Gerry, 78. Bertie. 75. Enda, 74. Each with unbreakable ties to their individual parties politics. Regardless of what the public outside of their parties feel. These parties govern themselves vs govern the people. Or me, 35. Young, active,… pic.twitter.com/HiLn3jAQ2e
McGregor went on to talk up his desire to “clean the f—in’ dail” with “absolute transparency and consultation to the public.”
“President of Ireland is a unique position to other countries but it would demand response to questioning. Dialect would be so good for us in the public. Our people feel ignored. Unheard. Until of course election time. Then the waffle begins.”
To date, fighters and politics have provided little in the way of promising outcomes. And plenty of dysfunction for those that do manage to get elected. The general tenor of their political stances seems to be one of completely reactionary thinking and even while McGregor’s message sounds nice and fair it smacks pretty heavily of the kind of rhetoric BJ Penn was leaning on for his hopes as governor of Hawaii.
A desire to clean house as though government is just a few old folks sitting together in a room? A promise to hold weekly votes involving the country’s entire population? And a promise of being free from political allegiance (which tracks a lot more like being easily swayed and free of any guiding compass)? These aren’t the propositions of a serious person, and McGregor could probably make his money go a lot further to helping people without pouring it into a doomed campaign.
Bad weight cuts are an everyday occurrence in the MMA world, where fighters are often carefully orchestrating a drop of 10-20 pounds in the days leading up to their bouts. But it’s a bit more rare in the boxing world, where multiple, close together weight classes encourage fighters to stay nearer to a healthy walking weight.
That said, pugilists still have their share of bad days on the scale, even those with plenty of big fight experience. As Jermall Charlo reminded fans ahead of his non-title bout against Jose Benavidez Jr.
WBC boxing champ Jermall Charlo misses weight for Benavidez fight
Unbeaten middleweight boxing champion Jermall Charlo makes his return to the ring this Saturday, November, 25th in Las Vegas, NV. The bout will mark the first for the WBC title holder since defending his title against Juan Macias Montiel in June of 2021. Unfortunately for what was intended to be a 163 lb catchweight bout looks like it will now have to be renegotiated after Charlo came in at 166.4, and then again at 166.6 after attempting a second cut.
According to Sports Illustrated’s Chris Mannix, both teams are in negotiations to keep the fight on Saturday’s card, with Benavidez likely to receive extra financial compensation for Charlo’s lack of professionalism.
Reps for Jermall Charlo and Jose Benavidez Jr. are negotiating financial terms for the Charlo-Benavidez fight to move forward Saturday after Charlo missed the 163-pound catchweight by 3.4 pounds, source told @SInow
After a few hours of negotiating, it looks like the fight is still on. Michael Benson tweeted the news and included a clip of Charlo and Benavidez in the face-off. Showtime Boxing also noted the bout being official for tomorrow night.
Jermall Charlo mocks Jose Benavidez Jr for trying to intimidate him during their final face-off ahead of tomorrow night. Fight going ahead despite Charlo coming in overweight…
Jermall Charlo and Jose Benavidez, Jr. face-off before tomorrow night’s boxing card
Jose Benavidez Sr. responds to weight miss
While the two sides are looking to come to a new deal, Benavidez’s father, Jose Benavidez Sr. gave his thoughts on Charlo missing weight for his son’s boxing match.
“I’m waiting for Junior and David [Benavidez] to go to the weigh-ins,” Benavidez Sr. explained. “A little bit upset because, at first, the contract was at 160 lbs. with Jose Benavidez Jr. Then they decided that they wanted to change it to 163 lbs—and we agreed to that. And now Charlo is, like, three pounds—almost four pounds—[over].
“I don’t know, man. I don’t think this guy wants to fight. I knew he was going to come heavy. If it were for me? I would cancel that fight. But Junior? He’s a warrior. He got ready for this fight and we kinda worked something out. I’m thinking, hopefully, he can show up and maybe we can make that fight.”
Charlo open about mental health, substance abuse struggles
This week’s trouble with weigh-ins only marks the latest struggle for Boxing champ Jermall Charlo, who has been open about his struggles with depression and bipolar disorder and how that caused him to turn his back not just on competitive athletics, but on friends and family as well. Eventually, it seems that Charlo even severed his relationship with his twin brother, and fellow top boxer, Jermell Charlo.
The two are back on speaking terms now, however. Jermall talked about his journey back to competition in an interview with the New York Post earlier this month.
“Depression, self conflation, going from hot to cold really fast is shocking to you,” Charlo explained. “Dealing with all kinds of cases of [being] bipolar, being by yourself, thinking that you shutting the world out is gonna help you. But you need to be able to speak to someone and help you get past whatever you’re going through.
“It just feels like everybody is against you, I don’t care if you’re in the Uber, a cab, wherever, everybody is just against you. Why I felt like this, [I don’t know]. I couldn’t tell that some people weren’t against me, it was just that at the moment it’s the way you’re feeling and I turned my back against pretty much the world. I just had to start getting help with it and it made me a lot better.”
Jose Benavidez Jr. vs. Jermall Charlo is set for the co-main event under a Super Middleweight title fight between unbeaten 27-0 WBC champion David Benavidez (younger brother of Jose Jr.), and 32-0 WBO middleweight champion Demetrius Andrade. The card will also feature 19-1 Subriel Matias vs. 23-0 Shohjahon Ergashev for the IBF Jr. welterweight title as well as 16-1 Hector Luis Garcia against 23-1-1 Lamont Roach for the WBA super featherweight belt.
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At this point I think it’s fair to say that there’s almost too much news in the combat sports world to cover. Too much drama, too many fights, too much business intrigue. But that doesn’t mean we can’t try and hit a few bold points on the stories that maybe don’t mean all that much on their own, but give us something interesting to talk about.
To that end, I’m debuting this Love/Hate column to round up a few stories each week that made me feel ways about things that aren’t otherwise major industry shaking points of news. In the future, I may try to hit more stories with quicker takes, but just for now, this is a trial run. So, let’s see where it goes.
LOVE TO SEE IT
Tom Aspinall calls for Jon Jones to be stripped
Tom Aspinall gets his piece of UFC gold. Justin Renfroe / ZUMA Wire | Justin Renfroe / ZUMA Wire, IMAGO
When Jiri Prochazka tore his shoulder up last year it felt like the news he had ‘vacated’ the UFC’s light heavyweight title was practically called in on his way to the hospital. Had the UFC finally learned the lesson taught to them so brutally by Dominick Cruz and Cain Velasquez? That you shouldn’t try to wait for champions to recover from serious injury before letting the division move on?
When the same thing happened to Jamahal Hill this past July it seemed like the answer was a clear and confident ‘yes’. It may be a harsh outcome for top end talent finally getting their first taste of real bargaining power after years and years of competition, but there’s no point in having a belt in the hands of someone out for an indefinite amount of time.
Then Jon Jones got hurt, and it turned out that everything was just the same as it ever was. Jiri and Jamahal were small fry in the UFC’s eyes and JOnes was a star. Stars get kid gloves while everyone else gets hosed.
Those optics were only enhanced after Tom Aspinall won an Interim heavyweight belt over Sergei Pavlovich in the co-main event of UFC 295 and then quickly resorted to pleading with Jon Jones to give him a crack at unifying the belts instead of just riding off into the sunset. It was a sad look all around for a man supposedly in the running for the title of ‘Baddest Man on the Planet’.
Good on Aspinall then that he’s no longer asking for the UFC and Jon Jones to throw him a bone. In a recent conversation with Michael Bisping, the fellow Brit staked his claim to the heavyweight crown and made it clear that in his eyes, he’s the champ.
“I think Jon Jones should be stripped from the title to be honest, because everyone else does when they get injured like that,” Aspinall admitted (transcript via MMA Junkie). “I don’t see why he’s still got it. I don’t understand that. I think I should be the real champion right now.”
“It’s hard to say without sounding rude, but who’s asked about Jon Jones and Stipe anymore? Why do we get this legacy fight, and they get to live by their own rules? What’s a legacy fight, a retirement fight for a title? I want to fight Stipe and then I want to fight Jon Jones. … I think all this other stuff is rubbish. Stop protecting him now. Stop protecting your boy Jon Jones at the top. If he’s injured, get out of the way and I’ll fight Stipe.”
By all accounts, you’ve got 9 more months to make this point Tom. Get louder, use the position the UFC has granted you with that interim title. Jon Jones vs. Stipe Miocic is a cool fight and I’ll watch it, but Aspinall will be doing himself a disservice if he really just sits quietly and waits on the sidelines.
Bill Burr goes to bat for his wife
At this point, there’s no two ways about it, MMA is Trump country. While the community has always had a cozy relationship to conservative politics of all kinds, from deeply religious athletes to anti-government/anti-tax business interests, Dana White has kicked things into overdrive in recent years. The UFC CEO has nearly turning the Octagon into a presidential campaign stop, and used the pull of anti-COVID rhetoric and booming profits to push himself way up the speaker list for the 2020 Republican National Convention in the process.
Hell, the UFC’s friendlyness as a conservative political platform even turned Jorge Masvidal and Colby Covington into political pundits.
It does the soul good, then to see actress Nia Renee Hill take an opportunity to break up the love fest and give a high ranking former (and very possibly future) politician the finger when given the chance. She hand her husband, comedian Bill Burr, were at UFC 295 as guests of Dana White, when Trump was ushered into Madison Square Garden along with Tucker Carlson and Kid Rock.
Burr addressed the incident in a recent appearance on The Rich Eisen Show, noting that not only were his wife’s actions entirely non-confrontational, but that it’s exactly the kind of free expression that everyone says they want to see.
“I love my wife. You know where you stand with her,” Burr said of the incident (transcript via MMA Fighting). “The guy walked in the arena, everybody cheered, she gave him the finger, nobody got arrested. That’s why this country’s great. Everybody expressed themselves. Can we all be adults?”
“I don’t know about you but I came there to go to the fights. I didn’t know I was going to the Republican National Convention.”
“It’s like those Trump guys — they’re always going, ‘You snowflakes, eff your feelings,’ and all of that, and then you make fun of Trump and they’re like, ‘Oh my God, that’s so disrespectful!’” he added.
Honestly, at this point in time, I can’t think of one recent president I wouldn’t mind seeing get the bird in public. Politics shouldn’t be the realm of hagiography, there’s too much at stake for it to be a job people get to enjoy. If the payoff is power over life in America, then the cost can be people not wanting to be seen around you in public.
With Tyson Fury still seemingly on pace to face Oleksandr Usyk in early 2024, the hunt is on for Francis Ngannou’s next opponent. With a big splash of a debut in boxing under his belt, it seemed like the obvious choice for ‘The Predator’ would be a return to the ring. After all, why take $8-$10M to fight in the PFL when the right boxing PPV could easily pay multiples of that.
Instead, however, the former UFC heavyweight champion sounds intent on making his return to MMA—claiming that he wants at least one fight in the cage and one boxing bout next year. And if he can’t do the boxing bout first, then he’ll do the MMA fight. Given that Ngannou has also made it clear that the only boxing bout he’s really interested in right now is a rematch with Tyson Fury, it seems like the PFL better start making some phone calls.
That’s what makes Wilder’s recent interview with EsNews feel so dire. In it, Widler says he’s “trying to come into the UFC family,” and that he wants to be a champion in both the “UFC and boxing.”
It could be that the man is just playing coy, looking to drive up the PFL’s price and make it look like he has other buyers on the table for a potential move to mixed martial arts. But even that is bad news. Anything that puts the PFL in position where they have to lean on current free agent MMA talent to make Francis Ngannou’s next fight is a loss for fans. Because, you know what that gets you?
“I can make Middleweight, I can make Light Heavyweight, I can make Heavyweight, so if they need somebody to fight Francis Ngannou, you never know, man,” former top-ranked middleweight Derek Brunson told MMA Mania recently.
That’s right. Today Deontay Wilder plays hardball with the PFL, tomorrow we’re all watching Derek Brunson try to lean Francis Ngannou against the cage for 25 minutes. Nobody needs that.
At this point it feels like we’re well into Khamzat Chimaev’s ‘meme-fighter’ era, and I truly hate to see it. When he burst on the scene in 2020, the Chechen had the look of a true force in MMA. Someone that would work his way quickly to a title shot and make his name among other great talents from the Caucuses.
Illness, travel issues, and political machinations seem to have slowed all that down, however, and after competing three times in 2020, ‘Borz’ has fought just four times in the past 3 years.
While the reasons for his slow down feel largely circumstantial, I can’t help get the suspicion that there are other factors at play as well. Chimaev’s bout against Kamaru Usman was supposed to guarantee him a title shot, to the point that he was even asked about it in the Octagon.
“I didn’t come here for the titles. Just make money, be happy,” he told the crowd in Abu Dhabi.
Is this then a sign of regret from the Fight Club Akhmat fighter? Did he realize that his seeming disinterest in fighting for gold after beating Usman pushed him away from both his pursuits of making money and being happy? Or is this just the latest in an increasing series of career moves that seem to have Chimaev going nowhere fast?
I honestly don’t know, but I think the thing about this that I like the least is the realization that I also don’t care. I know Khamzat Chimaev isn’t about to fight for the light heavyweight title. Nor is he going to fight for the welterweight title. And I’m not even convinced he’s going to be fighting for the middleweight title anytime soon. I want to see the dude back in the Octagon in fights that mean something, but until that happens the Chimaev smash/kill gimmick has been run dry.
That’s all for this week. Love to see it/Hate to see it will be back next Wednesday with a fresh crop of MMA news that strikes some kind of nerve, for better or worse.
At this point we all know that that Tyson Fury is the fight Francis Ngannou wants next. The former UFC heavyweight champion made major waves in the boxing world back in October, with a competitive split decision loss to the WBC heavyweight champion at the Kingdom Arena in Saudi Arabia.
As a result of his performance, Ngannou grabbed a top ten spot in the WBC rankings. Even though that seems like the kind of success that would leave him primed for other bouts, Fury is all that’s on his mind.
“The rematch is what I want next the most,” Ngannou said in a recent interview. “Because, as for right now I feel like there is a lot of options for me, but I want to choose wisely—and I would go for the rematch first.”
Tyson Fury’s manager says rematch is a priority
Fortunately for Francis Ngannou, while Tyson Fury currently has another fight on his horizon, it sounds like the ‘Predator’ might not be waiting too too long to see a rematch of his boxing debut. In a recent interview on the MMA Hour, Fury promoter Frank Warren made it clear that a February 17th booking against Oleksandr Usyk was still priority one, but Ngannou was not forgotten.
“I don’t know [if it’ll be next for Fury],” Warren explained, when asked about a rematch (transcript via MMA Fighting). “It’s like jumping too far forward. Let’s get the big one [with Oleksandr Usyk on Feb. 17] out of the way first, and then we’ll see where we go. But I do think [it’ll happen]. Tyson told me that he wants the rematch, and I know Ngannou wants it, because after the fight we were out there, we met at His Excellency [Turki Alalshikh]’s house and we had quite a lengthy conversation. He’s a nice guy, by the way. He’s a really nice guy, good team around him, and I’m quite sure we’ll do it again.”
Warren sings Ngannou’s praises
Despite (debatably) losing to Tyson Fury when the final scorecards were read, Francis Ngannou’s work earned him no end of praise and credit from the boxing community. While Warren was quick to note that Fury’s training for Usyk—before the Ngannou fight was made—had left him somewhat depleted for the bout against the Cameroonian-born Frenchman, he was also sure that Ngannou’s performance was no flash in the pan.
“When that first bell went and he came out and I watched as he shapes up, I thought to myself, ‘Oh, this is not what I’m expecting,” Warren said of Ngannou. “This is not.’ Normally, MMA guys, they’re a bit more square on. He actually had the stance of a boxer, and he could jab and he was switch hitting. And after a couple of rounds, obviously I believed Tyson was winning, but I thought, ‘This is not going to be the job that everybody’s saying it’s going to be.’”
“I think Ngannou will give any of the guys in the top 10—and he’s ranked now, I think couple of the organizations have dropped him in there, and they should do it, he’s just gone the distance with the world champion—I think it’ll give all of them a problem,” he added later in the conversation. “And there’s a couple of them there I think he could beat.”
Andre Ward does 180o on Francis Ngannou
The fact that we’re even talking about a Tyson Fury vs. Francis Ngannou rematch at all is remarkable considering what the narrative for this fight was going in. All around the combat sports world, skepticism was high that Ngannou—a pro MMA fighter more known for his fearsome power than his technical skill—could look like any kind of high level competitive boxer, much less someone that could hang with a world champion.
A former undefeated, multi-division champion himself Andre Ward apparently wasn’t even watching the fight when it started. Electing instead to get a workout in, while Fury picked up an easy payday.
“I get on the Stairmaster, I’m doing my 20-30 minutes, but I’m looking over and I’m like, I don’t see anybody reacting,” Ward explained in a recent interview on the MMA Hour (transcript via MMA Fighting). “The fight is not over. So I yell over, I’m like, ‘The fight is still going?’ And the look on their face — they look, they say, ‘Oh yeah, it’s going and Fury may be losing.’ I’m like, ‘No.’ I get off the Stairmaster, right after that he gets dropped. I just couldn’t believe it, and it was a legitimate knockdown. I don’t know what to make of it.”
“I got to give him his credit. He deserves every bit of what he is getting. I know he’s going to have another big fight or two. He said he made more money in that fight than he did in his whole UFC career. That’s what it’s about, especially as you start getting older. I don’t have the words. I don’t know how that happened.”
Ward doesn’t feel Ngannou deserves ranking
Despite all his praise for Francis Ngannou’s great work against Tyson Fury, Ward still has a major issue with the WBC putting a number next to the Xtreme Couture talent’s name. Notably, that even if it was an exceptional performance against a top ranked opponent, Ward feels that a spot in the rankings should be representative of a body of work from a boxer, and not just a one-off performance.
“You don’t get to pick and choose which guy gets in the rankings depending on who you know or what’s going on in the back room,” Ward chided (transcript via Boxing Social). “Ngannou did a great job, but that’s a one off. He has to establish himself. They do whatever they want to do. The problem that I have with that… If we weren’t paying them 3% to keep the company going, you don’t make money outside of what the fighters are paying you.
“If we weren’t paying that, you do what you want to do. If you just want to have these rankings and it doesn’t really affect the fighters, that’s your business. This stuff affects guys’ livelihoods. Guys get phone calls saying ‘Hey man, we were getting close to a title shot we’re not gonna get out now cause they bumped you out the top ten.’ How? I’ve been played around with the rankings, and I just gave the belt back to the WBC at a certain time.”
“The sanctioning bodies, I have no respect for the way they play with these rankings, play with guys’ livelihoods and play with guys’ careers. Shame.”
Perhaps no boxer has had as active a retirement as Floyd Mayweather. The unbeaten multi-divisional champion walked away from the professional side of his career back in 2017, with a bout against UFC superstar Conor McGregor, bringing Mayweather’s record to a perfect 50-0.
But if fans expected ‘Money’ to sit back on his laurels and spend his time chilling on a beach somewhere, they underestimated the 46-year-old’s desire to stay in the spotlight—and his desire to keep collecting checks. Since hanging up his gloves, Mayweather has competed in seven exhibition bouts, with five of those coming in the last two years.
Most recently, he fought notable Mafia scion John Gotti III to a no-contest back in June. More than any of his previous exhibitions, the bout devolved into a complete circus midway through—with the referee eventually forced to call off the fight due to constant fouling and taunting from both men. From there fans and corners got involved and a brawl kicked off.
Floyd Mayweather vs. John Gotti 2 set for February 2024
Given the controversy of their first bout (and the wild amount of bad blood that seemed to spill over after the event) it’s not terribly surprising that Floyd Mayweather and John Gotti III would be looking to run things back. As has been the case with most of the aging superstar’s exhibition fights, he’s targeted opponents that offer just enough intrigue to pull in fans while providing little in the way of pugilistic threat. Gotti fits that bill perfectly.
No precise date for the rematch has been announced as of yet, but given that the Superbowl is on Sunday, February 11th, it seems likely that the fight will be targeted for Saturday, the 10th.
Gotti says beef with Mayweather squashed
While it seems like the bad blood narrative would make for the most sale-able running theme for the rematch, it’s not all that clear that Floyd Mayweather and John Gotti III have much actual animosity left to run with. Shortly after their first bout, Gotti stopped by the MMA Hour to talk about his clashes with the long-reigning former-champion.
He wanted to talk, and I wanted no part of it,” Gotti explained (transcript via Low Kick MMA). “I didn’t want to talk to him. My father, however, went to his locker room, and they talked and hashed it out. Listen, there’s no animosity toward Floyd. I said he was my enemy for life out of anger, but he’s not my enemy.
“He did his job. His job is to entertain and box, and so is mine. I still have respect for Floyd. Even at 46, you see him in the ring. How great he is. At 46, his reflexes are phenomenal…his speed. Listen, it was a great experience to share the ring with Floyd. It’s a memory I’ll never forget for the rest of my life, that’s for sure.”
“It got diffused,” Gotti added. “We’re good. We’ve been speaking. My father’s been in touch with their team, and there’s no bad blood here. It’s business. We did what we had to do, and we squash it and move on.”
That just leaves the question: If the beef is gone and the first fight was bad, what’s going to bring fans back to the arena? Or is Floyd Mayweather just banking on there being enough people with enough money already in Vegas at the time, that the fight will sell, whether there’s any interest in seeing it or not?
By the time that Francis Ngannou had made his exit from the UFC and signed to PFL, his working relationship with Dana White appeared to be all but destroyed. The two men had battled back and forth through the media for months trading passive aggressive barbs and seemingly, only very rarely looking to hash things out behind the scenes.
“No. We negotiated with him for years,” Dana White told reporters at UFC 285, when asked if Ngannou might ever return to the UFC. “It’s over, that’s over. He’ll never be in the UFC again. … I never say never, but I’ll give you a never on that one. We tried.”
Following Ngannou’s fight with Tyson Fury this past weekend, however, it seems White is—if not ready to welcome Ngannou back—at least not trying to bury him anymore.
Dana White reacts to Francis Ngannou vs. Tyson Fury
In a recent appearance on Donald Trump Jr.’s Triggered podcast, Dana White took some time to talk about the fight business. Most notably, about Francis Ngannou’s recent boxing debut. Even though he admitted he hadn’t actually seen the fight, White had nothing but good things to say about it as an achievement for the former UFC heavyweight champion.
“The fact that he went 10 rounds with Tyson Fury is crazy,” White said (transcript via MMA Fighting). “He just went 10 rounds with Tyson Fury, Conor [McGregor] made it 9 or 10 with Floyd, Anthony Pettis just beat Roy Jones Jr. – I know Roy is friggin’ 60 years old or whatever, but I don’t know what the hell is going on. It’s crazy.
“I didn’t see the fight, but the fact that he went 10 rounds is unbelievable.”
As to future UFC talents who may want to try their hand in the boxing ring? The UFC CEO didn’t exactly sound hyped by the idea, but also didn’t sound like he was pressed by any need to stop it from happening either.
“Listen, these guys, at some point, everybody is going to move on,” White explained. “Everybody has to do what’s right for them and make money for their families, so whatever they’ve got to do, they’ve got to do.”
UFC re-writes ‘sunset clause’ for fighters
Then again, the reason Dana White doesn’t sound too pressed about the idea of more star fighters trying to make the jump to boxing might be because the UFC has already worked to close up the loophole that allowed Francis Ngannou to make the jump to boxing.
When Ngannou left the UFC, as a title holding champion, it was because the contract he signed had a 5-year ‘sunset clause’. Which meant that if he completed all the bouts on his original contract, and didn’t sign another one, his contract would end 5-years after the date he signed it, no matter whether he was champion or not.
“The first set of changes to the clause was noted when Taila Santos’ contract was made public after it appeared in an unrelated court case. Two alterations were clear:
The five year sunset provision would now kick in on the date of the first fight on the contract, rather than the previous iteration where it began the day you singed the contract
The contract could be ‘paused’ in cases of suspension (could possibly include medical suspensions)
“On top of those changes, a brand new one is here, and it’s even more restrictive. Basically, what it says is that if you turn down fights and the UFC doesn’t think you have a legitimate enough reason to turn down said fights, they can again pause the five year period. Let’s say it’s the third year of a fighter’s contract and they decide, ‘You know what, I don’t like what I’m being offered, I’m just going to wait out my contract’. Well, the UFC can say that you are refusing to take a legitimate offer, and that five year period will be paused. So it ruins the whole purpose of a sunset clause.”
Francis Ngannou on Dana White
As for whether or not Francis Ngannou is going to see Dana White’s words as a potential change of heart from the UFC boss? Maybe there’s still some room for the two men to find common ground.
Following his fight with Fury, the 37-year-old was asked about White and if he had any words for the promoter now that he’d so obviously shattered expectations. The ‘Predator’ seemed entirely at peace with his past feud with White.
“Who cares?” Ngannou said when asked about Dana White on a recent episode of the MMA Hour. “Dana White feels like Dana White feels. I feel like I feel. Personally I feel great. I think you have to send him an invite so you can ask him. I would like to know, too.”
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