Dana White News

Russell Ess - December 23, 2016

The media battle between UFC superstar Conor McGregor and boxing legend Floyd Mayweather has been going on for quite some time now.

Russell Ess - December 23, 2016

There is a perfected recipe for UFC success with Conor McGregor and Nate Diaz being the two main ingredients. McGregor and Diaz who headlined UFC 196 and UFC 202 have two of the highest, if not the top two highest UFC pay-per-view buys in the history of the UFC. Diaz was able to shock the world and submit McGregor in the second round of their first meeting at UFC 196. Then McGregor came back to win the rematch at UFC 202 by majority decision and both events were a massive success.

Russell Ess - December 22, 2016

The MMA community has been buzzing with the news of Cris Cyborg’s potential Anti-Doping Policy violation stemming from an out-of-competition sample collected on December 5, 2016.

Tom Taylor - December 20, 2016

Over the last few years, the UFC has tapped into a veritable gold mine of talent in Russia. The most notable Russian fighter on the UFC roster, of course, is Dagestan’s Khabib Nurmagomedov, who is currently banging on the door of lightweight champ Conor McGregor with both hands. In addition to Nurmagomedov, the UFC is now home to Russian talents like Rustam Khabilov, Ruslan Magomedov, Ali Bagautinov, Albert Tumenov, Oleksiy Oliynyk, Omari Akhmedov, Alexander Volkov, Rashid Magomedov, Alexander Yakovlev, Shamil Abdurakhimov, and others. The list is always growing.

bjpenndotcom - December 14, 2016

This week, the UFC announced that former UFC women’s bantamweight champion Holly Holm, and #11 ranked women’s bantamweight Germaine de Randamie would be fighting for the inaugural women’s featherweight championship at UFC 208 on February 11th. That didn’t sit too well with Invicta FC women’s featherweight champion Cris Cyborg, who is now 2-0 in the UFC after making her successful UFC debut earlier this year. According to UFC President Dana White, Cyborg turned down two fights for the inaugural UFC women’s featherweight championship, forcing the promotion to opt to give the title fight to Holm & Randamie.

bjpenndotcom - December 10, 2016

Since the new WME-IMG UFC owners took control of the company earlier this year, they have continued to fire numerous high-profile employees, including UFC Canada’s Tom Wright, and UFC Hall of Famers Chuck Liddell & Matt Hughes to name just a few. Recently, there were reports circulating that in order to potentially secure a new TV deal, the promotion was looking to replace the “hype” style of commentary that longtime commentators Joe Rogan & Mike Goldberg brought to the table. While there has been no further reports on the matter, Joe Rogan’s friend, Eddie Bravo, recently asked on an episode of The Joe Rogan Experience’s Fight Companion “Who’s taking Mike Goldberg’s spot?” which led to a period of awkward silence with Joe Rogan and Brendan Schaub, potentially indicating that there was some truth behind Bravo’s question.

Russell Ess - December 9, 2016

UFC 206 takes place on Saturday night at the Air Canada Centre in Toronto. The Canada card has had a couple big shakeups as the originally planned main event for UFC 206 took a turn when it was revealed weeks out from the fight that Daniel Cormier was forced out of his UFC light heavyweight title defense against Anthony “Rumble” Johnson due to suffering an injury.

Russell Ess - December 9, 2016

With the five famous fighters that were a part of the Mixed Martial Arts Athletes Association announcement last week, UFC President Dana White has said that “fighters can go out and do what they want to do — they are all grown men.” However, White did state that he was surprised to see Donald “Cowboy” Cerrone as one of the five fighters standing as a part of the association, especially after White helped him out with a legal situation where White paid for Cerrone’s attorney out of his own pocket. White was a guest on Tim & Sid on Sportsnet and commented on Cerrone’s involvement with the MMAAA and the conversation that he had with Cerrone following the announcement of the association.

bjpenndotcom - December 8, 2016

HBO’s hit series ‘Game of Thrones’ is currently gearing up to release the seventh season of the highly anticipated show in 2017. Interestingly enough, news surfaced earlier this week that during his 10 month hiatus from the Octagon, UFC superstar Conor McGregor will be joining the cast of the hit show for one of the two remaining seasons.

bjpenndotcom - December 8, 2016

Since Conor McGregor was pulled from UFC 200 in April for refusing to fulfill his media obligations, there have been talks of the Irish superstar making the jump to boxing to compete against undefeated boxing icon Floyd Mayweather. While at that time talks progressed to the point that Colin Cowherd even announced the targeted date for the bout, the fight never materialized. Now, on the heels of McGregor’s UFC 205 win over Eddie Alvarez last month, which saw ‘Notorious’ claim the UFC lightweight championship and become the first ever simultaneous two-division UFC champion when he picked up a second round TKO win over Alvarez, talks of a McGregor-Mayweather boxing match have once again picked up steam.

Russell Ess - December 7, 2016

(Video has been taken down from YouTube channel) Many people were shocked when the UFC announced that Conor McGregor “relinquished” the UFC featherweight championship title recently. Many even speculated that the UFC simply stripped “The Notorious” of the 145-pound title with the Irish superstar being quite mum on the matter when it was first announced.

Russell Ess - December 7, 2016

https://youtu.be/5PbevV7PncM?t=4m57s UFC President Dana White apparently has changed his mind on a UFC women’s 145-pound featherweight division.

Tom Taylor - December 7, 2016

https://youtu.be/5McRtt8Dvg8?t=3m21s Every time Conor McGregor accomplishes a new and massive feat, it leaves fans eager to see him try to one-up that feat. When he knocked out Jose Aldo to win the featherweight title, fans immediately wanted to see him challenge for lightweight gold. When he knocked out Eddie Alvarez to win that lightweight gold, buzz about a potential welterweight title fight with Tyron Woodley quickly began to resurface. And then, of course, there’s the ever-present discourse about McGregor testing himself in a boxing match with boxing legend Floyd Mayweather.

Tom Taylor - December 6, 2016

Though Jon Jones stands out as one of the best mixed martial artists ever, he’s had an undeniably rough few years. His recent career has been marred by everything from cocaine use to a hit-and-run involving a pregnant woman. Earlier this year, of course, it looked like a matured Jones might finally be getting his life back on track. Though it was far from his best performance, he made a successful return to action, defeating late-replacement Ovince St. Preux to win the UFC interim light heavyweight title. With this win in the books, Jones was then pencilled in for a title unifying rematch with Daniel Cormier, who has been sitting on the divisional throne in his stead. The two were expected to share the main event honors of the landmark UFC 200 in July.

bjpenndotcom - December 6, 2016

Former Bellator MMA CEO Bjorn Rebney recently found himself making headlines recently when he joined former UFC welterweight kingpin Georges St-Pierre, former UFC champions TJ Dillashaw & Cain Velasquez, and top ranked fighters Donald Cerrone & Tim Kennedy in announcing the formation of the MMA Athletes Association. While the association mostly received praise form fighters, many questioned the former Bellator MMA CEO’s motives, with UFC President Dana White stating:

bjpenndotcom - December 6, 2016

Last week, former UFC welterweight kingpin Georges St-Pierre, former bantamweight champion TJ Dillashaw, former heavyweight champion Cain Velasquez, top ranked welterweight Donald Cerrone, and top ranked middleweight Tim Kennedy announced the formation of the MMA Athletes Association (MMAAA) along with former Bellator CEO Bjorn Rebney. The move was a very historic one, with numerous fighters taking to social media to express their support for the association, as well as many looking to join the association.

bjpenndotcom - December 6, 2016

In 2016, Invicta FC women’s featherweight champion Cris Cyborg successfully made her UFC debut earlier this year when she successfully defeated Leslie Smith at UFC 198 back in May. Given that Cyborg competes in the women’s featherweight division under the Invicta banner, her fight with Smith was a catchweight fight of 140 pounds. In her second Octagon appearance, Cyborg defeated Swedish striker Lina Lansberg via TKO in the second round of their ‘UFC Fight Night: Sao Paulo’ main event scrap. Despite that, it’s been well documented that Cyborg struggles to make the catchweight limit of 140 pounds. Leading up to both of her scheduled UFC scraps, Cyborg was forced to cut a tremendous amount of weight, to the point that cameras caught the Invicta champ crying while attempting to cut weight. In addition, leading up to her last fight, Cyborg was forced to cut 10 pounds in just 24 hours in order to make 140 pounds.

Russell Ess - December 2, 2016

When UFC superstar Conor McGregor makes any type of significant moves, the word spreads quickly. On Wednesday, Ariel Helwani and Brett Okamoto tweeted that current UFC lightweight champion Conor McGregor was granted a boxing license in the state of California. It later came to light that McGregor applied for a boxing license in numerous states.