Dana White News

Tom Taylor - November 13, 2016

UFC 205 was absolutely stacked. Though it was hurt by the last minute losses of a Donald Cerrone vs. Kelvin Gastelum welterweight bout and a Tim Kennedy vs. Rashad Evans middleweight bout, it still stood out as the most talent-rich card in UFC history. The lineup was topped by a lightweight title fight between divisional champ Eddie Alvarez and featherweight king Conor McGregor. Below this title fight were two others: a welterweight title fight between Tyron Woodley and Stephen “Wonderboy” Thompson, and a strawweight title fight between Joanna Jedrzejczyk and Karolina Kowalkiewicz. The rest of the card, finally, was packed with big names like Yoel Romero, Chris Weidman, Miesha Tate, Raquel Pennington, Frankie Edgar, Jeremy Stephens, Khabib Nurmagomedov and Michael Johnson.

Chris Taylor - November 13, 2016

UFC welterweight champion Tyron Woodley left Madison Square Garden with his title following an epic five-round war with Stephen Thompson in the evenings co-main event. “The Chosen One” and “Wonderboy” battled to a majority draw, this after two judges scored the fight 47-47 and one judge scored the contest in favor of T-Wood 48-47.

bjpenndotcom - November 11, 2016

Earlier this year, reports surfaced that a fighter’s union had officially been formed. With current and former fighters such as UFC legend Randy Couture, UFC women’s bantamweight Leslie Smith, and MMA veteran Cung Le jumping on-board to name just a few of the fighters. Earlier this week however, top ranked UFC welterweight & lightweight, Donald ‘Cowboy’ Cerrone weighed-in on the formation of a fighter’s union during a media luncheon, in which he stated:

Tom Taylor - November 11, 2016

Earlier this morning, UFC 205‘s stacked main card took a significant hit when welterweight contender Kelvin Gastelum failed to make weight for his planned bout with Donald “Cowboy” Cerrone. Though weigh-in misses do not typically result in the cancelation of a fight outright, Gastelum’s was severe enough that it forced him off the card altogether, leaving Cowboy without an opponent, and depriving fans of a highly anticipated fight. This weight related slip up is unfortunately not Gastelum’s first. In his eight scheduled welterweight bouts with the Ultimate Fighting Championship, the 25-year-old has missed weight 3 times, first for a 2014 bout with Nico Musoke, then for a 2015 bout with Tyron Woodley and most recently for this nixed bout with Cowboy. He also very nearly missed weight for a mid-2016 bout with Johny Hendricks.

bjpenndotcom - November 8, 2016

While former UFC light heavyweight kingpin Jon Jones is widely believed to be the pound for pound kingpin in MMA, Jones has fought just once in nearly two years. After defeating Daniel Cormier in a highly anticipated grudge match in January of 2015, Jones was booked to defend his title against Anthony ‘Rumble’ Johnson later in the year. Unfortunately, Jones was involved in an infamous hit & run car accident that ultimately saw him stripped of the title, and pulled from the card. Ultimately, after Jones was stripped of the title and pulled from the card, Daniel Cormier stepped in to fight Johnson for the vacant light heavyweight championship, winning the fight via 3rd round submission to claim the vacant light heavyweight championship.

bjpenndotcom - October 29, 2016

Earlier this year, the MMA community rejoiced as New York became the last state to finally legalize MMA. The announcement of MMA’s legalization in New York was followed up by an announcement from the UFC in which is was announced that they would be hosting UFC 205 at the historic arena.

bjpenndotcom - October 28, 2016

Relations between the UFC brass and former UFC welterweight kingpin Georges St-Pierre have continued to be strained over the last few weeks as St-Pierre’s highly anticipated return to the Octagon was once again postponed after negotiations for ‘Rush’ to return at UFC 206 failed. This resulted in St-Pierre revealing in an interview that he had terminated his contract with the UFC after the promotion failed to secure him a fight in a reasonable amount of time. Despite that, rumors of St-Pierre returning to the Octagon at UFC 206 for a fight with Michael Bisping continued to surface, until this week, when St-Pierre sent a message to Bisping via social media, in which he stated:

Chris Taylor - October 25, 2016

Earlier this week, BJPENN.com’s Chris Taylor reported that current UFC middleweight champion Michael Bisping was being targeted for a fight at December’s UFC 206 event in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. I spoke to one of Michael Bisping's coaches who told me thatthe UFC is targeting the champ to return at #UFC206 in Toronto, Canada.

Russell Ess - October 20, 2016

Former UFC welterweight champion Georges St-Pierre may be in the toughest fight of his career and it isn’t even taking place in the Octagon. A battle is currently taking place between St-Pierre and the UFC over contract disputes with St-Pierre and his legal team claiming that they are no longer under contract with the UFC while the promotion claims vice versa.

Tom Taylor - October 16, 2016

https://youtu.be/c-wml71s3I8 Bad news, fight fans. Despite plenty of speculation to the contrary, Georges St-Pierre will not be competing at UFC 206 in Toronto. UFC President Dana White shut down any surviving hope of a GSP comeback in the Ontario capital in a recent interview with FS1’s Jay and Dan.

bjpenndotcom - October 15, 2016

Invicta FC featherweight champion Cris Cyborg is now 2-0 inside the Octagon, with her most recent win last month being a 2nd round TKO win over Swedish striking ace Lina Lansberg. Although Cyborg is regarded as one of the greatest female mixed martial artists of all time, she fights primarily under the Invicta FC banner due to the fact that the UFC doesn’t have a women’s featherweight division. In her two Octagon appearances, Cyborg fought at a catchweight of 140 pounds, both times enduring a grueling weight-cut in the process of reaching the contracted weight.

Russell Ess - October 13, 2016

With all the fights the UFC puts on every year, UFC President Dana White still finds time to make sure he, himself, is staying in shape. When White appeared shirtless in an episode of “Dana White: Lookin’ for a Fight,’ fans were surprised to see the UFC boss with a ripped physique.

bjpenndotcom - October 13, 2016

When it was announced that Conor McGregor would be fighting Eddie Alvarez for the UFC lightweight championship at UFC 205, rather than defending his UFC featherweight championship in a rematch against Jose Aldo, who secured a rematch with McGregor when he defeated Frankie Edgar at UFC 200 for the interim featherweight championship, Aldo requested his release from the promotion, expressing a lack of faith in the UFC. UFC President Dana White was quick to shut Aldo down, stating that the promotion would be able to book him a fight at UFC 205 as well. Despite that, Aldo fired back by saying that he doesn’t want a fight, and plans to retire from MMA so as to pursue a career in another professional sport.

Chris Taylor - October 9, 2016

UFC President Dana White discusses all the action from last night’s UFC 204 event in Manchester, England.

Tom Taylor - September 30, 2016

Earlier this year, it was announced that the UFC had been sold for more than $4 billion. The organization was purchased by Hollywood talent agency WME-IMG, who would take the reigns from long-time owners Lorenzo and Frank Fertitta. When news of this massive sale first broke, it was unclear what effect it would have on the company. Today, however, it’s becoming quite clear that WME-IMG plans to push the UFC–and by association, the larger sport of MMA–further into the mainstream sports landscape. The new owners’ latest effort to this end has been the assembly of a group of A-list celebrity investors.

bjpenndotcom - September 28, 2016

Tuesday afternoon, UFC interim featherweight champion Jose Aldo left the MMA community stunned as he requested that the UFC release him from his contract so that he could retire from MMA and move to another sport entirely. Aldo expressed his frustration with the UFC for not making good on their promise to force Conor McGregor to defend his title after his UFC 202 scrap with Nate Diaz. While UFC President Dana White was adamant that McGregor either defend the belt in a title unification fight with Jose Aldo, or vacate the strap, McGregor has now been booked to fight Eddie Alvarez for the lightweight championship in the main event of the UFC’s historic card at the Madison Square Garden.

bjpenndotcom - September 27, 2016

Dana White sounded off on Roy Nelson’s post-fight kick to referee John McCarthy on the UFC Unfiltered podcast, and he certainly did not mince words. The UFC president repeated that he felt ‘Big Country’ should “be buried” for his actions following his second round knockout win over Antonio ‘Bigfoot’ Silva in Brazil over the weekend.

Chris Taylor - September 25, 2016

Fight fans are eagerly awaiting news on current UFC featherweight champion Conor McGregor’s next fight. Most people presumed that the Irish star would return at November’s highly anticipated UFC 205 event in New York, where he was expected to challenge current UFC lightweight title holder Eddie Alvarez for the promotions 155-pound title.