UFC President Dana White admitted Monday that the unruly brawl following Saturday’s Conor McGregor-Khabib Nurmagomedov fight was “not our best moment,” as he continued to question Nurmagomedov’s response to the biggest sports moment of his life.
White remained incredulous over the actions of Nurmagomedov and his team, which he said Saturday “disgusted and sickened” him. And the UFC boss defended UFC’s “Bad Blood” promotion of the lightweight title bout, arguing that McGregor’s incendiary pre-fight comments were no excuse for the messy post-fight skirmishes.
“There’s no doubt that he’s justified for being upset and everything else,” White said of Nurmagomedov in an ESPN interview Monday, “but first of all, you just won the fight. You just beat the biggest superstar in all of sports, let alone our sport. You just beat him in front of the whole world. The whole world was watching. It really wasn’t about him and Conor at that moment.”
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Nurmagomedov, who won in a fourth-round submission, has apologized for the brawl that erupted after McGregor tapped out in a fourth-round chokehold. The arena descended into chaos when Nurmagomedov charged at Dillon Danis — McGregor’s jujitsu coach — just before three members of Nurmagomedov’s entourage climbed into the Octagon and attacked McGregor. The three were arrested, but later released after McGregor declined to press charges.
That followed an ugly lead-up to the fight, which marked McGregor’s return to UFC after a lengthy absence during which he fought and lost to Floyd Mayweather Jr. and was involved in an incident with Nurmagomedov’s entourage last spring. McGregor had attacked a bus carrying the group and others in Brooklyn in April, shortly after Nurmagomedov had confronted McGregor’s teammate and friend Artem Lobov at the hotel housing the fighters for UFC 223. McGregor pleaded guilty to a single charge of disorderly conduct and has no criminal record over the incident.
Still, the bad blood between the two men — whether genuine or amped up for publicity purposes — lingered into the news conferences leading up to UFC 229.
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"He talk about my religion. He talk about my country. He talk about my father,” Nurmagomedov said of McGregor on Saturday night, adding, “This is a respect sport, this is not a trash-talking sport. … You cannot talk about religion, you cannot talk about a nation, you cannot talk about this stuff. For me, this is very important.”
Nurmagomedov left the arena after the fight without his paycheck and with the whole incident under investigation by the Nevada State Athletic Commission.
“The only one who is going to get hurt out of this whole thing is Khabib,” White said on Monday. “Now he’s got to go before the Nevada State Athletic Commission. They kept his purse. All the things that were said — you won! You won the fight!
“You had the opportunity to stand up there, get the belt put on you in front of the whole world. Now you’re going to stand in front of the Nevada State Athletic Commission. It’s just a really bad decision in the heat of the moment.”
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Some have questioned how White and UFC could act shocked — shocked! — at Saturday’s mayhem, after the organization enthusiastically promoted the past unpleasantness between the two fighters and allowed insults to be hurled during the pre-fight news conferences.
“This is a fight. The way that we promoted this fight is exactly the way that this thing played out,” White said. “That’s all part of the story line. Almost 20 years I’ve been doing this — we’ve had plenty of fights where there’s tons of bad blood ... and we don’t have fights after the fights. We have scuffles with guys in the back [sometimes]. This is the fight business and a lot of people don’t like each other.”
The whole episode, ESPN’s Molly Qerim suggested, seemed to captivate fans of the sport.
“You know who doesn’t like it?” White replied. “The Nevada State Athletic Commission.”
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And now the sport is in some limbo. Will Nurmagomedov be stripped of his title? And what about a rematch with McGregor, who tweeted about that very thing just hours after his loss?
“First of all, he has to go before the commission,” White said of Nurmagomedov. “We have to see what’s going to happen with Khabib with this whole mess, but Conor McGregor has already called me wanting a rematch.”
Read more MMA coverage from The Post:
MMA fighter who hit Conor McGregor in melee crows about fulfilling a promise
UFC 229 brawl: Conor McGregor wants a rematch after incident leaves Dana White ‘disgusted’
Nurmagomedov-McGregor brawl leaves UFC world reeling, wondering what’s next
Conor McGregor accused Khabib Nurmagomedov’s manager of being a ‘terrorist’
‘I’m coming for that man’s head’: Conor McGregor says he’ll crush Khabib Nurmagomedov
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