Just moments after Fabricio Werdum produced a major upset victory over Cain Velasquez to win the heavyweight title at UFC 188 last night, Dana White spoke to Ariel Helwani Octagon-side to give his reactions to the evening’s biggest talking points.
Read our keynotes below and scroll down to watch the video for yourselves.
– White played down Helwani’s suggestion that, given some of the big wins he’s had in his career, Werdum might be the greatest heavyweight of all time.
– The UFC president seemed to still be getting his head around the idea that Werdum is now the champion and wasn’t able to commit to who he would fight next with Andrei Arlovski staring directly at him at cage-side, Junior dos Santos also in attendance and Stipe Miocic being another top contender.
After pausing for a moment the best White could muster was what appeared to be a less than enthusiastic acknowledgement that the division is now, “very interesting” in the wake of this upset.
– Moving on, White said he believed Eddie Alvarez did do enough to win a decision over Gilbert Melendez, and had given him the last two rounds on his won scorecard.
– White believes that the altitude in Mexico City, “affected everybody in this building tonight,” including Melendez.
– White notes that the victorious Yair Rodriguez actually had full poisoning all day before the fight which explains why he actually threw up during his post-fight interview with Joe Rogan! Under the circumstances White thinks the Mexican put on an “unbelievable” performance which earned him a $50,000 bonus.
– Kelvin Gastelum wants permission from the UFC to move back down to welterweight despite having missed weight their a few times recently. However, despite his victory White remains unconvinced by that, noting that Gastelum still had to cut weight to even make the 186lb limit on Friday, and looks set to force him to continue to compete at middleweight.
– Capping off the conversation, White said it was a personal accomplishment to put on a huge event like this in Mexico with a completely sold-out arena and appeared to have relished the atmosphere during the main event. Nonetheless, he also couldn’t resist mentioning one more time that “altitude kills!”
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