UFC CEO Dana White has spoken out about the allegation that Isaac Dulgarian deliberately threw his fight against Yadier del Valle at UFC Fight Night 263 on Saturday night.
“Probably about 1 o’clock that day, we’re with a company called IC 360, and they are the best bet monitoring company in the business. They reached out to us, and they told us that there was some unusual action going on with that fight – did we know anything. We didn’t,” White told TMZ Sports.
“So what we did was we called the fighter and his lawyer, and said, ‘What’s going on? There’s some weird action going on in your bet, some weird betting action going on with your fight. Are you injured? Do you owe anybody money? Has anybody approached you?’ And the kid said, ‘No, absolutely not. I’m going to kill this guy.’ So we said, Okay.
“The fight plays out and first-round finish by rear-naked choke. Literally, the first thing we did was call the FBI. So we called the FBI, I’ve met with the FBI twice today, so that’s the whole thing.”
Since the news broke about the suspicious betting activity there’s been talk that over 100 UFC fights are currently under investigation, but Dana White has stated that’s simply not true.
“Now you see people out there talking, ‘Oh, hundreds of fights under investigation.’ It’s total bullsh*t. Usual, clickbait bullsh*t,” White declared. “IC 360, our company, they monitor all of the betting. Like I said, they are the best in the business. There aren’t hundreds of fights being investigated. All clickbait BS.”
“This company, IC 360, which is the best bet-monitoring company in the business, we’ve been with them for years. We get a report after every single fight that we do,” White continued. “We’ve been with these guys for years. We take this very serious, and we’re watching every single fight that happens in the UFC, from the first prelim to the main event.”
Several other UFC veterans like Vince Morales, Vanessa Demopoulos and lando Vannata have spoken out in recent days to say that they have been approached about throwing UFC fights in the past, but refused to do so, and White has warned that anyone who does attempt to fix a fight will be harshly punished.
“If you try to do this, I’ve been very vocal and very open about this: we will be your worst enemy,” White said. “We will immediately go after you, guns ablazing, with the FBI and whoever else we need to get. We will do everything we can to make sure you go to prison.”
The 29-year-old Dulgarian has yet to be found guilty of the allegations against him, but in the mean time he has already been released from the UFC, while the Nevada State Athletic Commission have withheld his fight money, and his team Factory X have also cut ties with him.
“I’m not saying this kid is guilty,” White said. “There is no proof that he’s done this yet, but I can tell you this: it doesn’t look good. It definitely doesn’t look good.”
