Dana White Vows UFC Will Be First Major Sports Organization To Start Up Again

Dana White continues to be bullish about how he reacts to the coronavirus pandemic, claming in a new interview that the UFC will bounce back quicker than other leading sporting organizations.

“Here’s the reality: We will be up and running before any other sport will,” White told MMAjunkie. “Our sport’s different. We have our own arena next door (the UFC Apex). So we will fulfill every fight for every fighter this year, and we’ll get this thing done.”

White has received some criticism in the media for trying to continue to put on events despite the latest medical advice being for people to stay at home as much as possible and avoid gathering in large numbers, but he appears to be paying them no attention.

“Think about this: Go online and look at some of these people – and this isn’t a knock, this is just a fact: The weakest, wimpiest people on earth cover the biggest, baddest sport on earth,” White said. “What do you expect them to say? What do you think they’re gonna say?

“I have over 350 employees who work for me. Multi-billion-dollar companies are laying off all their employees right now. We haven’t laid off one person at the UFC. And every fighter that fights for me will fight three times this year. Our schedule will go on. Everybody’s gonna get paid, and we will figure this out, and we will be the first sport back on. And, uh, f*ck that sh*t. Everything will go on.”

White then doubled down on that and insisted that they’ll pull out all the stops to ensure that the UFC looks after it’s fighters.

“Listen, the media can talk as much sh*t as they want. They don’t feed families. They don’t take care of f*cking people. They don’t have people that count on them. They don’t have people to support. We’re doing the right thing as far medical testing goes and everything. That’s all we f*cking do. That’s nothing new. We were doing that sh*t way before the coronavirus. We were taking care of people and making sure that everybody’s healthy, and every fighter that’s with me on the road is getting much better medical attention than they are at home – if they’re with me. You know what I mean?

“I told our whole roster: If you or your loved ones have any type of situations or anything wrong, call me. I’ll do everything in my power to make sure you get taken care of.”

Ross launched MMA Insight (previously FightOfTheNight.com) in 2009 as a way to channel his passion for the sport of mixed martial arts. He's since penned countless news stories and live fight reports along with dozens of feature articles as the lead writer for the site, reaching millions of fans in the process.