You Get What You Pay For: UFC buys bad behavior for a living
When Dana White spoke to reporters in the aftermath of Conor McGregor’s attack on the fighters’ bus at Barclays Center, he was explicitly disgusted. “This is the most disgusting thing that has ever happened in the history of the company,” White told reporters. In fact, so dismayed was White with McGregor’s actions that he used the words “disgusting,” “disgusted,” or “despicable” almost ten times throughout the scrum.
“This was a real bad career move for him,” declared White. When asked about the health of his professional relationship with Conor, White replied that it was “not good.” “I think that after this disgusting, despicable move, I think everybody’s relationship with Conor is gonna be not so great.”
Four months later the UFC announces that it is back in the Conor McGregor business, booking him against undefeated champion Khabib Nurmagomedov for the lightweight belt. With McGregor now free from criminal liability for the bus attack, and only subject to civil recourse, White and the UFC took their green light and added orange and white Irish stripes.
Under the twisted guise of promotion, they also incorporated footage of the bus attack into their UFC 229 marketing videos. The action of dolly-through-window was even distastefully used as an editing transition into graphics that broke into pieces like shattered glass. This move was not merely a head-scratcher, but a head-shaker.
Real human beings were injured in that attack, both physically and emotionally. Not only did McGregor-and-gang assault a bus housing his new sworn enemy, but also a group of innocent peers. In defense of its own morality, the UFC should have, at the very least, excluded the specific video that now serves to magnify how little they value their own rosters’ well-being.
But White repeatedly defended the footage as “part of the story.” McGregor attacking the bus is indeed, without a doubt, part of the story. And if the UFC felt it insincere to exclude the criminal event in its promotion, that’s understood. However, there is a means to telling that story without alienating your roster, specifically those affected most. Why not use footage of Dana White decrying McGregor’s actions?
During that post-attack scrum, a reporter asks White if he still wants to be in business with Conor McGregor. “Yeah, no, right now, no, absolutely not. I mean, do you want to be in business with Conor McGregor right now? Do you wanna chase this guy around for interviews and buy his fights? Do you? I don’t think anybody is gonna want to right now. No, I think everybody is gonna be pretty disgusted with Conor McGregor right now.”
Add a record-scratching sound effect, cut to White announcing UFC 229, throw in your standard fight footage, one last sound bite of White calling this bout the biggest fight in UFC history, toss in a tagline of “never say never,” and now we’ve got ourselves a real promo video. A succinct reminder to fans that money talks and business is business. No hiding the ball, no bull s***. Fans would have respected, or at least, accepted, a face-forward approach more easily than the slimy strategy endorsed by the UFC.
But these days, the UFC isn’t brimming with creativity, or bravery. It seems they always opt for option C, never trying to conceive of what option A or B could represent. And so in advance of the October 6th date, the promos were released. And despite the distastefulness of the marketing strategy, the fans were rallied, and the media were poised, because Mystic Mac was back, and the floodgates were about to open.
With McGregor now unchained, the expectation of trash talk grew each day. But McGregor laid relatively low. After a two-year break from MMA, McGregor wanted to protect his emotional and physical energy, limiting his media exposure severely; at least in comparison to previous fights.
The world waited patiently, chewing slowly on social media morsels, anticipating the big day when both men would hit the press conference tables and sit vulnerably within earshot of each other. Peripheral vision, and White’s thick frame, their best defense against their respective opponent’s already clenched fists.
Choosing to host the first press conference in New York compelled the UFC, for some reason, to exclude fans. This resulted in an energetically off-kilter display of McGregor rowdiness and Nurmagomedov stillness. And yet, it was clear, Mac was back, and we were all the better for it. Sure, he behaved abhorrently in April, but somehow, though not all was forgiven or forgotten, all was accepted because a wild fight was afoot.
Conor’s words during the press conferences, though harsh in some ways, were also classic McGregor. He finds his opponent’s emotional vulnerabilities and talks them to death in front of adoring crowds and hovering media. But the air grew thick with revenge the more Conor rallied on about race, religion, and father-dom.
And despite White referring to the verbal showdowns as dark, he did nothing to quell the talk. Why should he? In the fight game, words are just words; verbal shadow boxing meant to hype new fans and unite old fans into one camp or the other. Words are just mouth sounds that flitter away into the ether, only recalled later for posterity.
Unless you’re Khabib Nurmagomedov. In which case, every indelicate utterance issued to him is a direct threat to his existence. Khabib waited patiently until fight day, promising to “humble” and “maul” and “smash” McGregor, but not specifically in that order.
And Khabib did just that. Conor got clobbered. Conor tapped out. All this was hard to watch if you’re a McGregor fan. But there was some comfort in knowing that, as always, McGregor would be humble in defeat and raring for a rematch. The world, though shaken, would be right again.
However, fans didn’t get a chance to swim in the afterthought, because the Russian eagle and his flock went in for the kill, attacking McGregor’s cornerman Dillon Danis and then cheap-shotting McGregor himself.
Poor timing, ill-advised, plain dumb? Yes, to all three. Surprising? Not entirely. It was clear from the build-up to this showdown that neither side would walk away with their guns re-holstered. The chaos that erupted immediately following the tap-out was more disheartening than shocking. The night was already rolling to a rapid boil, and since the UFC did nothing to punish Conor after the bus attack, it was clear, at least subliminally, that no holds were barred.
But didn’t Khabib get that he totally smoked Conor? Didn’t Khabib understand that he beat Conor on every level, both mentally and physically? Maybe so; still didn’t matter. The aggrieved Russian felt fundamentally compelled to smash his righteousness into McGregor, whether directly or indirectly. You offend Khabib, you pay.
When asked post-fight if White would seek to strip Khabib’s belt, White deflected, deferring repeatedly to the authority of the Nevada State Athletic Commission (NSAC). He also hid behind the arrest of Khabib’s teammates, those who attacked Conor in the octagon, as partial evidence to the seriousness with which the affair was being treated. (McGregor did not press charges and those men were later released from jail.)
When asked in April if there were any steps the promotion could take against Conor for attacking the bus, White sang a different tune. “…obviously, we’re disgusted with him right now, completely disgusted.” “The answer to that is yes. The question is what.” At the time, White was at least willing to publicly admit that Conor would face repercussions for his criminal actions. Obviously that never came to pass. It also never came to last.
This time around, White knew better than to offer any sound bites that could be used against him in case another champion goes off the rails. This is how he finished his remarks about Conor in April. “Listen, this is the fight game. Mean things are said. People get in each other’s faces. People grab each other and do stuff like that. It’s completely normal. And we always, you know, contain it and handle it, it’s part of the business. But what happened today, was criminal; disgusting, despicable, makes me sick, and we as an organization need to make sure that this never happens again.”
Cut to, October 6th, and guess what, it’s happening again. What do we learn from this? What is the key takeaway? Well, when the cat’s away the mouse will play. And even though Dana White is the public face of the company, he’s not meaningfully present.
This is why the UFC is full of stars but absent of integrity. They treat their independent contractors like employees when it benefits them: to impose a uniform policy, to impose media obligations, to withhold pay, to terminate contracts, to force drug testing. And in the same breath, they withhold responsibility when a fighter makes basic demands for health insurance and commensurate pay. The UFC now also withholds meaningful reproach when it comes to criminal behavior.
Conor attacks a bus. Dana is furious. Dana promises punishment. The UFC instead pays Conor millions to return to the octagon, even providing him room on the canvas to promote his new whiskey.
Khabib attacks Danis, his team attacks Conor. Dana is furious. Dana defers to the NSAC for punishment, who chooses to hold Khabib’s purse. White admits that Khabib will not be stripped of his belt, but that his teammates will be booted from the UFC. Days later Khabib declares that he doesn’t care about the money, only his brothers, and if they go, he goes.
Just when it seemed like things couldn’t escalate any further, they went ahead and escalated much further. The UFC tapped out when Conor attacked that bus. They tapped out when Khabib attacked Danis. What will they do now that their new money man, fresh from a visit with Russian president Vladimir Putin, threatens to bounce if they don’t give him what he wants?
History tells us that in four months Dana White will be announcing Khabib’s next championship fight, and in his corner, or on that same card, will be the “brothers” who joined him in the 229-melee. If Conor got the pass, why not Khabib? The current UFC is willing to pay big bucks for big buys, no matter the message it sends to fighters and fans. But as always, you get what you pay for.