On a night packed with controversy and talking points, UFC president Dana White arrived at the UFC 259 post-fight press conference with a bee in his bonnet, but the target of his ire came as a slight surprise.
White revealed his desire to book a swift rematch after the controversial finish to the Petr Yan vs. Aljamain Sterling fight and discussed the situation surrounding the UFC’s virtually non-existent women’s featherweight division. But the UFC boss was most animated when he railed against the increase in 10-8 rounds scored by judges in the current climate following Jan Blachowicz’s win over Israel Adesanya in the night’s main event.
These guys are giving out 10-8 rounds like f*cking … There’s two rounds in that fight they gave a 10-8. Now, when I came up in the fight business, a 10-8 was an ass-whooping. You got your ass whooped. You didn’t do sh*t in that round and got beat down if that was a 10-8. They’ve gotta stop giving this. … This 10-8 sh*t is out of control right now, so hopefully we can get this fixed. They’re going to screw up a lot of fights if they’re handing out 10-8s like that. There was no 10-8 in that fight.
But is this “10-8 sh*t” really “out of control?” Were White’s comments an overreaction, or on the money?
We put White’s statement to our panel on this week’s episode of our rapid-fire reaction show Spinning Back Clique as MMA Junkie’s Mike Bohn, Farah Hannoun, and Brian “Goze” Garcia weighed in. You can also watch the full episode below.
