Ariel Helwani is taking aim at Dana White after his recent comments on a potential super-fight.
MMA journalist and podcast host Ariel Helwani has not had a good relationship with UFC president Dana White for years. Stemming from some news that Helwani broke before the UFC wanted him to, he and White have had a tumultuous relationship. Helwani hosts a weekly show called The MMA Hour in which he often calls out White for his transgressions. This week Helwani is taking aim at White over comments he made regarding a possible super fight between champion Jon Jones and boxing champion Tyson Fury.
Last week Jones and Fury were going back and forth on social media calling each other out to see who is the biggest and the baddest. Fury invited Jones into the boxing ring and Jones counteroffered calling for an MMA fight. White is now very interested in making this happen if both parties can come to an agreement, the only problem is Helwani finds this offer to be exactly contradictory to his recent comments about not wanting to put on “gimmicky fights“
Ariel Helwani slams Dana White’s promotion of a fight between Jon Jones and Tyson Fury
Helwani took a video of White saying he was not interested in putting on fights that were considered “gimmicks” and then three days later pointing out that he would be interested in having the boxer, Fury fight his champion, Jones. Helwani pointed out the flaws in White’s logic on a recent episode of The MMA Hour.
“It’s a walking contradiction at this point and anyone who’s falling for it is just being played,” Helwani said. “He thinks that you are falling for it and you are being played if you are falling for it…it’s just absurd to say that boxing is just putting on gimmicky fights right now, same as it is absurd to say that you could be the guy to fix boxing. When you know dudes like Garcia and Tank and Spence and Crawford are all going to get paid an incredible amount of money to fight. The best part about that is he’s dismissing a fight like Joshua vs. Francis, which features you know, the lineal heavyweight champion of the world. The guy who you know held the belt in the UFC not that long ago.”
Not only did Helwani think White’s comments were ridiculous, but he also called out the UFC president for running with his own narrative. He even took responsibility for making Conor McGregor vs Floyd Mayweather happened back in 2017. Helwani didn’t believe that either and asked the question of why is White so interested in Fury vs. Jones when he laughs off the possibility of Francis Ngannou taking on one of the other big-name boxers.
“I will make that happen? Did you hear what he said? I thought they don’t do those fights there. What’s the difference between Tyson and Jones? Joshua and Francis? Nothing Well, I guess the big difference is you don’t have the rights to promote a Francis fight anymore. That’s it, but ‘I will make that happen.’ Look at the excitement, the offer to Tyson, ‘call me up. Let’s make it happen.’ What changed? What’s the difference? Nothing changed. Hypocrisy.”
The fact is that White will do or say pretty much anything in order to promote the UFC. He has been known to bend the truth or straight out lie to get deals done. He often fabricates numbers and situations and Helwani very rarely lets him get away with it, in his case as well.
