“Never gave me a f***** chance” – Luke Rockhold explains his RESENTMENT towards UFC President Dana White
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Luke Rockhold and Dana White
Last weekend fight fans witnessed the former UFC champion Luke Rockhold fight for the last time in the octagon. Although he is happy with his decision to retire, the former champion didn’t hold back in the pre-fight media interaction. The former champion shared his thoughts on fighter pay and his voiced his disappointment with Dana White.
In a recent interview with Ariel Helwani on the MMA Hour, the former champion explained his beef with the UFC President. Before going into his recent co-main event Middleweight bout with Paulo Costa, the former champion voiced his dissatisfaction with the promotion. He went off on the UFC President and how he runs the promotion.
Rockhold was on a 2 fight-losing skid coming into the bout at UFC 278 after a 3-year break. Although he didn’t win the fight against the Eraser the former champion is happy with his performance. The former champion also stated that he is one of the underappreciated champions in the promotions.
Although he came up short in the final fight of his carrier, the former Strikeforce champion was satisfied with how things unfolded. In the interview with Helwani, the former champion voiced his disappointment with how he was treated by the promotion. According to him the reason for his beef goes back farther than just the recent years since UFC was purchased by WME-IMG.
Luke Rockhold claims that Dana White controls the narrative of what the public perceives
In the interview, Luke discussed the favourite moments of his career, his performance at UFC 278, the altitude and his broken nose during the fight, his beef with Dana White, what Daniel Cormier said to him after the fight, why he rubbed blood all over Paulo Costa, and Jake Paul’s comments.
While talking about his performance in the co-main event last weekend, the former middleweight champion went off on the UFC President, “It’s f*cked up, It’s f*cked up to say, ‘Why do you think I’m so mad at Dana?’ Because Dana never gave me a chance. From the moment I came in the UFC, he never gave me a f*cking chance. Wrote me off, never highlighted my years in Strikeforce or anything I did on the wins, only my losses.”
Rockhold believes he wasn’t treated appropriately and stated, “Dana White controls the narrative of what the public perceives. And you know, it’s like, he f*cked me from the start. It took me 16, 17 years to come back into a fight like that to earn my respect. Nothing I did in the past mattered till now?”
“Alright. That’s why I feel the way I feel sometimes, you know? And that’s why I say the things I say. You got to understand the power that you have in that situation, the narrative that you create. The public believes what they want to believe and what you tell them to believe.” the former champion added.
Rockhold crossed over to UFC when Strikeforce was bought out in 2013 by the promotion. He goes down as one of the Middleweight division’s more underappreciated talents in history. What are your thoughts on this beef between the two? Let us know in the comments below.
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Abhijit Singh
(125 Articles Published)