“UFC officially washed” – Fight Night card quality feat. Marvin Vettori attracts huge criticism for Dana White

As the world’s biggest MMA promotion, the UFC enjoys a massive global following, attracting millions of fight fans. As UFC CEO, Dana White is responsible for delivering top-tier MMA action regularly, ensuring fans are entertained with exciting matchups. However, the upcoming Fight Night featuring Marvin Vettori has not generated the excitement fans expected, leaving many disappointed.

The promotion recently announced the main card of UFC Apex 104, headlined by Marvin Vettori and Roman Dolidze. Other than that, in the co-main event, Chidi Njokuani and Elizeu Zaleski dos Santos will fight each other in a welterweight bout. The fight card doesn’t have any big names, which is not what many fans had expected. 

Vettori is making his UFC comeback after a whopping 20 months hiatus. The ‘Italian Dream’ is a former UFC middleweight title contender, who is currently the #8 ranked fighter in the division. His last fight was against Jared Cannonier where he lost via unanimous decision.

It’s time to have this conversation…

The UFC is officially washed pic.twitter.com/3Sjx1Z37Wr

— Super Fan🇮🇪 (@McGregorRousey2) March 11, 2025

It will be his second fight against Dolidze as he won the first fight at UFC 286. Nevertheless, the fight doesn’t seem to excite fight fans who recently experienced the stacked fight card of UFC 313. The event will take place inside the UFC Apex in Las Vegas, which already has a negative reputation.

Fight fans react to underwhelming fight card featuring Marvin Vettori 

Dana White has always focused on giving fans the best fight cards and is himself quite strict about boring fights. The CEO doesn’t shy away from publicly criticising fighters who don’t go for finishes. Recently, he showed similar disappointment in the main event bout between Alex Pereira and Magomed Ankalaev. 

Marvin Vettori isn’t known for his finishing abilities and has been accused of taking safer routes in fights. Similarly to him, other fighters in the upcoming card are also not that popular. While there is a chance that the card might surprise everybody, for now, however, things are not looking good. 

The fights r fun but nobody is gonna watch it bc of name value. I seriously don’t get why the UFC does this.

— RAWDOGJOHNSON (@RAWDOGJ0HN) March 11, 2025

Been washed ever since the ESPN deal and after the Contender’s series fighters became 75% of the UFC roster

— Tennis + UFC (@TennisAndUFC) March 11, 2025

Alex being dethroned is like the last nail in the coffin. It will be a while before the UFC is consistently entertaining again. I've already been watching UFC news less

— GT (@GT9148828680195) March 11, 2025

UFC product was peak from 2014-2021 ish.

Now its on the decline. Still great, but missing the magic that it once had.

Get rid of the apex, and its okay to slightly lower the quality of a PPV to give better fight nights

— Tak 🕊️ (@TheTakMaeda) March 11, 2025

Card ain’t even that bad yall just expect championship fighters every single week and fight nights like these will typically have hidden bangers

— Testiclaps_ (@CouchesLLC) March 11, 2025

@danawhite retire

— Salvare 🛰 (@SE_Investing) March 12, 2025

Come on, bro. Just two weeks ago, they announced a ton of hitters. 😆 The problem is we have too many cards. Personally, I don’t mind only having a decent main and co-main each week, no matter what, and always having the PPV stacked top to bottom.

— Da Cake (@SlipsterOG) March 11, 2025

Featuring not more than one big name seems to have upset the MMA community. The lack of promotion or even fighter talking trash remains scarce. Only popular names in the UFC resort to trash-talks to sell fights. As such, fans don’t like it when lower mid-card talents gets the spotlight in Apex Fight Nights.

How important is trash talking to sell fights in UFC?

Underwhelming fight cards such as this highlight the much more importance of fighters who use trash talking to sell fights. Former UFC champion Sean Strickland is a great example of a fighter who has utilized it to the fullest. The American fighter has repeatedly given decision fights but his persona outside the octagon attracted millions of fans.

Someone like Conor McGregor, who has built his whole career trash talking his opponents, also enjoys a similar hype. Despite being inactive for years, the ‘Notorious’ is still making headlines. While there are superstars such as Alex Pereira who don’t speak much but they attract fans via their fighting style. In order to survive in the UFC, all fighters may need to pick a strategy and work with it.

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