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The first
Ultimate Fighting Championship event at its new home on
Paramount+ is rapidly approaching, with
UFC 324 set to be headlined by Justin
Gaethje-Paddy
Pimblett for the interim lightweight title on Jan. 24 at
T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas. While it wasn’t much of a surprise to
see Gaethje and Pimblett get selected as the contestants for what
will hopefully be a short-lived championship, there were many who
vocalized that Arman
Tsarukyan was more deserving of the opportunity. I’m positive
there were many more who agreed with that sentiment but didn’t
bother piping up, knowing the UFC was going to select the “more
marketable” fighters.
UFC CEO Dana
White recently admitted in an interview that part of the reason
Tsarukyan didn’t get the call was due to his head butt on Dan Hooker at
the ceremonial weigh-ins for their main event in November. Did the
head butt do any actual damage to Hooker? I strongly doubt it. Even
if it did, Hooker wouldn’t be the type to say so, considering his
response to the head butt. “Let’s go. I love it,” he said when
asked about the cheap shot.
In general, I absolutely agree with the UFC’s thought process on
this. Sure, the head butt didn’t seem to hurt Hooker in any
meaningful way and may have even added some fire to the contest.
However, there’s a time and place for violence to take place, and
it isn’t at weigh-ins. Even if it’s a light slap or a push, it
shouldn’t be tolerated. Remember when Jeremy
Stephens shoved Drakkar
Klose? The whiplash injured Klose badly enough that their bout
had to be called off. Klose received a lot of flak for that, but he
wasn’t expecting to be shoved. Any fighter will tell you the
blow—or in this case, the shove—that does the most damage is the
one you don’t see coming. Tsarukyan shouldn’t have had a free pass
to head butt Hooker, which is how it appeared upon first glance. We
now know UFC brass did mete out some form of justice for the
infraction.
Of course, there’s also the example of Conor
McGregor gumming up everything. We all know about McGregor
throwing a dolly at a bus full of fighters, injuring several of
them in the process. McGregor was criminally charged, and the UFC
punished him by granting him a title shot against Khabib
Nurmagomedov. It doesn’t take a genius to see the sarcasm in my
last comment. In fact, McGregor received no punishment at all from
the UFC. I understand McGregor’s stardom was a once-in-a-generation
deal, but that shouldn’t be an excuse when it comes to legal
issues. I’d venture to guess that 90% of other fighters would have
been cut for his actions, and those who managed to survive being
removed from the roster would have faced suspensions. Any regular
fan would know this. Would fighters?
Keep in mind that fighters must be delusional to a degree in order
to find success. In the fight business, you’re far better off not
knowing the odds of your getting knocked out. It explains why
fighters usually seem to have a change in approach after they
suffer their first loss, especially if it occurs in a violent
manner. By no means am I calling fighters stupid. Perhaps I would
be better off calling it an insane degree of self-belief instead of
delusion.
Regardless of what term I use, it doesn’t just infiltrate into how
they believe they’ll fare within a fight. It trickles down to how
they see themselves. When was the last time a fighter said, “I
don’t think I deserve a title shot,” or something to that effect?
I’m sure it has happened somewhere at some point, but I’ve never
heard it. However, they’ll hear White talk about them needing to
“show him something.” Given that those words—or something akin to
them—are frequently uttered to fighters on long winning streaks,
it’s obvious White isn’t just referring to winning fights. They
know the boss wants them to get his attention.
Take someone like Tsarukyan, for example. In his last 11 fights, he
has a single loss on his ledger—a highly controversial decision to
former two-division
Konfrontacja Sztuk Walki champion Mateusz
Gamrot. Media scores favored Tsarukyan by more than a 2-to-1
margin. He had a title fight with Islam
Makhachev lined up in 2025 but pulled out with less than 48
hours’ notice due to injury, and he has been in the doghouse
since.
Tsarukyan knows as much. What can he do to get back in the good
graces of the UFC? He knows he needs to do something that will get
attention. Who was better at getting attention than McGregor? What
would McGregor do in his situation? Tsarukyan knows he isn’t
McGregor in terms of notoriety, but he had been inserted into a
title fight that headlined a pay-per-view. That means he has some
cache, right? A dominant performance probably won’t be enough, but
what if he were to do something that would get people talking
during the weigh-ins? Tsarukyan didn’t get the same type of rewards
McGregor did for less-than-exemplary behavior. He misjudged the
amount of pull he had.
Jon Jones, Conor McGregor Poster Boys for Bad Behavior
To be fair, it’s not like McGregor is the only one who has been
rewarded for bad behavior. The UFC didn’t strip Jon Jones
after he got into a shoving match with Daniel
Cormier at a promotional event. That incident was heavily
promoted. The company didn’t strip him after he tested positive for
cocaine. It arranged a high-profile interview. No, the UFC waited
until he crashed into the vehicle of a pregnant woman and fled the
scene.
I’m not going to say the UFC was wrong in holding Tsarukyan back
from the title fight. He shouldn’t have head butted Hooker. I’m
also not going to say I don’t understand why the UFC gives leeway
to those making the organization the most money. The problem? It
has set up a perverse incentive structure for those looking to
break into the top echelon of stardom by rewarding the likes of
McGregor and Jones.
Perhaps it’s merely the UFC learning its lesson. White recently
said the UFC doesn’t need another McGregor. Of course, we all know
that White says a lot, some of it true, much of it not true.
Regardless, White and the rest of the UFC power brokers should
acknowledge that they created an atmosphere in which Tsarukyan
thought assaulting Hooker would be a good idea. Hopefully, at the
very least, they can apply whatever standard they decide to enforce
consistently.
