Den gångna helgen mötte de två veteranerna Chuck Liddell och Tito Ortiz i ett tredje möte, vilket slutade med att Liddell knockades redan i första ronden. Det hela anordnades av proffsboxaren Oscar De Lay Hoya under hans egna ’Golden Boy Promotions’.
Matchningen hade fått mycket kritik då Liddell närmar sig 50 år medan Ortiz är 43 år. Han har även varit pensionerad från sporten sedan 2010 och innan detta förlorade han 3 matcher via knockout, samt 5 förluster i de senaste 6 matcherna.
UFC:s VD Dana White riktar skarp kritik mot De La Hoya för att han lät matchningen bli av.
Via ’UFC Unfiltered’:
I love Chuck Liddell and I don’t ever want to bad mouth Chuck Liddell. People even think I’m remotely bad mouthing Chuck Liddell, but the reality is — first of all, I heard last week the cokehead ‘Oscar De La Weirdo’ is talking shit that I don’t have any place to tell guys when to retire. First of all, it’s called ‘friendship’ you f*cking cokehead. I’ve been friends with Chuck Liddell for 20 years and the reality is that Chuck Liddell retired when he should have retired. Eight, nine years ago, however long it was. And Chuck Liddell’s almost 50 years old and has no business fighting anymore. The fact that the state of California even let that fight happen is disgusting. Disgusting.
Chuck Liddell has an incredible legacy. He’s a huge superstar in this sport, so of course as a friend, anybody who claims to be a friend of Chuck Liddell and was anywhere near this fight is full of shit. They’re not a friend of Chuck Liddell. To let him go in and fight this fight is terrible.
White är medveten om att Liddell har friheten att göra sina egna val och kommer ihåg hur svårt det var att övertala honom att gå i pension 2010. När det pratades om den nya matchningen berättade WHite att han skulle bli besviken om man genomförde den.
The problem is Chuck Liddell was a fighter. Chuck Liddell loves to fight, that’s his passion, it’s what he loves in life. But there comes a day and age, fighting is a young man’s game. You can’t do it. And Oscar f*king De La Hoya says, ‘Oh, come over to Golden Boy where we respect the fighters and it makes me sick what these fighters were paid’ and all this shit. Out of 14 fights on the card, five bouts were amateur fights. Which means he didn’t pay them jack shit, right? And 12 of the professional fighters on the card made less than [$3,000 show and $3,000 to win]. What the f*ck are you talking about you cokehead junkie?
Some of the guys on the card made $1,000 and $1,000. And he respects the fighters so much, he couldn’t remember their f*king names at the press conference.
Det återstår att se hur mycket mötet mellan de två drog in. Enligt De La Hoya gick biljettförsäljningen bra, men White tror inte att det kommer att visa sig ha varit särskilt lönsamt.
Tito and ‘Oscar De La Dummy’ were made for each other. First of all, Tito says, ‘Hey, you guys want to get paid. Come over to Golden Boy MMA.’ Are you kidding me? Wait a couple of months until this whole thing pans out. Everybody’s going to be suing everybody in a couple of months. There was no money made over there. De La Hoya’s a moron. An absolute moron. And I don’t know how Chuck allowed himself to be talked into this stupid shit.
I hope somebody talks De La Hoya into fighting again. I hope the state of California makes the fight and I hope he gets f*cking knocked out just like Chuck Liddell did in the first round. F*cking cokehead nutball.
Mötet har även kritiserats starkt av fightern och MMA-personligheten Chael Sonnen.
Håller ni med om Whites åsikter gällande mötet?