Dana White: “It’s not 100 percent Khabib Nurmagomedov will retain his belt”
In what is being revered as the wildest ending ever to a UFC event, that saw Khabib Nurmagomedov hurdle over the octagon and attack Conor McGregor teammate Dillon Danis in the audience shortly after submitting McGregor in the fourth round of the main event at UFC 229 this past Saturday, there could be some serious hell to pay for the reigning UFC lightweight champion.
The chaos increased when both McGregor and Nurmagomedov’s teams stormed the cage leading to a hellacious brawl.
In the midst of the melee, McGregor was apparently attacked from behind by a Nurmagomedov team member.
Once security and police began flooding the cage along with UFC staff including UFC president Dana White himself, the mayhem was eventually stopped as Nurmagomedov was personally escorted from the from the arena to his locker room, forcing Bruce Buffer to make the announcement of his victory without neither him or McGregor being physically present in the octagon due to the madness that just occurred.
At the UFC 229 post fight press conference, Dana White was asked if it was 100 percent certain Nurmagomedov would retain his UFC lightweight championship after the crazy incident that had taken place only moments ago.
“No, it’s not 100 percent,” White said. “The thing is, we’re regulated by the Nevada State Athletic Commission, or whatever state we’re in, right? The Nevada State Athletic Commission is going to go after him, I’m sure pretty hard. He doesn’t have to worry about me right now, he has to worry about Nevada.”
“The Governor [Brian Sandoval] was here tonight,” he said. “The Governor went running out of the building. That’s not good. The Governor running out of the building isn’t good. He’s in trouble.”
After the ruckus was completely settled, White then explained to Nurmagomedov why he was not about to put the title on him on his waste inside the octagon due to the circumstances that would transpire.
“[Khabib] said put my belt on me, and I said no, we’re not going to put the belt on you because I think that the fans are going to go crazy and they’re going to throw stuff in here,” White told the media gathered at the press conference. “And he says, ‘I don’t care. I’m ready for this,’ I said, ‘yeah, but the other 20,000 people that are sitting here and paid for tickets aren’t ready for this.’
“And he said, if I have to be arrested, then I have to be arrested, but I want my belt put on me.’ And then finally, [Daniel] Cormier and [Luke] Rockhold did a great job of helping contain the situation and get him out of there.”
Should Khabib Nurmagomedov by some miracle not suffer any serious consequences, and is able to fight again at a reasonable time table, White stated he’s not sure at the moment who’d be next in line to challenge him.
When asked about Tony Ferguson, who defeated Anthony Pettis via TKO corner stoppage at earlier in the night, White said that was the last thing on his mind.
“I am completely not even thinking about that shit,” he said. “I’m not even thinking about pay-per-views, that’s how messed up I am right now, so yeah, I’m not even thinking about that stuff.”
