UFC APEX – UFC CEO Dana White told reporters after DWCS that the UFC landed at The Sphere on Mexican Independence weekend because the MGM announced the date for the Canelo Alvarez card.
“Look, I paid tribute to Al Haymon. He slipped in before the end of the weekend and canceled the date without MGM telling us,” White told reporters at his post-fight press conference on Tuesday night.
“I told you. Bill Hornbuckle is trying to fix the whole thing. That’s why he gave me the sphere this year. Sure, we’ll get it done.”
Haymon runs Haymon Sports LLC, which founded Premiere Boxing Championships (PBC), which has signed Alvarez for three fights, including the Sept. 14 fight against Edgar Berlanga, which takes place the same night as UFC 306, also known as Noche UFC.
White has a problem with MGM, the operator of the T-Mobile Arena, and called the relationship disrespectful.
“When I say MGM, I mean the people who run the arena, who have treated us with disrespect literally since day one of our relationship. So Bill Hornbuckle, the guy who runs MGM, now had to step in and try to solve the problem. That’s how I ended up with The Sphere,” he said.
“This is a one-hit. We’re going to come back with MGM and hopefully Bill can work things out between us and the damn guys who run the arena.”
MGM not only secures the date in the arena, but also guarantees entry for the Alvarez-Berlanga card.
“Extra kick in the balls? Yes, that’s what they do. That’s what these guys have been doing for many years. It’s fucking crazy,” White said.
“There’s a documentary coming out. I explain all this crap in it. You’ll hear every detail about what’s happened to us and the MGM over the last 23 years. It’s fucking crazy. You’ll be like, ‘What?'”
The relationship seems to have suffered from a crisis from day one.
“I just think the guy who runs the arena has been a complete asshole to us for 23 years,” he said.
White said he tried to get the date after Noche UFC in 2023, but was told it was already sold out.
“They got the date. After that event, I told my friend Pete, ‘Secure that date again for next year.’ It was already gone. They never called us, never asked, never said, ‘Hey, we’re giving the date away.’ They never said, ‘Fuck you.’ They never said anything. We called and the date was already gone,” he said.
“Look, Haymon and Canelo are just doing their thing. Respect to them. Good for them that you guys could actually sneak in and steal our date like that, without a phone call, without anything, good for you. I would do that too if I could.”
When White said Hornbuckle was working to mend the relationship between MGM and the UFC, the obvious question was whether there was an opportunity for the promoter to move on to other tasks.
“Our contract will expire at some point and we need to sort that out,” he said.
As Noche UFC and Alvarez-Berlanga draw closer, fans and media alike are asking who will win the weekend. White was unsure who would put up the bigger numbers on Mexican Independence weekend.
“Who knows. MGM guarantees the tickets. Who knows what the tickets are really going to be. What I’m focused on this weekend is putting on a show that nobody has ever seen before. This show is so complex and there are so many different moving parts that everything is seamless and happens the way I want it to. That’s what I’m focused on more than any of this other MGM nonsense,” White said.
Noche UFC takes place on September 14th at The Sphere. The headliner will be UFC bantamweight champion Sean O’Malley defending his title against Merab Dvalishvili. The co-headliner is the trilogy between flyweight champion Alexa Grasso and former champion Valentina Shevchenko.
