After UFC 229 Brawl Fiasco, Time for UFC to Enact Code of Conduct
By CASSANDRA COUSINEAU
LVSportsBiz.com
UFC 229, headlined by Khabib Nurmagomedov vs Conor McGregor, will be recorded Saturday night as the biggest fight in UFC history. It will also go down for having one of the most unfathomable endings in any combat sport hosted in Las Vegas. Perhaps it ranks just behind “Bite Fight”, Holyfield-Tyson 2, in its completely unexpected turn of events.
Nurmagomedov is UFC’s newest 155-pound virtuoso. He was brilliant from the opening bell, punishing his opponent for the better part of three rounds. McGregor’s two years off showed. Although his takedown defense was decent, the Irishman’s wrestling took a dip from his last UFC victory over Nick Diaz in August of 2016.
The fight was eventually stopped in the fourth round when the best lightweight in the world forced McGregor to tap out via a rear-naked choke. In most fights, that’s it. A winner is declared and belts are either retained or relinquished. Not this time.
Khabib had to be pushed off a spent McGregor and restrained by referee Herb Dean. The fight wasn’t over.
The 27-0 champion then responded to a nasty barrage of verbal taunting from McGregor’s corner. Before a robust security detail could scramble into place, Khabib threw his mouthpiece and within seconds hurdled the top of the Octagon. McGregor’s good friend and jiu-jitsu coach, Dillon Danis was in the cross hairs of a shouting match and flying front kick.
There’s a famous line said by Prop Joe, a character from HBO’s acclaimed series, The Wire. “Every man gotta have a code.” For cage fighters, a code to compete, behave, and win or lose by is necessary to manage egos and prevent disruptions.
The fight game has a long history of bravado, both in and outside of the ring. Animosity sells tickets. Still, a fighter’s code is a thin, oft unidentified line of demarcation between gamesmanship and the path of diminishing returns.
In this case, the latter was mapped out by UFC’s head honcho Dana White’s complicit shoulder shrugs and smirks as McGregor hurled metal gates and insults leading up to this fight.
“This is some street (expletive), White said. “This isn’t sport.”
No, it wasn’t sport for Khabib to pop out into the audience, and jeopardize the health of fans while members of his corner went to work on McGregor in the ring.
But McGregor’s shtick of ethnic jokes, swipes at Khabib’s Dagestan roots, and even pejorative comments about the man’s family had little to do with sport either. This wasn’t business or promotion for a sport event. It was personal.
A still amped up Nurmagomedov appeared briefly in front of reporters after the fight show that drew more than 20,000 fans to T-Mobile Arena and apologized to the Nevada State Athletic Commission. But he explained why those McGregor comments were personal.
“This is respect sport,” he said. “This is not a trash talking sport. I want to change this game. I don’t want people talk (expletive) about opponents, his father, religion. You cannot talk about religion, nation.”
He later posted on his Instagram page (translated from Russian), “This is certainly not what father taught me, but it was a matter of honor.”
For Nurmagomedov, religion and country are not smack — or “mean talk,” as UFC ringmaster White put it. We can’t pretend that making incendiary statements don’t have consequences. These words and type of behavior can prove deadly where he comes from. As Cormier put it in his tweet, “Diff culture man.”
But White didn’t see it that way after UFC 229. “I should feel a lot better right now than I do,” White said during the press conference in a media tent packed with sports reporters.
We can’t be incredulous when men paid to beat people up for a living resort to violence to settle disputes.
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However, this was the Octagon’s equivalent to the Malice in the Palace.
Since the notorious pro basketball melee in Indiana, the NBA and all other major sports in the U.S. have identified and enforced a code of conduct for athletes to deter contact with spectators.
It’s time for UFC to do the same.
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