By Alan Snel and Cassandra Cousineau
LVSportsBiz.com
Listen to the entire Dana White podcast here.
Dana White will partner with Lorenzo and Frank Fertitta if the brothers buy an NFL team and the blunt-talking UFC president implied he and the Fertitta brothers were out-bid by Fertitta cousin Tilman Fertitta in the purchase of the Houston Rockets in 2017.
White sat down with LVSportsBiz.com Tuesday evening as part of the news site’s four-podcast series to celebrate the site’s second anniversary.
White unleashed his well-known candor on a variety of subjects, from serious business deals like Las Vegas-based UFC being purchased for $4.2 billion in mid-2016 (and the suitors who tried to purchase the world’s biggest MMA fight show organization) to silly stuff like promoting a fight event if celebrities Justin Bieber and Tom Cruise actually are serious about fighting each other in a UFC-style cage match. Here’s White chatting about pulling together a Bieber-Cruise cage match:
Here’s White discussing the Fertittas and his willingness to join them on buying an NFL team:
White said before he joined the Fertitta brothers in buying UFC in 2001, he made $360,000 a year with his training businessss and gyms. In fact, people still come up to White these days and recount stories of him training them during White’s pre-UFC days.
Then there’s White’s friendship with President Donald Trump. White recalled Trump reached out to him to host a UFC fight show at Trump’s Taj Mahal in New Jersey. More here on White discussing Trump:
White also discussed international expansion as UFC continues to make Asia a key destination for the promotion backed up by the investment of a $13 million training center in China. The 93,000-square-foot UFC Performance Institute Shanghai will be three times the size of UFC’s original at the Las Vegas headquarters off the 215 beltway in the southwest valley. The soon-to-be-largest MMA training facility in the world will feature a gym, sparring areas, recovery pools, and its very own octagon.
White said the center will “help train China’s next generation of MMA fighters and spread the sport throughout the country.” There are currently 11 Chinese fighters on the company’s roster including strawweight contender Weili Zhang.
After hinting of the match-up earlier in the week, White confirmed on the LVSportsBiz podcast that Zhang would challenge newly crowned champion, Jessica Andrade, for the 115-pound belt on Aug. 31 in Shenzhen. It will be the first time a Chinese athlete has ever challenged for a UFC title.
“We talk about the American Dream- something that is definitely real. For a person like Zhang that just doesn’t exist where she comes from. She’s undeniable though. This woman is a fighter in every sense of the word,” White said of the powerful rising star. Here’s White discussing China:
Zhang is currently riding a 19 fight win streak dating back to 2014, winning all three of her UFC fights after making her debut just nine months go.
The Shenzhen card will be just the third trip to Mainland China in three years for the promotion and part of a larger international footprint which includes UFC Africa, three sites in Mexico, and a future location in Puerto Rico.
White also mentioned that it’s going to be tough getting UFC star and quick-talking hell-raiser Conor McGregor in the octagaon because “Conor is super rich. It’s hard to get guys to fight when they’re super rich.”
White also acknowledged the Irishman would like a piece of UFC, though White noted, “I don’t think he wants to buy” that share of UFC. Endeavor, which recently filed documents to go public, owns UFC.
White recalled that hedge funds and networks looked at buying UFC in 2016, with offers coming from from $3.7 billion-$5 billion. “The Fertittas were not going to take less than $4.2 billion,” White said.
It’s no secret the Fertittas covet and NFL team, and they sniffed around the Carolina Panthers, said White, noting the Broncos and Chargers might be on the market.
He said his life didn’t drastically change when UFC sold for more than $4 billion. But White did say he bought out his neighbors’ homes in Las Vegas to tear them down and “I did build a ridiculous house.”
Click the podcast to listen to more of White’s observations on UFC.
Here’s one of White’s most well-known and often-told stories on how he got muscled out of Boston.
The LVSportsBiz.com podcast series is presented by sponsor AdoreOil and produced at the studios of Guerilla Cross Radio in downtown Las Vegas. Mike Dixon provided podcast photography.
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