The war of words because UFC’s Dana White and celebrity boxer Jake Paul probably isn’t going to stop any time soon, as White has thrown another shot toward Paul.
“I got a challenge for Jake Paul. This guy keeps saying that I’m a coke head, right? He can randomly cocaine test me for the next 10 years, if I can randomly steroid test him for the next two,” White said in an interview on The FIGHT with Teddy Atlas.
Paul, of course, has said that about White, and has also heavily criticized White’s treatment of UFC contracted fighters and the pay scales those fighters operate under, which is not a criticism unique to Paul, he’s just somebody with a big megaphone when he brings it up. None of that was discussed any further and that’s mostly just a thing for splashy headlines, but White did discuss some other boxing topics in the interview.
On the state of the boxing business
“When me and my partners got into this 20 years ago, our goal and what has remained my goal, is to build this sport into the biggest sport in the world. 15 years ago, people thought I was nuts when I was saying that. But look at what we’ve done. Look at what we’re doing. That’s never been the goal of boxing. Every time they put on a fight, it’s like a going out of business sale. ‘How much money can we steal from everybody?’ And every time you turn off the TV, you’re pissed off that you stayed home on Saturday and watched the fight. You wish you’d done something else.”
“(They) don’t even care if the fans are happy with the product. Because that guy isn’t going to fight for another year again anyway, and everybody will forget how shitty this fight was and they’ll buy the next one.”
On White possibly revisiting previously stated plans to enter boxing
“I’m still kicking the tires and looking around. It’s a very complicated — you know, the sport’s such a mess. It’s literally a mess. And, uh, to pull it off, you have to actually get in there and clean it up. I’ve been working on this for years. And, uh, I don’t know. We’ll see what happens.”
On Showtime’s Stephen Espinosa’s confrontation with Conor McGregor in 2017
“It was incredible. Conor sniffed that guy out in one day. We had a stop up in — I think we went to Toronto, then I think the next one, he had figured that guy out. Could you have nailed it any better? Not only is he a weasel, he looks exactly like a weasel.”
On White’s feud with Oscar De La Hoya
“(Nurmagomedov) just started his own promotion and I said, listen, Khabib has no idea but he’s gonna know, you’re gonna learn what it’s like to be a promoter. Then De La Hoya comes up and goes, ‘Ah, Khabib, it’s easy.’ Yeah, it’s easy (for you), you don’t fuckin’ do anything! You lost every fighter you ever fuckin’ had and you literally do nothing. Of course it’s fuckin’ easy! You don’t do anything! Yeah, you’ve advanced the sport of boxing big-time, Oscar. I’m done, I didn’t even want to — I left it alone, it’s just embarrassing at this point.”