SAN JOSE, Calif. - Let it go. You're not going to win this one against Dana White.
The UFC president continues to hear from some longtime MMA fans what a misstep it was to put just one fight on the UFC's debut on Fox. Last Saturday, during the UFC on Fox postfight, White lashed out at critics and explained why the show was done the way it was done.
He got more of it tonight on Twitter when hundreds of fans asked "imagine if the Dan Henderson-Mauricio Rua classic was on Fox?"
White fired back again during the UFC 139 aftermath.
"If that fight that happened tonight went on FOX for the first time ever, let me tell you what ? I would not be having a good time these last five or six days," White said at the UFC 139 postfight press conference (0:26 mark). "[...] Those of us who are in this room and people who have been watching this for a long time just incredibly appreciate what those two did tonight in there, and you can understand what they went through and what's going on. The rest of the world would go, 'Oh my God. What was that?'"
White said the last thing he needed were kooks coming out of the woodwork to complain about the level of brutality.
"That's not the fight you want for your first time on network television," White said (1:29 mark). [...] The big thing is to go on network television and not have Fox flooded the next day with phone calls saying 'get this [expletive] off of TV.'"
The boss isn't backing away from the stern message he sent hardcore fans following UFC 139.
"I couldn't care less what they think about that fight. I don't care. People are like, 'Oh, you don't care what your fans think?' No, I do not care what you think. That fight had to go the way that it went because none of you guys understand what goes on behind the scenes," said White.
White confirmed the next UFC on Fox show will be in Chicago at the United Center on Jan. 28. It'll be a two hour show featuring four televised fights.
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