Ilia Topuria is speaking out for the first time about his run-in with Josh Hokit.
During the UFC White House press conference earlier this month prior to UFC 328, Hokit was turning his trash-talking persona to Alex Pereira, which led to the lightweight champ having enough, throwing a cup at Hokit, and having to be separated from the surging heavyweight contender.
In an interview with Alvaro Colmenero, Topuria was asked for this thoughts about the incident.
“I couldn’t believe it,” Topuria said. “I’ve
been at many press conferences, I’ve seen everything. But I’ve never seen anyone stand up and talk about someone’s mother in such a disrespectful way.
“I mean, it was pretty disrespectful. And Alex, at the same time, there was so much noise you couldn’t hear much, and I said I can’t believe he’s saying all this stuff for no reason. Because you’re not even going to fight him. No, no. What for? You can talk about the other’s professionalism, you can go after each other, it’s fine. We’re used to it. We know what we’re in for. But talking about the other’s mother in that way, it made my blood boil.”
Topuria is headlining the White House event in a lightweight title defense against interim champ Justin Gaethje, while Hokit is set to face Derrick Lewis on the card.
For Topuria, it wasn’t the security that needed to keep him from Hokit, but the other way around.
“The cup definitely couldn’t miss,” Topuria said. “Lucky he had so many security people there, because, come on. One of the two was coming out worse off and it wasn’t going to be me.”
In classic Hokit fashion, he responded to Topuria on social media.
“You’d never survive at a middle school lunch table in America then,” Hokit wrote. “You sheltered little boy, I said I’m gonna Chama on his Mama. If that’s so bad, then that begs the question, what does “Chama” even mean.“
