Zuffa Boxing promoter Dana White recently joined iFL TV to discuss this weekend’s boxing card headlined by Jai Opetaia, while giving some cryptic insight into why he likes his company being a mysterious new force in the industry. Check out some of what he had to say below with the full video in the link at the top.
White on Zuffa Boxing’s ambitions
“I like that people don’t understand what we’re doing. If you notice that when we were launching I didn’t talk a lot, I didn’t say a lot of things…My thing is ‘how about you judge us at the
end of the year on the body of work we do in boxing.’ That’s where I’m at with this whole thing. I don’t have a set plan of where I’m like ‘we’re only going to do this, this, and this.’ I get into these types of businesses and what I want to do is put on the best fights I possibly can with the best fighters I can. As far as the sanctioning bodies go, and all these other things, it’s all a work in progress.”
On whether Zuffa’s belt will be on the line in Jai Opetaia’s fight
“Yes.”
On whether that means the IBF title won’t be on the line
“Anything is possible. Everything is open and anything is possible…We’ve done three fights and the world is losing its mind. There are a lot of forces out there that would love to work against us so the less everybody knows, the better it is.
“If you look at my body of work over the last 25 years…how in the f-ck are you going to underestimate me, right?!…I get it, [other promoters] got egos and they’ve been around and think they know everything and nobody else knows anything. But underestimating me and my team coming into this is one of the dumbest things you could ever do, but I don’t think anybody that’s run boxing over the last however many years is looking towards the future or how to build the business. They live fight to fight off scraps.”
On his beef with Eddie Hearn
“It’s not personal. I like Eddie. I don’t dislike Eddie but…nobody can deny that he’s been acting like a p-ssy for the last couple months. It’s been crazy. And to be honest with you, when I got into this I wasn’t going to mess with Eddie Hearn at all and then Eddie uncharacteristically comes out and just starts going crazy and saying all this stuff.”
On signing Conor Benn
“I want anybody that anybody might perceive could be the best or might win a world title…”
