LAS VEGAS – UFC CEO Dana White is adamant that he doesn't even try to influence anyone's opinion.
Former two-division UFC champion Alex Pereira accused Daniel Cormier of being told by the UFC to promote Ciryl Gane vs. Josh Hokit over a Gane vs. Pereira rematch.
Cormier denied Pereira's claim and said, after "Poatan" was finished by Gane at UFC Freedom 250, an immediate rematch would be a hard sell.
"Of course that's not true," White told MMA Junkie and other reporters at a DWCS 96 post-fight news conference. "These guys are the most paranoid people on the planet. I've never told DC (Cormier) to do anything, ever. It doesn't work like that. We don't operate like that. We've got over 700 guys under contract. We talk about two of them being sideways
right now. This is normal when you're in this business.
"First of all, I've never told Rogan or DC or any of these guys to say anything about anybody. As a longtime fan of the fight business, I actually can't stand the commentators saying negative things about fighters or anything like that, but I don't tell anybody what to say. I don't tell the fighters what to say. I don't tell the commentators what to say. This thing just all plays out organically in the way that the fights are called and whatever they say when they walk out of here and interview with you guys tonight. We don't police any of that stuff. If we did, Sean Strickland would have been gone three f*cking years ago, and we wouldn't even be having this conversation."
Gane (14-2 MMA, 11-2 UFC) defends his heavyweight title against Hokit (10-0 MMA, 4-0 UFC) in the UFC 334 main event on Nov. 14 at Madison Square Garden in New York. Meanwhile, Pereira (13-4 MMA, 10-3 UFC) takes on Sergei Pavlovich (20-3 MMA, 9-3 UFC) in a five-round bout in the UFC 335 co-headliner on Dec. 12 from T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.
This article originally appeared on MMA Junkie: Dana White takes umbrage with Alex Pereira's accusation against Daniel Cormier
