Dana White confirms he is serious about moving into boxing as Eddie Hearn playfully warns the UFC chief to ‘go away’
UFC president Dana White has confirmed he was seriously considering making a move into boxing before the outbreak of COVID-19.
In fact, the 50-year-old had even constructed offices in Las Vegas complete with a ‘War Room’ to start making fights.
Dana White teased a move into boxing which Eddie Hearn playfully dismissed
Although White has helped transform the UFC into the premier MMA organisation in the world and a billion-dollar powerhouse, his first love was always boxing.
A huge fan of both Mike Tyson and Muhammad Ali, White has always maintained he would enter the world of pugilism with his company Zuffa Boxing.
However, the outbreak of coronavirus put pay to those plans and he confirmed to Matchroom Boxing chief Eddie Hearn he was now solely focused on the UFC after finally getting the opportunity to put fights on at the Apex in the Performance Institute.
“So about four, five, six months ago or whatever it was, I was talking about boxing,” White said on the Talk the Talk podcast with Tony Bellew.
White has so far put on several UFC shows without fans during the coronavirus crisis
Eddie Hearn wants to work with Dana White on boxing/MMA fight night
“I was poking around, looking at boxing and doing all this stuff. I actually built offices over here [Las Vegas] for boxing.
“I have built another ‘War Room’ over there and then the pandemic.
“I mean, who the hell could see that coming right now? Now I am fighting to get live gates back, now I’m trying to figure out how we run our business.
“I just got the ability to do fights in my own arena, that I built next door here. We all have bigger problems right now, but these are the times where I become more aggressive.
“F****** everything else was on cruise control before and I was looking at boxing and goofing around. I am hyper-focused right now on my business and how I can get this thing back.
“How do we take this thing to the next level while all this is going on?”
When White maintained he had his ‘own f****** problems to deal with right now’, Hearn had a cheeky response to the Las Vegas native.
“Good, don’t come into boxing – stay away!”, the Matchroom chief replied with a chuckle.
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