UFC president Dana White is less than pleased with bantamweight Merab Dvalishvili’s rejection of a potential title shot. Although Dvalishvili is one of the hottest prospects in the 135-pound division, he has recently asserted that he won’t fight for the title until his training partner and friend, former champ Aljamain Sterling, is out of the division. At a recent Contender series press conference, White tore into Dvalishvili.
“Everybody in this room and everybody that watches this video knows how I feel about this s***. Yeah, I hate it and if that’s… why did you even get into this sport if that’s your mentality in the way that you think? ‘I don’t even want the title, I don’t want the championship. We’re friends, we’re this, we’re that.’
Dana White BLASTS Merab Dvalishvili Over UFC Title Shot Mentality
This is not… you could be friends with everybody in this business. There’s a lot of nice people in this business. A lot of good people. This is not about friendship. It’s about finding out who the best in the world is.
And if you don’t want to find out who the best in the world is this is not the place for you. You should be somewhere else. There’s plenty of places to fight where they don’t give a s*** what you do. Doesn’t work here.”
“Suga” Sean O’Malley claimed the UFC bantamweight title from Aljamain Sterling at UFC 292 via a photo-finish knockout only a few short weeks ago. O’Malley’s star has long been on the rise, and in earning a UFC title, the champ’s stock is more valuable than ever.
Dana White will want to capitalize on the momentum surrounding O’Malley, and book him for a title defense before 2023 is up. Who exactly O’Malley will fight is an interesting question.
Aljamain Sterling has already announced that he will take the rest of the year off, and a hand injury (and his beef with Dana White) will likely keep Merab Dvalishvili out of the Octagon for a while.
O’Malley himself has called out Marlon “Chito” Vera for his first title defense, as Vera is the only fighter on the UFC roster to ever defeat O’Malley.
Perhaps the greatest testament to O’Malley’s rising star power is the UFC’s choice to upload the finish to their YouTube channel immediately after the fight.
“They wanted to put that out that night and they wanted to promote that fight so they did. I think that they obviously saw the star potential in O’Malley that night and I think that opening it up to everyone was like an investment in O’Malley.
I don’t know if that’s the truth, you’d have to ask them that question but that’s why I think they did it.”
