Dana White Claims He Used To Beat The Sh*t Out Of Tito Ortiz
(Ortiz and White pictured here, most probably discussing the economic climate in the far east)
UFC President Dana White is never short of a few words when it comes to former Light-Heavyweight champion Tito Ortiz. ‘The Huntington Beach Bad Boy’ used to be the poster boy for the promotion, and was one of the most dominant fighters in his prime.
Fast forward to present day and Ortiz has only one win since 2006, recently got pinged for a DUI and is awaiting his debut for Bellator. Needless to say, White still has plenty to say about Ortiz, especially regarding the boxing match that Ortiz had challenged DW to. Legend goes that Tito called out White for a public boxing match, but bottled it last minute and no showed the weigh ins. White explained on a recent media tour for ‘The Fighters’:
“The reality is, with me Tito knew, Tito knew… Tito had Jenna Jameson call like two weeks before the fight negotiating that he wanted to switch it to no head gear — cause this was supposed to be an amateur fight — so he wanted to switch to no head gear. I said fine, we can go no head gear. He wanted to switch to 8 ounce gloves. I said okay, we can do 8 ounce gloves.”
White used to be a pretty handy amateur boxer, whereas Tito was a wrestler in MMA. Tito’s striking, in boxing terms, was probably below par compared to that of an amateur boxer. White believes that this reason alone is why Ortiz chose not to fight.
“The reality is I used to beat the living sh*t out of Tito Ortiz, back when we first bought this company and we used to box. Now if Tito would have made this an MMA fight, I would have never said yes because Tito would murder me. He would double-leg me, elbow my face off and rip my head right off my shoulders in an MMA fight. That’s not what he asked for. He asked for a boxing match with me, and I would’ve beat the living shit out of Tito, and he knows it and that’s why he didn’t do it.”
Whether White would have beaten Ortiz on that day is unknown, but all the facts point towards a pretty humiliating experience for Ortiz, had he shown up. Currently embroiled in a ton of legal battles and riddled with more injuries than ever, is it time for the former 205lb. boss to call it quits?
