UFC boss Dana White 'very happy' rocky 2012 almost over
LAS VEGAS – Almost over.
UFC President Dana White on Thursday said he was "very happy" to see the end of a year that's seen virtually every major fight card altered by injuries.
"We hung in there, and it was still a good year – a lot of milestones for us in 2012," he said during a news conference in support of UFC 155, which takes place Saturday at MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas. "But one of them is also most injuries ever in a year."
White expressed hope that the promotion never has to contend with the spate of withdrawals it did this year, but with another packed schedule in 2013, it's an unlikely prospect.
Indeed, the UFC's first card of the new year already has one injury change on the books (Thiago Perpetuo vs. Michael Kuiper, which was announced Thursday), though the bout is not of the status of several high-profile bouts scrapped in 2011.
Among them: Vitor Belfort vs. Wanderlei Silva, Dominick Cruz vs. Urijah Faber, Jon Jones vs. Dan Henderson, Jose Aldo vs. Frankie Edgar, Shane Carwin vs. Roy Nelson, and countless others.
White today told MMAFighting.com that while the withdrawals did affect the UFC's bottom line, the promotion still had a strong year. And with 2011 seeing its own share of card changes, it wasn't unfamiliar with the problem.
In previous interviews, he has shot down conspiracy theories surrounding the phenomenon, which have pointed to the promotion's accident-insurance policy and fighters simply choosing to report injuries to get out of unfavorable matchups.
UFC 155 pits heavyweight champ Junior Dos Santos (15-1 MMA, 9-0 UFC) against former champ Cain Velasquez (10-1 MMA, 8-1 UFC) in a rematch of a meeting 13 months ago on the UFC's network TV debut, UFC on FOX 1. Questions surrounding this weekend's fight have leaned heavily on a knee injury to Velasquez that conceivably could have dimmed the luster of the promotion's big night.
Velasquez, though, said he wanted to move past that storyline, telling MMAjunkie.com that he wished it "never came out."
White couldn't agree more.