Two weeks ago, UFC President Dana White still was not sure who would coach the 13th season of “The Ultimate Fighter.”
“We were sitting there, working on this thing for such a long time,” White said on a Tuesday media conference call. “At the press conferences, everybody kept asking me. I said, ‘I’m behind the eight-ball. I should’ve had this done already.’”
With the show scheduled to go into production in late January, time was running short for the promotion to attach a pair of big-name fighters to the season. Then, one day, it came to White.
“There were a lot of different people we were looking at and then, boom, Cain Velasquez gets hurt,” said White. “I was literally driving to work one morning and I said, ‘You know what? This makes sense. Let’s see if we can do this.’”
Enter former heavyweight ace Brock Lesnar and top contender Junior dos Santos, who was next in line for a title shot before champion Velasquez was sidelined with a rotator cuff injury. With dos Santos riding a white-hot, six-fight Octagon win streak -- including wins over top-tier heavyweights Fabricio Werdum and Roy Nelson -- White said it made little sense for either the fighter or the promotion to have the Brazilian out of action for six to eight months.
“To put this guy on the shelf for a long time is ridiculous, and much credit to him for not wanting to go on the shelf,” said White. “We’ve seen guys who have been in similar situations that say, ‘You know what? I’ll just sit out and wait.’ Sitting out and waiting is insane.”
While getting dos Santos on board may have been relatively painless, the UFC executive could not say the same about the notoriously curmudgeonly Lesnar.
“In dealing with Brock, one minute, he can be into something, and the next minute, he can completely be not into something,” White explained. “I’m already prepared for this, mentally, and it’s gonna be a tough season. I know it is.”
After Lesnar had his heavyweight crown taken by Velasquez in a brutal October drubbing, rumors swirled that the former NCAA Division I wrestling champion was looking to retire from MMA and possibly return to pro-wrestling.
“None of that was true,” White said. “Obviously, I was in communication with Brock and his team, and talking to them the whole time... There was no wheeling and dealing about the WWE. I think everybody knows how I feel about that. He’s under contract with me.”
Though Lesnar has only three years and seven bouts’ worth of MMA experience, White bristled at the notion that the 33-year-old was unsuited to the task of coaching on the reality program, which premieres March 30 on Spike TV.
“The guy’s a former world champion, has beat guys and held the title. No matter what his record is, what the guy has accomplished in the short amount of time that he’s been in MMA is incredible,” White said. “To say the guy doesn’t have the credentials to coach ‘The Ultimate Fighter’ is probably one of the dumbest things I’ve ever heard.”
