Former UFC lightweight champion Khabib Nurmagomedov met with Russian president Vladimir Putin after bulldozing longtime rival Conor McGregor in the UFC 229 pay-per-view (PPV) main event back in late 2018.
But we already knew that.
What we didn’t know is that Putin also gifted “The Eagle” upward of $20 million worth of Russian real estate. That’s according to UFC CEO Dana White, who revealed the post-fight windfall during an appearance on the “Games with Names” podcast.
I guess his podcast ban is over.
“He didn’t even make it back to his dressing room after the fight and Putin was on the phone,” White said. “Putin gave him and his father like $20 million worth of property in Russia. Then he went into the Muslim territories where these guys are like, cars, money, gyms, whatever he wanted.”
One less thing to worry about.
Nurmagomedov, now 35, walked away from combat sports in the wake of his submission victory over Justin Gaethje at UFC 254 back in Oct. 2020. White tried every trick in the book to talk “The Eagle” into taking flight one last time, to no avail.
After all, those sheep won’t feed themselves.