The news making the rounds Saturday claiming that Dana White offered Cyborg Justino a fight against UFC women’s bantamweight champion Ronda Rousey was a surprise to many.
Among those most surprised, apparently, was UFC president Dana White.
White went on the offensive Saturday against longtime nemesis Tito Ortiz, who floated the Rousey-Cyborg rumors on AXS-TV’s “Inside MMA,” telling Yahoo Sports’ Kevin Iole the information was “a complete lie.”
“That was a complete lie,” White said. “It’s 100 percent a lie. First of all, the UFC doesn’t even talk to Tito Ortiz, so let’s start there. But we haven’t offered any fight to [Justino]. Tito Ortiz is just making this [expletive] up. In no way, shape or form did we offer her a fight against Ronda at Cowboys Stadium. Completely untrue.”
According to Ortiz, the UFC offered a title shot at Rousey on a proposed Dec. 5 stadium card in Dallas.
But White, whose goal is to have Rousey vs. Miesha Tate and a featherweight title fight between Conor McGregor and Jose Aldo on the big event, said he wanted to put a stop to the Rousey-Justino talk before it spiraled out of control.
“The problem is, this kind of thing gets out there and picks up momentum when there is no truth to it,” White said. “And it was just something that he decided to make up. But it’s not true.”
Update: Tito Ortiz tweeted the following after hearing Dana’s response.
Well @criscyborg there’s your answer! https://t.co/DFroaWuVbt
— Tito Ortiz (@titoortiz) August 8, 2015
Update 2: Cris Cyborg also tweeted a response to the Yahoo report.
I’m not lying nor is Tito- UFC called my manager last Sunday to see if I would fight Ronda at 135 on December 5 at… http://t.co/pF2VJdRuEU
— Cris Cyborg (@criscyborg) August 8, 2015