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It’s safe to say that Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) and welterweight contender Colby Covington currently aren’t seeing eye to eye. That’s because the promotion has been unable to book a highly-anticipated fight between “Chaos” and current UFC welterweight champion Kamaru Usman, most recently targeted for UFC 244 in New York.
Stuck in the middle of the proposed matchmaking is none other than UFC president Dana White. And even though Covington recently revealed that UFC has followed “slave labor negotiations” to book the welterweight title fight White is adamant that “Chaos” is to blame for the fallout at the end of the day.
“So Colby Covington can say whatever he wants, but we make fights for a living,” explained White during UFC 244’s press conference earlier this week (highlights HERE). “That’s what we do. We go after guys and we say, ‘This is next. This is the date. Do you want the fight?’ Obviously he wanted more money to fight Usman. We went back and forth.”
Covington, who has won his last seven Octagon appearances in dominant fashion, is the perfect candidate to test Usman’s new reign and finally cash in on a long-awaited title shot. But if the brash 31-year-old is unwilling to play ball then UFC is going to go in a different direction, which is exactly what they did for UFC 244’s headliner.
Luckily for Covington, it’s not too late to dial the boss and come to an agreement. But this isn’t the first time “Chaos” has declined a UFC booking so who really knows where things go from here.
“This is the second time he’s done it,” White said. “He had a fight in Dallas, too. So we said, ‘If you don’t want to fight Usman then we’ll give you Tyron Woodley’. He turned down Tyron Woodley, too. You either want to fight or you don’t. When Colby Covington is willing to fight, he’ll let us know.”
With bad blood brewing with former friend and fellow welterweight contender Jorge Masvidal, Covington has more options on the table than just Usman. But if Covington finally wants to prove he’s the best 170-pound fighter in the world and be able to bring a real UFC title to the White House then he’s going to make the Usman fight happen.
Considering the bout already fell through for UFC 244 on Nov. 2 it makes sense for UFC to now turn it’s attention to the end-of-year PPV event in Las Vegas on Dec. 14, which is currently slated as UFC 245. If the promotion is unable to book Usman vs. Covington for that event then the next welterweight title shot may very well go to the winner of Jorge Masvidal vs. Nate Diaz.