LAS VEGAS – Laura Sanko had a banner year for her career in 2021. However, she’s not satisfied.
With a new calendar year just around the corner, Sanko has some big goals on her checklist, with the most prominent being a debut in the booth on an actual UFC card.
Sanko, a former MMA fighter who has transitioned into a backstage reporter role for the UFC, gained experience on commentary in recent months. She got her feet wet with LFA, then got her shot with a bigger platform on Season 5 of Dana White’s Contender Series.
The natural progression for Sanko has her eyeing a spot on color commentary for UFC Fight Night events, and she hopes she can find a way to crack into the rotation alongside the likes of Daniel Cormier, Dominick Cruz, Michael Bisping, and Paul Felder.
“For next year I would like to be able to call – not that I don’t love the Contender Series, it’s my baby – but I would like to be able to call some Fight Nights,” Sanko told MMA Junkie. “The UFC does things for a reason and the people above me who make those decisions make them with lots of things in mind. So I’m certainly not looking past all that, but the reality is, that’s what I want to do. I know I’m capable of doing it. I feel like I’ve proved that.
“The experience of Contender Series was great because it’s 10 weeks in a row, I did every single show. Got to work with Paul, got to work with DC, got to work with Michael Bisping. So a lot of reps. A lot of reps with different people. So, I’m ready. Let’s do it.”
Sanko doesn’t know when or where the opportunity could come, but said she will be ready for anything. She got the call to debut on Dana White’s Contender Series on very short notice, and her work was met with overwhelmingly positive feedback.
She intends to keep that same focus going forward, and when the time comes, said she’ll make it happen.
“The way that it all happened, very last-minute and all the things leading up to it,” Sanko said. “To participate and do the commentary things for the LFA, which was also a very last-minute thing. Then growing in that role then thinking the Contender Series opportunity wasn’t going to come to fruition. Then to have it happen with like 12 hours to go and just go in there and do it, it’s awesome. I’m not someone who is ever satisfied, so I always want more.”
Watch the interview with Sanko in the video above.
Laura Sanko hopes to make UFC commentary debut in 2022: ‘I’m ready’
