White Claims McMahon Stopped UFC Broadcast Deal With NBC

Dana White wasn’t lying when he said former World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) CEO, Vince McMahon, has tried to screw him over multiple times, but if you didn’t believe the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) president before you will now.

While White and McMahon are now working together following the merger of UFC and WWE this past September, their relationship before that was rocky to say the least. There were certainly some instances in which UFC and WWE came together on small collaborations, but for the most part the two massive companies were on opposite ends of the combat spectrum.

White, who helped build UFC from the ground up, has always had a lot of admiration for McMahon and the way he was able to turn WWE into a billion-dollar company. However, White has always said that McMahon has tried to screw him over when he could. Whether it was White’s nosebleed tickets for WrestleMania or McMahon’s proposed fight against White inside the Octagon, the two frontmen have butted heads along the way.

Earlier this week during an appearance on Donald Trump Jr.’s Triggered podcast (listen HERE), White recalled a situation in which McMahon blocked UFC from closing on a massive broadcast deal with NBC. According to White, the deal was at the “one yard line” before McMahon put a stop to it.

“It’s been an interesting relationship with Vince McMahon,” said White. “I never saw Vince as competition, but I’m thinking Vince, in his heyday, he saw everyone as competition.

“He was one of those guys that would fucking stick it to me, just to do it. We were about to do a deal with NBC, and it ends up, we get to the one yard line, and Vince has the final say of who can go on USA Network and who can’t if you’re a combat sport.

“Lorenzo [Lorenzo Fertitta] and I flew out to Connecticut, sat down with him, we do all the small talk, ‘We’re doing a deal with NBC.’

“Vince sits back like Vince sits. ‘We’re about to do this deal, we’re about to have fights on NBC and everything else, but you need to sign off on it.’

“Vince says, ‘Yeah, I’m not going to do that.’ We’re like, ‘Why?’ ‘Eh, I’m just not interested in it. I don’t like the idea of you guys being on USA Network.’

“The whole deal blows up. At the end of the day, it all worked out better, we ended up on FOX. That’s just one of ten times where Vince did it,”

Luckily, UFC was able to land a broadcast deal with FOX which eventually led to the promotion’s ground-breaking partnership with ESPN. Now that White and McMahon are under the same umbrella it seems like their “feud” is a thing of the past, but how would you assess McMahon’s decision to stop UFC’s proposed deal with NBC?

Sound off!