Dana White on Tim Sylvia in the UFC: ‘No’
Former UFC Heavyweight champion Tim Sylvia has gone 6-1 since being ignominiously caught early by Ray Mercer in June of 2009….
Former UFC Heavyweight champion Tim Sylvia has gone 6-1 since being ignominiously caught early by Ray Mercer in June of 2009. The Mainiac been campaigning to get back into the UFC, most recently in a video post on the Underground, where he expressed his belief he could beat 80% of the current UFC heavyweght roster.
Last night UFC President Dana responded.
“No,” White told MMAjunkie.com when asked whether Tim Sylvia could possibly be seen again inside the octagon. “I don’t even know what Tim Sylvia’s done. The last Tim Sylvia fight I saw, he got knocked out by a boxer. What has he done since then?”
“If you look at when Tim Sylvia was in the heavyweight division, I say it all the time: It’s when we had the weakest heavyweight division in the company’s history,” he said. “Him and Arlovski were knocking each other out every weekend.
“I have no beef with Tim Sylvia or whatever. The guy’s out there trying to make a living and doing what he’s doing. But for him to make the claim that he could knock out 80 percent of the heavyweights in the UFC, what I just said before says it all.”
White went on to discuss Strikeforce’s Herschel Walker.
“I talked to Herschel at the last Showtime,” White said. “You know I’m very vocal about stuff and I’ve said stuff about Herschel Walker. My thing that I used to say about Herschel Walker was like, ‘This guy is never going to win the heavyweight championship in the UFC.’
“I totally respect the guy , the fact that at 50 years old, or however old he is – he’s in his 50s, right? – that the guy even came out and competed in mixed martial arts. I’m 42, I can barely get on the f——] treadmill. So for me to talk s— – the guy is a stud in what he’s been able to accomplish.
“But there’s no way he could compete in the UFC heavyweight division.”
“You’ve got to get through that little miserable guy that makes the fights,” White said, referencing UFC matchmaker Joe Silva. “You get through him and you get in the UFC.”