Dana White reacts to the moment when one of his UFC 300 main card stars got into an altercation with a fan in the audience as he made his octagon walkout.
UFC 300 is officially in the books and what an outstanding event it was with instant-classics, viral knockouts, and back-and-forth wars galore – yet there was also an incident between one fighter and crowd members that Dana White suggests could get complicated very quickly.
Arman Tsarukyan earns split decision victory over Charles Oliveira
Arman Tsarukyan was able to survive multiple submission attempts from the most decorated submission specialist in UFC history as he earned a razor-close split decision victory over Charles Oliveira last night.
The rising contender was able to utilize his superior wrestling throughout the contest, landing vicious elbows and ground-and-pound from the top to dye Oliveira’s bleach-blonde hair a violent shade of red.
Whilst Tsarukyan was unable to get the finish, his best punch of the contest arguably came before the fight had even started.
Dana White reacts to Arman Tsarukyan fighting fans during walkout
Yet there was controversy even before Tsarukyan had made his way into the octagon, with the budding lightweight appearing to throw several punches toward a crowd member during his walkout. It’s unclear in the footage whether the attempted punch landed, however.
Separate fan-captured angles of the incident suggest that the audience member had been goading Tsarukyan as he was walking past, although it remains unclear what was actually said between the two, before ‘Ahalkalakets’ decided to turn back around to throw an overhand.
Speaking at the post-fight press conference, Dana White did appear concerned that the incident could, upon further investigation, have repercussions:
“Yeah, you might not want to hang over things and grab people when they’re walking out. These guys are all f***** hyped up and whatever, I’m sure we’re probably going to get sued but we’ll deal with that on Monday too.”
Tsarukyan himself was also questioned about the fan incident at the post-fight press conference, with the now 22-3 wrestler noting: “I’m from Russia, don’t do that please or I’m going to go to prison in the US.”
“He showed me that he wanted to f**** punch me, and I wanted to punch him back, that’s it. No one shows me ‘f*** you’ [like that] it doesn’t matter who you are, I’m going to punch you in the face.
“When you’re 200m away, I’m not going to punch you, but when you’re close to me it’s like automatically going to end in someone getting hurt.”
Tsarukyan admits submission attempt was uncomfortably ‘tight’
In the opening round of the contest, Charles Oliveira was able to lock up one of his signature submissions, a guillotine choke, which appeared to be incredibly close to earning him the underdog win.
Speaking with Caroline Pearce via the TNT Sports YouTube channel, Tsarukyan admitted that the choke “was f***** tight” but that there was no way he was going to tap out on such a big stage:
“Yeah, it was tight, but I knew that I’m going to get out and I’m going to win, I can’t lose and I want to be a champion,” said Tsarukyan, who was ranked the #4 best lightweight in the world prior to UFC 300.
Social media did appear to be split on who they thought won the contest, given just how close those submission attempts were – unsurprisingly, Tsarukyan disagrees with the split scorecards:
“I don’t know why they gave [the fight to] him for the one guillotine and the one d’arce and one sweep? I was better at striking, I was better on the ground, and that’s b******.”
In the aftermath of UFC 300, lightweight champion Islam Makhachev called out Tsarukyan on social media.