“When I make a fight, I don’t say a word until everything is signed. I did exactly what I never do. That big media call was the next day and Machida couldn’t be reached and his manager thought he’d take the fight,” “Before this happened he was terrorizing me for a title shot, and then he said four weeks wasn’t enough. But then things start going in another direction. It happened to Rashad Evans. He was out of a fight for a year and a half. Machida is not next in line now. He will need to go fight somebody else first.” -Dana White
In what should come as a surprise to no one, Dana White has gone back on his word once again and has taken away Lyoto Machida’s title shot. Originally the title shot was promised to the winner of Shogun Rua vs Brandon Vera, but that didn’t last long. Dana changed it to whoever performs the best out of Shogun Rua vs Brandon Vera and Lyoto Machida vs Ryan Bader. Well that winner was Lyoto Machida.
What is amazing about all of this is that Lyoto Machida is being punished for something that wasn’t even his fault. UFC 151 being canceled has been blamed on everyone except the people really at fault, Dana White and his Zuffa crew. These guys have been watering down the PPV cards for years and UFC 151 was so bad, that without Jon Jones and Dan Henderson carrying the card by themselves, there wasn’t even one fight on it anyone wanted to see.
If the UFC had been selling lots of tickets they wouldn’t have canceled, with or without Jones, but reports are that they had barely sold any tickets and the event was going to be a huge flop. So as Dana does, he went on a smear campaign, against Jon Jones, Dan Henderson, Lyoto Machida and anyone else he could try and pass the blame on besides himself. It is not the fighters fault that Zuffa tried to pass off a garbage card onto the viewers and it back fired on them. Bashing all of the top guys at Light Heavy Weight isn’t going to help the situation. I really wish these fighters would start standing up for themselves and realize that they are the ones with all of the power, but they give it to Zuffa all the time.
One good thing out of this is that we might be able to see Lyoto Machida vs Dan Henderson if Henderson heals from his injury in the next few months. I think that would be a great fight. I would rather Jon Jones just move up to heavyweight if he beats Vitor Belfort. Jones is huge and walks around as big as most heavyweights and he has a longer reach. It would give him a challenge and open up all kinds of new and exciting fights.
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