Issue 200

December 2023

With the Ultimate Fighting Championship recently celebrating its 30-year anniversary, one man has become synonymous with the brand, leading the organization for more than two decades: Dana White. Former Fighters Only Journalist of the Year winner John Morgan sat down with White in his “War Room” at UFC headquarters for a frank and revealing conversation with the man who blazed a trail for the sport, and those iconic three letters.

The omnipresent frontman of the world's premier mixed martial arts organization, Dana White is undeniably the face of the sport, not just the promotion he oversees. With that visibility and power, White is oftentimes a polarizing figure, with a legion of supporters who swear by his accomplishments in bringing MMA to mainstream awareness, but also a fair share of adversaries who believe he's public enemy No. 1.

White insists unless you're among the small circle of trusted voices he holds near, he doesn't care where you fall on that spectrum.

"I've got a group of people that their opinions matter to me, and nobody else's opinions matter – and you know what? You're not wrong," White told Fighters Only. "I am both of those things. To some people, I'm a great friend, and to others, I'm the exact opposite, and if you don't like me and you think I'm an a**hole, you're probably a piece of sh*t and we probably had words. 

"If I don't like you, you're never going to wonder, 'I wonder if he likes me or not?' You'll never wonder. I will let you know that I do not like you, and we probably shouldn't be around each other."

Launching his incredibly successful career from humble beginnings, the future UFC CEO certainly never could have imagined he'd one day be at the helm of a multi-billion dollar global entity, but White insists he was driven by an entrepreneurial spirit from an early age and wasn't ever destined for a typical 9-to-5 grind. Bouncing around between Las Vegas, Boston and rural Maine throughout his formative years, White began readying himself for future opportunities.

"You know, I didn't go to school, but I used to read lots of books and s**t back then," White said. "Outdated concept, but I used to go to the library and get f**king books. I used to go Barnes & Noble and all that. I knew early, early on that I didn't like to work for other people."

It was also right from the start that White knew the fight game was where he hoped to earn his keep. "The Sweet Science" was his first love, and White famously learned the ropes from Boston boxing icon Peter Welch.

"I've always been a grinder, and I always knew what I wanted," White said. "I knew I wanted to be in the fight game, and I started through working for Peter Welch for free, working under him and learning all that I could learn about the fight business, and then training clients to make money. That's how I paid my bills and did whatever."

It was also through Welch that White was first exposed to MMA, watching the UFC's debut event on pay-per-view at the chance invitation of a man he crossed paths with in the gym.

"I just got inducted in the Boston Garden Hall of Fame, and Peter Welch was there," White said. "Right across the street from Boston Garden, Peter and I were talking about that's where we used to train. It was a gym across the street from the Garden, and we used to train there everyday, and one of the guys that was there that had something to do with the gym, he was a martial arts guy, and he was having the fights at his house that night. It's like, 'Oh, it's this no rules fighting,' and all this s**t. We watched it in his house.

"Me and Peter literally just talked about this. We went to that guy's house and watched it."

White said he was intrigued by what unfolded at that legendary event on November 12, 1993 in Denver, Colorado. However, while he enjoyed the inaugural fight card and the world's introduction to Royce Gracie and Brazilian jiu-jitsu, White wasn't instantly converted into an MMA hardcore.

"I thought it was awesome," White recalled. "I said, 'This is crazy.' Nobody could believe that it was real and that it was actually happening, and that there were going to be no rules, and so we watched the first one and the first one was cool as hell, right? Then the wrestling started and all that, and I didn't watch. I might've watched UFC 2, I don't remember, but 3 or 4 and all that stuff, I didn't watch anymore. I was a boxing guy."

White isn't a big believer in fate or the guidance of the universe, but even he struggles to explain just how many steps along the way could have seriously altered the unbelievable ride he's experienced as UFC boss.

"I don't even know what to say to that," White said. "I mean, there's just so many things that have happened in my life.

"Lorenzo (Fertitta) and I have had some drinks and talked about this at length throughout the years, the way that the whole thing played out from, you know, I've told the story about Adam Corrigan a million times. The kid that used to pick me up from school, take me to school every day, then he's getting married, and I had this whole blanket policy on weddings. I didn't go to anybody's f***ing wedding. Nobody's wedding. 

"You know that age in your life when you're like 24 to 30, and everybody's getting married? I went to nobody's wedding, but there was no way I wasn't going to go to Adam Corrigan's wedding, this guy who was so good to me growing up, so I go to his wedding, and that's where me and Lorenzo and Frank (Fertitta) reconnected and saw each other, and Lorenzo and I started training on Monday after the wedding, and we've been together ever since."

The reunited childhood classmates shared a passion for combat sports, though that largely centered around boxing for them all, even as they witnessed the hurdle-filled evolution of the UFC under the watch of Bob Meyrowitz and Semaphore Entertainment Group. That quickly changed following a chance encounter with MMA pioneer John Lewis.

"Frank Fertitta and I were out at the Hard Rock one night, and we saw John Lewis, and I'm like, 'I know that dude,'" White said. "Frank was like, 'I've always wanted to learn the ground fighting,' and I said, 'I've always wanted to try it, too,' so we went up, we started talking to him, and we made an appointment for Monday morning to train with him, or Monday night or whenever the f**k it was, and we told Lorenzo, and Lorenzo came with us. We started training jiu-jitsu. 

"It was a wrap. That was the beginning of the end. We became addicted to it. We started training all the time, trying to kill each other. Then through John Lewis, we met B.J. Penn, Chuck Liddell, Tito Ortiz, and tons of other guys that would come in and train with us here and there. I started managing Chuck and Tito, and then you know the rest of the story."

The well-told history of the UFC outlines White convincing the Fertittas to purchase the promotion for $2 million after he learned through his negotiations for Liddell and Ortiz that a lack of bankroll meant the company was struggling to hold any future shows. But along the way, there was one more decision to be made that could have significantly changed the path of the UFC.

"I'll tell you a crazy story," White said. "There was a guy named Wayne Harriman, and he was involved with John Lewis. They owned a gym together here in Las Vegas. He and John Lewis started the WFA, and they asked me to come and run it. They asked me to be the president of the WFA, and Wayne Harriman offered me a lot of money and a house and all kinds of crazy s**t to do it, and I told Lorenzo. I said, 'Listen, this guy Wayne just gave me this f***ing offer,' and blah, blah, blah, and Lorenzo looked at me like, 'Are you f**king nuts?' and he's like, 'I thought you and I were going to do something together.' I said, 'All right, yeah, we will. All right.'

"I'm not kidding you – maybe it was two weeks, but it feels like it was a week later, is when I had that call with Bob Meyrowitz about Tito, and Meyrowitz flipped out and said, 'There is no more money. There probably won't even be another UFC,' and that's when I called Lorenzo."

Given their previous conversation, White said there really wasn't much convincing to be done.

"A week or two earlier, Lorenzo had said, 'I thought we were doing something together,' so yeah, there was no doubt," White said. "Yeah, I'm not that guy. I would never go to my friends and say, 'Hey, give me $2 million dollars and let's do this.' Lorenzo and I had this conversation two weeks before or whatever the timeframe was, and, you know, I knew we wanted to do something."

With the Fertittas taking ownership of the UFC in 2001 and White installed as president, the venture was not an immediate success. The company burned through nearly $40 million by 2005, and White admits he felt some serious concern about being the one who brought the opportunity to the table. When the Fertittas eventually looked to cut their losses and asked White to find a buyer for the UFC, he understood the choice.

"I felt terrible," White said. "This was my idea, and we're losing s**tloads of money. You know the part when Lorenzo came to me and said, 'I can't keep doing this. I want you to get out there and see what you can sell this thing for,' and, you know, I came back that night: $6 million, $7 million maybe, and he said, 'OK, I'll call you tomorrow,' and then he called me the next morning and said, 'F**k it, let's keep going,' so here we are. Thank God."

Galvanized by the decision to carry on, White and the Fertittas grew the UFC into an international juggernaut, acquiring rival promotions such as PRIDE, Strikeforce, and the WEC, as well as signing high-profile broadcast deals around the globe.

In 2016, the Fertittas elected to sell the UFC to WME-IMG in a landmark deal worth $4.025 billion. As a minority owner in the company, White received significant compensation in the sale but insists he never once considered walking away after the deal.

"It was never about getting paid for me," White said. "It's never about getting paid. If I was worried about money, I would've stayed at the Boston Harbor Hotel. It was never about money for me. I love to do this. I love doing what I do, and I have this philosophy that if you love what you do as much as I do, the money just happens."

In fact, rather than the elation that one might assume would come along with finding a few hundred million dollars wired into your bank account, White actually struggled to cope with the transaction at the time.

"It was very, very weird," White said. "I went over to Palace Station, and I was in a room for two or three days there and didn't leave. I didn't want to sell. I didn't care about the money. The way I looked at it, I had money at the time, you know what I mean? We were making money, and it was never really about the money for me.

"What ended the whole funk that I was in was Lorenzo basically said to me, 'Listen, man. You're my best friend. This is what I want. Be happy for me.' How do you not be cool with that? I had to, you know?"

White has continued to usher the UFC to new heights, with the promotion signing a lucrative broadcast deal with ESPN, as well as taking a huge step forward in popularity when the organization was the first major sport to return to action following the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic. Earlier this year, his long-held title of president was amended to CEO prior to a merger with multi-billion dollar professional wrestling leader WWE.

There's no doubt that the grind of the UFC's unrelenting schedule has made the family schedule a challenge for White, at times, but he's happy with the balance he's been able to find.

"Obviously when you grow up, no matter who you are, you want your kids to have better than you had," White said. "Not everybody is successful at achieving that, but I did the best I could with what I had and what I had going on at the time, and I have a great relationship with my kids, all three of them – both my boys and my daughter. I always made sure that I made time for my family, and that's the philosophy here at the company, too. 

"You know, one of the things that I used to hate about working for other people – and more specifically, the hotel business because I worked at a couple different hotels – I felt like the hotel business treated you like s**t if you were f**king three minutes late. They're writing you up, and you've got these a**holes just breathing down your neck the whole time you're at work. God forbid you call in sick or take a day off or do something like that. The philosophy here is everybody that works for me, in my opinion, is the best of the best. We have an incredible team here. You're all grownups. You know what needs to be done, but let me tell you what: If your kid has a f**king game, go to your kid's game. If your kid has a play or a performance at school, you better f**king go to the performance at school. Don't miss that s**t because it's only going to happen once. 

"I was very lucky, too. At the time that we were building the business, technology started to advance quickly, so I couldn't be at every game and I couldn't be at every performance, but you know what I did? I sent production over there, and they live-streamed it to me and I watched it. You know what I mean? So maybe I couldn't have been there physically, but I was there, and I saw it. I watched it, and they knew I was watching, and, you know, unfortunately, that had to be good enough."

At 54, White has started to joke at times that he's getting a little more lenient in his old age, but there's still a sliver of that savage businessman it his core.

"Me and a bunch of people were having this discussion the other day," White said. "There's definitely some things that I am softer on, but I have this quote on the wall in my office. It says, 'May God have mercy upon my enemies because I won't.'

"You get to pick what you want to be. We can be friends, and I'm a really good friend. I'm a really good enemy, too."

White has also recently started mentioning certain milestones he still wants to reach before his time with the UFC is done. Departure was not something he ever publicly considered in the past, but the truth is, he's really not thinking about it now, either. He's simply acknowledging that time waits for no man – though he's trying to make it hold off as long as possible.

"Listen, I still love what I do," White said. "I mean, I get here every day between 8:30 and 9 a.m. and I'm here every night until 7, so I still love what I'm doing. I love this building. I love being here. I love my staff. I still love going to the fights, so I don't know if there will ever be a day when I wake up and say, 'I don't love this anymore,' but I'll be here until that day comes. 

"I mean, it's inevitable. You know, eventually – well, I guess, it's not inevitable. Bob Arum's f**king 93 or some s**t. That guy's still doing it. I don't know. I don't know."

White's MMA story started a few years after the UFC's run began, but the journey of the man and the promotion have become inseparable, and it's a true rags-to-incredible-riches journey. Was White simply a guy in the right place at the right time to catch a ride on a rocket ship that was bound for success either way, or is there a lesson to be learned from his core philosophies?

White believes it's quite clearly the latter.

"What happens when you build a business like this, it's very easy to fall off the path," White said. "When the UFC started getting bigger, all these people started coming to me. Movies, television shows, and all these other f**king things that are a waste of time. I'm not in the movie business, and I don't ever want to be in the movie business. I don't ever want to be an actor. I don't ever want to be in a f**king movie or any of that kind of s**t, so none of that appeals to me. Then you get into all these other businesses that spin off the brand, whether it's gyms or video games or merchandise or, you know, the list goes on and on. 

"When you have a powerful brand, those are all great things. They go right to the bottom line and are great for the company and it's great for the brand, but you can never stop focusing on what the core of the business is, and the core of the business is in this room. This is why you always see me in this room. I'm always in this room, always talking about this room. This room is literally the heart and soul of this company. It's about finding new talent, building new talent, putting on the right fights and making sure that the in-house and the live production are absolutely flawless, and as long as you stay focused on that – whatever your business is, whatever the core of your business is – as long as you stay focused on that, you can't f**k it up, and there is definitely a formula to what is done here, and we don't ever, ever stray from the formula."

White on… Gary Brecka

If White's ascension from the head of a fledgling sport on the brink of extinction to his current state as one of the most powerful executives in all of sports wasn't easy to predict, his recent emergence as a fitness industry influencer may have been even more difficult to see coming.

But even to critics of his often-contentious leadership style, the 54-year-old's physical transformation has inspired many to try and follow the UFC CEO's lead. Under the guidance of 10X Health System founder Gary Brecka, White has adapted the holistic approach of the self-described "bio-hacking and functional medicine" expert, and the results – images of which have been widely distributed – are undeniable.

Now White can be seen in nearly every public setting with a cup of hydrogen water in his hand and anxious to sing Brecka's praises.

"I used to call people hippies that would talk about this s**t," White said. "Something has to make sense to me. You have to prove something to me. Gary came in and read my bloodwork and told me things about myself that I hadn't told anybody that were wrong with me, and that blew me away. Then he said, 'Give me 12 weeks, and I'll change your entire life.' I can do anything for 12 weeks.

"Now I am f***ing all in on this thing. Like nutty. Somebody that I would have made fun of a year-and-a-half ago, I'm that guy."

It seems countless others are taking inspiration from White's journey, as well, with a recent 86-hour water fast making headlines across the world and earning multiple millions of social media impressions – not to mention an instant financial impact to an unexpecting bone broth production company. 

Kettle & Fire executives suddenly found themselves fielding an incredible increase of attention when White mentioned the company's beef broth as his primary source of protein during the fast.

"That's definitely f***ing crazy," White said. "At the fights in Austin, the guys from Kettle & Fire, the owners, came to the fight, and they came back in my room, and they were like, 'Holy sh*t man, what you did?'

"It's fascinating. Everywhere I go right now, people are either going, 'Hey, I just finished a fast,' or they're yelling 'F**k Peloton, or something crazy like that, so yeah, it is wild."

White on… raising kids

White's three children have had a front-row seat to the ascension of the UFC, as well as the incredible increase in their family's net wealth. While the UFC boss has at times been criticized for lavish spending on his children for costly birthday parties, holiday celebrations and the like, White says he tries to strike the proper balance between enjoying the fruits of his labor with his children and ensuring they're also understanding of what it takes to find success of their own.

"This is what I've learned with whether you're extremely wealthy or you're broke: No matter what the scenarios are, your kids are always going to have issues with something, you know?" White said. "I remember I would walk to school almost every day, and sometimes my grandmother would take me, and my grandmother had a sh**ty car, you know, and I went to Bishop Gorman, so I would have my grandmother drop me off on the corner, right? And then I would walk the rest of the way to school. 

"So then I'm taking one of my sons to school one day and he says, 'Are you seriously taking me in this car?' I'm like. 'Yes, it's my f**king car. What do you mean?'

"'This is embarrassing, Dad,' and I'm like, 'This is embarrassing? That's f**king fascinating.'

"It's interesting, you know? No kid is ever going to have the perfect upbringing, and no matter what your situation is in life, to be a good f**king parent, be the best you can for you and for your kids. No matter how s**tty your car is or how nice your car is, you're going to embarrass somebody, somehow, and we all have our issues. 

"I have a Ferrari. That's the car I dreamed of having when I was a kid, and apparently I should have bought a Toyota Corolla to drive my kid to school so he wouldn't get dropped off in a Ferrari. But really, there is no perfect solution. There's no perfect book out there to tell you how to raise your kids. You've got to just get out there and do the best you can. Just be there for them. Be there for your kids as much as you possibly can."

White on… charity

When White is in Las Vegas and isn't at UFC headquarters, he's likely to be found in one of the city's iconic casinos placing a wager or two in the high-roller rooms. With tales of his blackjack escapades becoming the stuff of legend, what's often not discussed publicly is the amount of White's money that isn't laid in front of a few playing cards and is instead put in the pocket of those in need in the community. White makes significant annual contributions to a number of charitable organizations and private citizens in Las Vegas, but he makes certain that those stories aren't made public.

"I say it all the time, if you're the guy that's showing up at things and giving the big check at halftime and all that bulls**t, it's for all the wrong reasons that you're there and doing it," White said. "You donate and you help because you can and you should, and all the stuff that's done behind the scenes is done because it's done for the right reasons, and when you do help and take care of some people, I'm sure it can be embarrassing for people who need to be helped or whatever. 

"You know, I see these people posting on social media, giving this guy $1,000 because he's this and that. You're putting the guy on camera and showing that the guy needs $1,000. You're not doing anything f**king nice or anything. You're not. You're no hero. You're doing it for all the wrong f**king reasons. If you're taking care of people, take care of people because that's what you should do, and people can say whatever they want about me. I know who I am. I know what I do. The people who know me know who I am and know what I do. Everybody else, I can give a s**t what they think."

White on… remaining in business with the Fertitta brothers

The growth of the UFC under White and the Fertittas is an incredible success story, but their relationship didn't end with the sale of the company. The trio remains good friends to this day, and they've even gone back into business together with the highly controversial and powerfully viral Power Slap brand, as well as the self-described "next-generation content company" Thrill One Sports & Entertainment.

White said he never once questioned whether he would continue to do business with the Fertittas following their departure from the UFC and intends to remain tied to them both personally and professionally.

"I always knew that we were going to do more stuff together," White said. "I mean, ever since that day that I told you that I met Lorenzo at the wedding and we reconnected, we've been together ever since. My money is where their money is. We've invested in a lot of the same things. We own a bunch of different businesses together like Thrill One and Power Slap. We run these businesses together. We meet every week, and they're like my brothers. I'm like the third Fertitta, so we'll be together until the day we die."

While White remains the more publicly visible figure of the three, the Fertitta brothers are still very active in high-stakes business decisions in Las Vegas through the Station Casinos brand, a company started in 1976 by their father, Frank Fertitta Jr. The pair recently opened the Durango Casino and Resort just a few minutes down the road from UFC headquarters, and White believes the new property should immediately be considered among the top casinos in Las Vegas.

"In life, you've got to pick a team," White said. "What team are you with? I've been Team Fertitta for like 27 years, and we're still having fun. We love it. We love what we do together. 

"Lorenzo hit me up the other night and said, 'Meet me over at Durango,' and he walked me through Durango, and I was wondering how the hell they were going to beat Red Rock. They did it. It's unbelievable. Those guys are f**king brilliant, and they're the last visionaries left in the casino business. You know, all these guys on the Strip, they don't own those casinos. These are the last two guys now that Steve Wynn is gone. Family-owned, family-operated, real casino visionaries in Las Vegas. They're the last of a dying breed."

White on… Power Slap's parallel to "TUF"

One critical moment for the UFC's modern growth boom was the launch of "The Ultimate Fighter." The legendary reality competition show that was capped off with the UFC Hall of Fame encounter between Forrest Griffin and Stephan Bonnar is widely credited with saving the company.

The project was famously bootstrapped by the promotion when they couldn't find a network that was willing to invest in the project despite some promising financial results from the promotion leading into the 2005 series, In retrospect, White says that was an incredible blessing in disguise, and he thinks he's seeing a repeat performance with the launch of Power Slap, which has been met with a heavy dose of criticism but has allowed White to operate autonomously on the project.

Yeah, I mean, there was definitely momentum there. I mean, there was momentum. Ticket sales were picking up. All that stuff was coming together or that that last $10 million investment would have never happened. We absolutely believes that there was momentum and we believed that if we could get on television that it would work. The beautiful fucking thing. The beautiful thing is that. Nobody else believed, including the network. So the fact that we were able to put up the last 10 million. Gave us 100% ownership of the UFC. And it's the same position I'm in right now with Power Slap. It it's f**king beautiful that everybody's shit on it and nobody believed in it. And, you know, I end up in the same position again that I was in with the UFC. 

"There's an even better story to the Power Slap thing that I will tell someday, and it's f**king fascinating, man. It's absolutely fascinating, but it happened again and I don't know – I love it."