According to Tito Ortiz, the UFC offered his client (Cristiane “Cyborg” Justino) a contract to fight Ronda Rousey at an event planned for AT&T Stadium in Dallas in December.
“I’ve heard from Cris, actually… that they offered the (Rousey) fight to Cris. I know her management said yes. I’ve told her, ‘Let’s do it.’ So, I guess, the ball is all in Ronda’s corner,” Ortiz told Ron Kruck and Bas Rutten on Inside MMA Friday night. “Ronda wants to do it. Dana said if Cris comes down to 135, he’ll make the fight happen. Let’s see if Ronda accepts the fight.”
UFC president Dana White told Yahoo! Sports that Ortiz’s saying that the promotion offer Cyborg a contract to fight Rousey is complete BS.
“That was a complete lie,” White said. “It’s 100 percent a lie. First of all, the UFC doesn’t even talk to Tito Ortiz, so let’s start there. But we haven’t offered any fight to [Justino]. Tito Ortiz is just making this [expletive] up. In no way, shape or form did we offer her a fight against Ronda at Cowboys Stadium. Completely untrue.”
On Monday afternoon, White did an exclusive interview with UFC.com and confirmed that the promotion never offered Cyborg a fight with Rousey as well as confirming that the UFC will not be holding an event at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas in 2015.
“To show you that Tito Ortiz has no idea what he’s talking about, we’re not even doing the fight in Dallas, Texas,” UFC president Dana White told UFC.com on Monday. “The fight is going to be in Las Vegas at the MGM. Just to show you that Tito is absolutely talking out of his ass.”
After Cyborg said that the UFC did offer her a contract, White felt that it was weird Cyborg would state this.
“I thought it was weird that she wasn’t screaming for this fight – that she wasn’t trying to make the weight and trying to make this fight happen,” White told UFC.com.
“The deal we have with her is that she’ll make the weight and fight at 135,” White said. “We said to her: ‘What’s going on? Are we going to do this?’
“She was never offered a fight with Ronda anywhere. She has to make the weight, and then fight, and then we know she can do it and we do the fight with Ronda.”
Rousey’s next fight will be against Miesha Tate, but that fight has not been given an a date yet. As for Cyborg, her next fight is up in the air.
