‘Frank Ocean Ruined Him’: UFC Fans Blame Grammy Winner For Payton Talbott’s First Career Loss

Payton Talbott lost for the first time in his professional career, Raoni Barcelos at UFC 311 on Saturday night. While Talbott’s defeat left many fans surprised, the reactions online took an unexpected twist as Grammy-winning artist Frank Ocean’s name cropped up

Known for his love of music, Talbott has often expressed how big a fan he is of Ocean. But MMA fans humorously speculated that the singer’s influence might have distracted the young fighter. The playful finger-pointing added a lighthearted angle to an otherwise disappointing night for Talbott, making him a trending topic in both MMA and pop culture circles.

Before Talbott’s fight at UFC 311, music icon Ocean surprised fans by publicly showing his support for the rising UFC star. Despite his low-key social media presence, Ocean broke his usual silence with an Instagram story, wishing Talbott luck as he prepared to face Raoni Barcelos.

The post featured a photo of Talbott cooking, captioned with a simple yet supportive message, “Gotta cook tonight, P”. With Ocean having nearly 7 million followers, the message quickly caught fire in the MMA community, sparking excitement and speculation about the unlikely friendship.

Of course, there are consequences to things going viral. So after the defeat, the reactions poured in just thick and fast. One fan joked, “Damn Frank Ocean ruined Payton Talbott.”

The ultimate troll in MMA, Dillon Danis made a remark that probably only made sense to him, “All that grappling with Frank Ocean didn’t pay off for Payton Talbott.”

Another angry fan just lashed out, saying, “payton talbott lost f*** u frank ocean”.

Another fan asked Talbott to get back in the gym ASAP and said, “Payton Talbott fraud checked, n***a needs to stay away from Frank Ocean and get in the gym #ufc311”

Talbott would certainly look to train harder in the gym. But it seems rather irresponsible and pointless to change his taste in music in order to win. To top it all, Barcelos was the one who did all the heavy lifting.

A closer look at how the fight played out for Talbott 

In the final preliminary bout at Intuit Dome, Barcelos (19-5) simply smothered Talbott (9-1) with relentless pressure.

Barcelos opened the fight with a quick takedown, threatening multiple submissions, including a rear-naked choke and an arm triangle. Talbott showed resilience by escaping, but Barcelos’ grappling dominance set the tone for the rest of the fight.

Talbott tried to rally in the second round, landing strikes and pushing the pace, but Barcelos consistently disrupted his momentum with well-timed takedowns.

In the third round, Talbott showed flashes of his striking skills but couldn’t overcome Barcelos’ ground game and ground-and-pound to close the fight, earning a unanimous decision with scores of 30-27, 30-27, and 30-26.

For Barcelos, 37, it was a statement win. For Talbott, 26, it was a hard lesson in his young UFC career.