It’s difficult to not share an ounce of respect for an opponent, especially when they have given everything inside an octagon, no matter how bad the rivalry might be. Even Colby Covington and Kamaru Usman hugged it out in the end, despite the former’s MAGA avatar. However, former UFC contender Ben Askren absolutely hates it when it happens.
Sharing his thoughts with fellow Olympian and UFC veteran Daniel Cormier, the former welterweight asserted that even Chael Sonnen feels this way. Being a wrestler, not liking someone comes from the core, he claims, old school values, so to speak. Askren adds:
“I can’t stand it when people are like, ‘I hate your guts blah blah blah,’ and after the fight, they hug each other and you’re like, ‘This is bullcrap, you guys are supposed to hate each other, you guys are not supposed to hug right now.'”
Now, on a closer look such genuine rivalries in most cases have pushed the individuals to be better just like how DC racked up two titles after his bloody feud with Jon Jones.
But in other cases, it has created a rift between great friends, forever dividing them like the Jorge Masvidal-Colby Covington and Alexander Pavlovich-Sergei Volkov stints.
But then feuds need to get kept to the octagon, and the octagon only! Or people get to watch Muhammad Mokaev and Manel Kape just duking it out WWE style. Nobody asked for that!
DC details UFC’s most awful rivalry
Rivalries are synonymous with combat sports. It’s literally the most primitive form of dealing with an issue, except everyone loves it because while it maintains its gladiatorial aesthetics, it remains an act of controlled violence.
But at times, things get too sticky fighters tend to run up to each others’ faces and get it down at the most random places. For instance, DC & Jon Jones threw hands at a hotel lobby when their rivalry peaked. Likewise, the UFC recently had an infamous brawl between undefeated British contenders, Muhammad Mokaev & Manel Kape.
While the duo were slated to face each other at UFC 304 in Manchester, they decided to settle it outside the cage in UFC’s Performance Institute, getting their hands on each other well ahead of their scheduled bout.
In the lead-up to the UFC 304 fight, the 23-year-old allegedly had a run-in with Kape at the Performance Institute in Vegas.
However, despite tensions flaring high, the two didn’t even manage to finish the fight, leaving it to the judges. This irked DC the most, leaving the veteran scratching his head.
“These guys fought at the PI…and then they get into the fight and they don’t fight! They don’t fight and then they hugged. How can it be so bad that security followed you the whole week but when it got to the fight you didn’t fight?”
Interestingly, following the fight the two settled their dispute with Mokaev winning via UD, after which the Brit even asked the crowd to clap for Kape, the same man who supposedly gave him a beating a week prior. Go figure!
