Outside Source
Speaking on his podcast of the “JRE MMA Show” on Wednesday with guests “Big” John McCarthy and Josh Thomson, color commentator Joe Rogan aired his thoughts about the UFC White House card coming up on June 14. The event is to be held on the South Lawn of the White House in Washington, D.C., in an outdoor venue that will be subject to weather and more.
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Rogan has spoken up about the event in other contexts, namely that it will be going on during the U.S. war against Iran at the time. His observations and grievances this time around were largely focused on logistics and giving the fighters the best possible situation to perform for what will be the biggest fight of most of their lives.
“The ‘White House’ thing is odd,” Rogan offered. “I don’t like it. I don’t like the idea of fighting outside, at all. And then there’s June, and it’s D.C., and we looked it up: last year, same day, it was 100 degrees [Fahrenheit.] That’s hot as f–k. You add the lights…bugs…how about dehydration? The bugs are a big one. How are they f—ing going to do anything about the bugs? [UFC President] Dana [White] was talking about maybe using fans…is that enough? You gonna get bug strips everywhere? What are you gonna do? How are you gonna stop the bugs, there’s a lot of bugs. Pesticide the s–t out of the f—ing White [House]?”
Just like everyone else
The longtime commentator believed that the stage should be equal for the competitors, and he felt that weather conditions would change that.
“I just don’t think you should compete in a world championship fight in a non-controlled environment,” he expressed. “I think it should be inside of an air-conditioned arena. It should be a controlled environment, just like [everyone else]…you wouldn’t ask them to play a world championship basketball game outside in the sun. That’d be crazy, right? You play in a f—ing air-conditioned arena, and that’s how it should be.”
He did have a solution, one that might not be feasible for this design plan.
“Build a f—ing roof. Build a roof. You’ve got all the money in the world, right? You’re doing this for f—ing America? Four-thousand seats? You can build a 4,000-seat arena. How big is that…get a f—ing ‘barndominium.’ Put it in there. We did UFC [Fight for the Troops] in [airplane] hangars.”
The overall interest in putting the fights at this location is to have the historic imagery of cage fights while the White House looms directly behind it like a modern interpretation of Roman gladiators. Rogan think they could achieve that without putting any athletes at risk.
“Put [the White House] in the background on TV, who gives a f–k? When world-class fighters are competing, I don’t think they should have to compete outside. Imagine if someone loses a fight because it’s too hot out. Imagine if that becomes a factor. Imagine the dehydrated fighters, like the dehydrated fighters that are now being forced 24 hours later to fight in 100-degree heat,” he concluded on the subject, beyond a reference to UFC 112 in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates.
This article first appeared at Recent News on Sherdog.com
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