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The UFC has been around now for nearly 27 years and has an absolutely rich history full of incredible stories and characters. However, like any sporting institution, the UFC also has its fair share of myths and legends, and not all of them are true.
Sure, some of the more outlandish tales from the UFC’s early days – Tito Ortiz’s brawl with Lee Murray, Joe Riggs, and Nick Diaz fighting in the hospital – are factual, but unfortunately, many of the others are more fiction than fact.
Here are five UFC myths that have since been exposed.
#1 Jon Jones hid under a cage during training to avoid USADA’s drug testers
Former UFC Light Heavyweight champ Jon Jones is no stranger to drug-related controversy. ‘Bones’ has been suspended on multiple occasions for positive PED tests, and early 2015 even saw him test positive for cocaine of all things.
Perhaps the strangest story involving Jones and drugs came in that same year, right after the positive cocaine test had been revealed. Rumors at the time suggested that the-then UFC champion had escaped from drug testers during a training session by hiding underneath the cage he’d been training in.
Jones’ former rival Chael Sonnen went on to share an anecdote about the story during a 2016 appearance on Joe Rogan’s podcast. ‘The American Gangster’ claimed that USADA’s testers had turned up at the Jackson/Wink gym, and in order to avoid them, Jones had hidden under the cage while his training partners claimed they didn’t know his whereabouts.
Interestingly though, this myth is only half true. Responding to a recent jab from current UFC Middleweight champ Israel Adesanya on Twitter, Jones revealed the truth of what happened. He did, in fact, hide from drug testers – but they were from the Nevada State Athletic Commission, not USADA, who didn’t begin their work with the UFC until much later in 2015.
And Jones claimed he hadn’t been using PEDs – but instead, he’d been smoking marijuana, which would’ve triggered a positive test and landed him in hot water. Regardless, only time will tell whether this new confession will have consequences for the former UFC champion.
#2 Zuffa cleaned up the UFC’s image and ushered in the Unified Rules of MMA
Ever since the UFC broke into the mainstream's conscience through its Ultimate Fighter reality show back in 2005, neophyte fans of the promotion have been taught the same thing.
According to what critics now label the ‘Zuffa Myth,’ in 2001, the UFC was on its knees as a promotion thanks to a series of bad business decisions, chief of which was its brutal portrayal of MMA as a sport.
With taglines like “There are no rules,” the UFC, under its former owners SEG, was supposedly just what its critics suggested it was – human cockfighting. That was until Zuffa – the Fertitta brothers and Dana White – swept in to save the promotion in 2001, cleaning it up and ushering in the current Unified Rules of MMA in the process.
So did the UFC really allow moves like biting and eye-gouging as recently as 2001? Well, no. In fact, this myth isn’t true at all. In its earliest days, the UFC did allow such moves, as anyone who’s seen the clash between Keith Hackney and Joe Son at UFC 4 can attest to.
However, the promotion had ushered in rules outlawing those types of moves as early as 1996. By 1997 meanwhile, the first weight classes – with a cut-off of under or over 200lbs – were introduced, and later that year, gloves became mandatory too.
Things continued to evolve from there until early 2000, when New Jersey’s athletic commission – after a lot of work from UFC commissioner Jeff Blatnick and referee John McCarthy – decided to create MMA’s Unified Rules. The UFC’s first event under these rules? UFC 28, two months before Zuffa purchased the ailing promotion.
Zuffa’s leadership can undoubtedly be credited with bringing the UFC into the mainstream, but in terms of “cleaning the sport up,” the truth is that nothing really needed cleaning by the time they stepped in.
#3 Tra Telligman died after suffering a knockout loss at UFC 54
Modern-day MMA prides itself on being a highly safe sport, and indeed, while there have been a small handful of deaths that directly followed fights, none have taken place inside the UFC. However, an enduring myth would suggest that this isn’t the case.
This myth suggests that a fighter was killed during his fight at UFC 54 – which took place in Las Vegas in August 2005 – and that the UFC covered up the incident following the event. Thankfully though, despite this story spreading like wildfire around various MMA forums, it simply isn’t true.
The fight in question saw veteran Tra Telligman stepping in on late notice to fight former UFC Heavyweight champion Tim Sylvia. The contest saw Telligman struggling with the reach of the 6’8” Sylvia. And in the dying seconds of the first round, ‘The Maine-iac’ caught him with a head kick and sent him crashing to the ground.
Telligman was clearly unconscious, and naturally, the fight was stopped, with referee Herb Dean quickly removing his mouthpiece to prevent him from swallowing his tongue. And indeed, the UFC did cut away as the veteran was removed from the Octagon strapped to a spineboard.
However, cutting away from an unconscious fighter to show their victorious opponent is customary for any MMA promotion. While Telligman was never brought back to the UFC, the stories of his death were far-fetched.
In fact, while he did retire from competition following the bout, ‘Trauma’ continued to coach budding fighters. And by 2007, anyone believing the myth would simply have needed to check out Chuck Norris’ World Combat League – where Telligman coached the Texas Dragons – to see that they’d been hoodwinked.
#4 The UFC paid TJ Grant to fake a concussion in order to insert Anthony Pettis into UFC 164’s main event
UFC 164 took place in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, in August 2013, and in the event’s main event, Anthony Pettis submitted Benson Henderson to claim the UFC Lightweight title. However, had things gone to plan, Pettis wouldn’t have been involved in the fight in the first place.
That’s because ‘Showtime’ wasn’t actually the number one contender for the title at the time – Canadian TJ Grant was. Grant had won five fights in a row – including a KO of former top contender Gray Maynard – to earn his shot. And the UFC had even produced posters for the event advertising his fight with Henderson.
However, with weeks to go before the event, Grant was forced out of the fight due to an injury. Pettis stepped in, and the rest is history. But a classic myth suggests that the UFC, rather than an injury, were responsible for Grant’s removal.
According to the myth, the UFC preferred to book a rematch of Henderson’s classic WEC fight with Pettis than allow Grant to fight the champion. And so they paid off the Canadian to fake an injury and remove himself from the running.
Of course, that’s simply not true. In fact, Grant had suffered a severe concussion – and even spoke out to deny the conspiracy theory at the time via Twitter. And in fact, the UFC did attempt to book Grant into a title fight with Pettis in December 2013 – only for the Canadian to back out as he still hadn’t recovered.
Grant has since retired from MMA altogether, as he’s been unable to recover from the issue – surely putting this myth to bed for good.
#5 The UFC cut Matt Lindland to protect Rich Franklin
Current UFC fans might not recognize the name Matt Lindland, but rewind to the early to mid-2000s, and ‘The Law’ was considered one of the top Middleweight contenders in the world. However, despite being considered the top contender to Rich Franklin’s UFC title at the time, Lindland was cut from the promotion in August 2005.
Why did this happen? One myth suggests that the UFC were worried that Lindland would unseat ‘Ace’ and take his title away. And with the promotion backing Franklin as one of their poster-boys, they simply felt it would be easier to get rid of Lindland altogether than risk the situation arising.
Incredibly, one of the biggest proponents of this myth was Lindland himself. He even went to the lengths of having a documentary produced about his fighting career – with the trailer outright accusing the UFC of releasing him due to “politics” and suggesting he could’ve been the champion otherwise.
However, regardless of how Lindland’s supporters felt, that wasn’t really the case. Sure, Lindland’s fighting style was sometimes considered dull, and so the UFC may not have gotten behind him all that heavily. But the truth is that when he was placed in a number o contender’s bout – in 2004 against David Terrell – he was knocked out.
As for his release? Well, it wasn’t anything to do with his fighting style. Instead, reports at the time confirmed that ‘The Law’ was, in fact, cut for wearing a t-shirt that displayed the logo of gambling website Sportsbook.com. This was considered both a conflict of interest and a potential breach of his contract – more than a valid reason for his release.
Would Lindland have beaten Franklin? Who knows. The likely answer is probably not, but it hasn’t stopped this crazy myth from persisting over the years.
