Dana White had cuts on his mind this weekend, and one of them was a joke.
“As soon as he lost, I told Hunter to cut him …I’m f*cking joking,” White said of Joaquin Buckley, according to a clip Happy Punch posted on X early Sunday. Championship Rounds posted the same exchange and described it as White trolling a reporter after Buckley’s loss at UFC Edmonton. The backstory is a fight-week snub. At the final face-off with Mike Malott on Friday, Buckley walked past White’s offered handshake, a moment Championship Rounds and Happy Punch both posted. So the line about cutting Buckley played as payback, and White made sure everyone knew it wasn’t real.
The release that did happen is the one people actually want explained. The UFC let go of Farid Basharat, an undefeated bantamweight at 16-0. Cutting a fighter with a perfect record almost never happens, and the move has fed a running argument about how the promotion manages its roster and how much weight it gives to entertainment over winning.
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White’s answer when he was asked about Basharat went viral on Sunday, GiveMeSport reported. NDTV Sports led its story with the phrase “There’s Definitely A Reason,” and MMANews.com framed his comments as a hint about the exit. The available reports present that as the extent of it. White has indicated the decision came from an internal reason, and he hasn’t said publicly what that reason is. Any theory about what happened behind the scenes is speculation at this point, and none of it has been confirmed.
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That gap matters. A 16-0 bantamweight leaving the UFC is a talking point in every corner of the sport. Fans who believe the promotion favors highlight reels over clean records will read this as proof, and the UFC hasn’t given them anything concrete to argue against. When the boss says there’s a reason and stops there, people fill in the rest themselves, and they usually pick the worst version.
The next real development has to come from someone other than White. Basharat, his team or the UFC would need to put the actual reason on the record. Until one of them does, the most widely shared line about a UFC release this weekend is one White said he didn’t mean, and the release he did confirm still has no public explanation.
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