Muhammad Mokaev is sticking up for Dana White. In a post on X, the unbeaten flyweight argued that White is not the one quietly pushing fighters out of the UFC. He put the blame on corporate parent TKO and on Paramount instead, according to Sherdog. Sherdog’s write-up summarized the post without reproducing its exact text, so here’s the gist: Mokaev refuses to believe White is releasing fighters for no reason, and he thinks the business side upstairs is making those calls.
That is Mokaev’s opinion, and it is unproven. The reporting includes no evidence for it and no response from TKO, Paramount or the UFC.
Mokaev knows this ecosystem from the inside. He’s a former UFC flyweight who now competes for Brave Combat Federation, where he’s the inaugural Brave CF flyweight champion. Knockout Daily’s rankings have him at 17-0, No. 7 at bantamweight, fighting out of KHK MMA, with his last bout on June 6, 2026. Before MMA he built a serious grappling résumé. He was a four-time British junior wrestling champion, finished fifth at the 2021 U23 World Championships and won two ADCC UK titles in the intermediate division. When a guy with that background talks about how the UFC decides who stays and who goes, people inside the sport listen.
View post on X
The timing is the interesting part. His post landed the same weekend White was cracking jokes about cuts. At the UFC Edmonton final faceoffs on Oct. 16, Joaquin Buckley ignored White’s handshake before his fight with Mike Malott. After Buckley lost, White told a reporter, “As soon as he lost, I told Hunter to cut him,” then followed it with “I’m f*cking joking,” according to clips posted by Happy Punch on X. It was a punchline. It also shows that fans already picture White personally holding the scissors, which is exactly the image Mokaev is pushing back on.
View post on X
The corporate chart supports at least part of his framing. The UFC was sold to a WME-IMG-led group in 2016, and White became CEO in 2023 when ownership was reorganized into TKO Group Holdings. White is still the face of every announcement, and that makes him the easy target. Whether the decisions actually come from above him is something only people inside TKO can confirm, and none of them have weighed in.
For Mokaev, the take costs him nothing with White and puts his name back in UFC conversations while he holds a belt somewhere else. He’s 17-0, he’s 26 years old and he just publicly backed the man who decides who gets signed.
View post on X
