How you view the UFC 272 main event, and whether you ultimately opt to plonk down 75$ (if you’re in the U.S., anyway) to watch it likely depends on how much you buy into the bad blood between Colby Covington and Jorge Masvidal.
The Pay-Per-View card’s marquee match-up has been billed as a grudge match between former friends and training partners turned enemies. Covington and “Gamebred” have said all the right things in the build-up — “Chaos” has been the agitator, doing his best to get under Masvidal’s skin. Masvidal has been, well, Jorge Masvidal, insisting that things will be just business in the octagon Saturday, even though he plans to “send [Covington] to the hospital Ben Askren style.”
Both men agree that there will be no burying of the hatchet, no handshake after the fight, regardless of outcome.
So, do you buy all that?
Covington’s persona is as manufactured as they come, and “Gamebred,” while unquestionably an OG of the fight game at this point, also knows how to promote. The “BMF” champ has become a bonafide star late in his career, and no doubt recognizes that paydays like this are few and far between.
But then, even if you don’t buy into the grudge match narrative, and see this as just another fight — it’s still two former welterweight title challengers looking to prove who is more violent.
Ahead of Saturday’s Las Vegas-based event, the pair faced of at the UFC 272 pre-fight press conference. A live stream of the affair, kicking off at 8PM ET on Thursday, March 3, can be found above.
