ESPN has made a major financial investment in covering the UFC. It cannot be happy to hear that the promotion’s boss and the network’s top reporter have no relationship, but that is the case according to Ariel Helwani.
Dana White doesn’t seem to have any moral dilemmas about making Helwani’s life difficult. The two have been in multiple public spats with Ariel Helwani at one point telling Sarah Spain that all he wants is the ability to do his job without White “messing with” his career. He went so far as to say that “the fans are smart. They see what’s messed up” about the situation.
Helwani was a guest on the most recent episode of Oral Sessions with Reneé Paquette on Colin Cowherd’s The Volume network. When Paquette asked about how Helwani and White interact, the reporter said that they don’t and added that it wasn’t always that way.
“It was once supremely close and good and healthy and the kind of relationship that any journalist would want to have with arguably the most powerful person in the sport,” he said. “Now, I don’t interact with him, we don’t text, we don’t talk on the phone, and what I have often said to people is that it doesn’t necessarily bother me. Of course I would love to have a great relationship with him, but I will say if he doesn’t want to talk to me, if he doesn’t want to do interviews, text, all that stuff, I can live with that.”
The bad blood goes back to 2016 when White banned Ariel Helwani from covering UFC events because he reported news about Brock Lesnar’s return that the promotion didn’t want made public. Despite White’s absurd reaction, Helwani says he ended up being the one to try and make peace.
“I vividly remember where I was sort of, not asked, but nudged to reach out via text to try to get the lines of communication open, but I never got a reply. So, you know I can make a very strong case that the olive branch should be reached out to me. You know, I’m not worth hundreds of millions of dollars. He is. I have lost money as a result of some decisions that he has made.”
Dana White rarely says Ariel Helwani’s name. Helwani isn’t the only member of the media White has been confrontational with. He said recently on an episode of Colin Cowherd’s podcast that while he has respect for the job, he will not put up with members of the media being unprofessional.
The UFC is a different world from the rest of pro sports and this is the perfect proof. The promotion’s boss considers his most important media partner’s top reporter a problem for trying to report on the sport.
