Trying to play the villain is to walk a tightrope. When done well by someone like Chael Sonnen, or Conor McGregor, or Khamzat Chimaev (who, to be fair, may not even be playing a character), it can sell fights like nothing else. When executed poorly, however, it can quickly veer into cringe and disgusting territory, eliciting genuine backlash.

There is a thin line between entertaining and genuinely offensive as Colby Covington found out prior to his loss to welterweight champion Leon Edwards at the UFC’S last PPV event last week. ‘Chaos’ implied Edwards’ father was in the seventh level of hell in the ceremonial weigh-ins for his third title shot. After the backlash, the Trump supporter went in-depth on why he engages in such vile trash-talk in a wide-ranging interview with Tucker Carlson.

Colby Covington explains why he insults his opponents

Tucker Carlson asked Colby Covington why fighters tried to unnerve each other before fights and if that worked. ‘Chaos’ told him that the purpose of trash talk was to get in the mind of his opponents and make them fight with emotion instead of with a calm and clear mind. This, he felt, threw opponents off their game plan, thus giving him the upper hand.

“Yeah it absolutely works and the process is just to try and get in the psychological part of someone’s mind and alter them, make them fight with emotions. Because when you fight with emotions you’re not going to fight the same as if you’re in a free state,” Covington told the conservative pundit.

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“But if you can get in someone’s head,” he added “and make them super mad, they’re just going to abandon their game plan and they just want to hurt you they want to knock you out then you’re an advantage.”

 This, of course, is an old tactic made popular by Muhammad Ali. Recently, Sean Strickland’s implications about Israel Adesanya and his dog ahead of their title bout is part of the reason ‘Izzy’ looked mentally checked-out during their fight.

On the other hand, Khabib Nurmagomedov made a genuine, good-faith attempt to kill Conor McGregor in their UFC 229 encounter after the latter insulted everything the Dagestani holds dear. Either way, no one can deny that it helps create buzz and sell fights, as Covington pointed out.

‘Chaos’ claims even opponents thank him for selling fights

Covington pointed out that manufacturing animosity and bad blood with his opponents created more excitement for the fight and sells more pay-per-views. ‘Conor-Khabib’ is the UFC’s most successful PPV event of all time in large part because McGregor was willing to step over every line and antagonize himself to the fans, serving as the perfect foil for the good guy, Khabib Nurmagomedov. “But also there’s a huge aspect to it too because it sells pay-per-views and it creates engagement because it makes it so people aren’t going to be down the middle,” he said.

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The 35-year-old claimed that his past opponents had even come around and realized that they made a lot more money because of Covington’s shenanigans.  All the people have taken it personal in the past. After their checks clear, they realized ‘hey man, I actually appreciate everything you did Colby like you made me a lot more money,'” the Trump supporter said. What do you think about Colby Covington’s take on trash-talk?

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