Who is one of the few in the MMA GOAT conversation who never made it to the UFC? Here’s a hint, he’s a knock-out artist who dominated the MMA scene in his prime and has a devastating 40 professional victories with only 7 losses and one singular no-contest. A resume you won’t see in such fashion anywhere else.

If you thought of Fedor Emelianenko, you were right. He waged his war in many promotions that were at the forefront during his time. He fought for Rings, PRIDE FC, and even Strikeforce. However, ‘The Last Emperor’ never quite graced the UFC. Why? Perhaps the reason was none other than Dana White.

Fedor Emelianenko didn’t have a soft corner for Dana White

Fedor Emelianenko has famously fought former UFC fighters such as Quinton Jackson, Chael Sonnen, as well as Mark Coleman, among many others. However, it was never inside the UFC Octagon. This was because he and Dana White could never come to an agreement. The Russian recently shared a post on Facebook about this decade-old piece of news.

In an interview that he gave to the Russian News Agency TASS in 2021 after beating Tim Johnson at Bellator 269, Emelianenko recalled the negotiations that went on when the UFC was interested in signing him. He came across Dana White and did not like his demeanor one single bit.

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“A very unfavorable impression. Money means everything to him. He has no respect towards fighters, no respect for any human being. Only money and that’s all,” Emelianenko said about White. “There is nothing humane about him and I found that quite revolting . . .  Money, of course, is important for living and for the family. But trading human relations for money is unacceptable.”

He had also mentioned that he and his team were conversing with the UFC to make a deal back in 2009, but there were things on both sides that were not compatible. He told TASS that they did not agree with the financial conditions either and eventually, a deal just couldn’t come through.

In response to these comments from 2021, White said, after UFC 267, “First of all, I don’t even know Fedor. Fedor doesn’t know me. We met one time. His statement was I was all about money — he should have been more about money when we made you that offer wherever the f*ck we were, whatever island that was we were on, and you wouldn’t still be fighting at 45 years old.”

Emelianenko was among the fighters the UFC tried to sign over from PRIDE FC after they purchased the latter. The idea was to pit the Russian against then-UFC heavyweight champion Brock Lesnar at the Cowboy Stadium in Dallas, Texas. Now, nothing even remotely close is going to happen between the UFC and Emelianenko.

‘The Last Emperor’s final fighting days

Since their failed meeting at an undisclosed location in 2009, Fedor Emelianenko amassed a record of 13-6. However, the UFC and Dana White never tried to re-negotiate their terms to make room for one of the greatest fighters in the history of combat sports.

Emelianenko fought for over two decades before retiring from the cage for good. The last time he fought was at Bellator 290 in February 2023, when he took on Ryan Bader for the second time. During their first meeting at Bellator 214 in 2019, Emelianenko lost via a TKO. Similar scenes were seen during their rematch and the ‘The Last Emperor’ was yet again taken down via lethal punches that stopped the fight in the very first round of the bout.

In a UFC press conference a few days after Emelianenko’s retirement bout, White said, “I don’t want to sh*t on the guy, he’s retiring and all that stuff, but you guys know the old interviews with me, I never thought Fedor was that (good)… I mean, he got knocked out by middleweight Dan Henderson. I think some of the guys in the business, people liked them, so they praised them. He never got to test himself over here. I never was one of the guys that thought he was one of the greatest of all time.”

Suffice it to say there is no love lost between the pair. Now, Emelianenko has retired and all the fights against UFC greats that he could have had can be added to the list of the greatest fights that never happened.

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