Drake’s Iceman rollout was already shaping up to be an absolute spectacle, but apparently, even the UFC got dragged into the madness, and Chuck Liddell claims the rapper didn’t even show up for his own part. The UFC Hall of Famer recently revealed that the promotion once flew him all the way to France for an event where he was supposed to meet Drake as part of the rapper’s plans for the Iceman project. There was just one problem: Drake allegedly never showed.

“I don’t know,” Liddell told N3ON on his livestream. “They were supposed to drop it back in the day. And when they… the UFC flew me out to France to watch the fight with him, and he no-showed.

“He no-showed. I don’t know, maybe they decided not to drop it that early or something. It was cool, but he no-showed. He no-showed, bro.”

The whole thing adds another wild twist to an Iceman rollout that somehow dragged on for nearly two years. Drake first teased the project back in August 2024, posting a screenshot of a folder labeled “2.0 Iceman” and kicking off the cryptic campaign.

The UFC Hall of Famer soon became one of the more unexpected names tied to the project. Drake even posted photos of ‘The Iceman’ on Instagram during the rollout, making it pretty clear that Chuck Liddell wasn’t just some random name thrown into the mix.

Whatever was supposed to happen in France clearly never came together. Instead, the Canadian rapper eventually took the Iceman madness straight to Toronto.

In April 2026, a massive 25-foot ice sculpture popped up in downtown Toronto, with the album’s release date literally frozen inside it. Twitch streamer Kishka eventually got to the prize, pulling a waterproof bag out of the ice during a livestream and revealing May 15 as the release date.

Drake’s team even rewarded him with a bag of cash for cracking the icy mystery. Of course, things didn’t stay peaceful for long. Fans started trying to break into the sculpture with flammable liquids and open flames, turning the whole stunt into chaos.

Eventually, the Toronto Fire Department had to step in and safely melt the giant ice block down. However, Drake wasn’t done playing the ice game just yet. The 39-year-old kept the Iceman rollout going around Toronto, even covering his courtside seats at a Toronto Raptors game in ice and sending fans on scavenger hunts for hidden coordinates.

Then May 15 arrived, and the rapper completely flipped the script. At the end of the Iceman livestream, three hard drives suddenly appeared on screen, followed by a message.

“I made this so that I could make this,” it read.

And then came the big reveal—Drake had two more albums ready to go. Habibti and Maid of Honour dropped alongside Iceman at midnight, turning what was already an elaborate rollout into a three-album surprise.

Chuck Liddell’s connection to the project also fit pretty neatly with the comeback theme surrounding the Iceman era. Back in 2003, ‘The Iceman’ suffered a brutal loss to Randy Couture. A year later, though, the UFC legend got his revenge, knocking Couture out in the first round and getting the light heavyweight title.

Naturally, fans started drawing parallels between that comeback story and Drake’s own Iceman era, which arrived after his very public rap feud with Kendrick Lamar. And when the three-album drop finally happened, the numbers were massive.

The projects combined to make Drake Spotify’s most-streamed artist in a single day in 2026, while Iceman posted the platform’s biggest single-day album total of the year. “Make Them Cry” also set the record for the most streams for a song in a single day on Spotify in 2026 at the time.

It is also worth noting that while his connection with Chuck Liddell may have started with a no-show in France, Drake was certainly paying attention when UFC 331 rolled around.

Drake just won big after Joshua Van’s title defense at UFC 331

Drake wasn’t just putting his money behind the Iceman comeback story either. The rapper recently dropped a whopping $650,000 Stake wager on Joshua Van ahead of his UFC 331 rematch with Alexandre Pantoja in Los Angeles.

The rapper shared the betting slip online, with the $650,000 punt carrying a potential payout of $1.098 million if Van got the job done.

“I don’t know bro… but he better win,” Drake wrote alongside the wager.

‘The Fearless’ ultimately got the job done, beating Alexandre Pantoja by a controversial unanimous decision and turning the Canadian artist’s $650,000 wager into a $1.098 million return. That means about $448,000 in profit.

This big win added another chapter to Drake’s long-running love affair with combat sports betting, although it hasn’t exactly been a smooth ride for the rapper. He previously backed Conor McGregor against Max Holloway at UFC 329 and has also put big money behind fighters like Jake Paul and Israel Adesanya.

Some of those bets have gone very differently. He reportedly lost $1 million in July when ‘The Notorious’ suffered a first-round TKO loss to Holloway, while his wager on Jake Paul to beat Anthony Joshua in 2025 also went up in smoke.

Drake’s betting luck has taken another hit over the years, including when he backed Charles Oliveira against Ilia Topuria. Those losses have only kept the infamous ‘Drake Curse’ alive, with MMA fans regularly joking that putting the rapper’s name behind a fighter is basically asking for trouble.

This time, though, Joshua Van wasn’t having it. He got the win, cashed Drake’s massive wager, and made sure the curse stayed far away from his title defense.