At UFC 322, Madison Square Garden became a pressure cooker long before Islam Makhachev and Jack Della Maddalena touched gloves for their welterweight title clash. Cameras caught controversial grappler and MMA fighter Dillon Danis in yet another confrontation, this time with Makhachev’s teammates Abubakar Nurmagomedov and Magomed “Chanco/John Pork” Zaynukov, moments before the main card began.

The UFC CEO, Dana White, himself confirmed what everyone suspected: Danis was finished. “You will never see Dillon Danis at a UFC fight ever again,” White said at the post-fight press conference. But while Danis’ ban became the headline, the ripple effect backstage told another story entirely. One man who unexpectedly found himself in the middle of this chaos was Jorge Masvidal. And as “Gamebred” recently explained, he didn’t throw a single punch, yet still ended up surrounded by UFC officials demanding answers!

Jorge Masvidal gets wrapped up in the UFC 322 chaos after Dillon Danis’s brawl with Team Khabib

In a clip shared on X by Red Corner MMA, Masvidal revealed that Danis had already crossed lines with Makhachev’s team long before fists flew. “They’d been sending a couple messages,” he said, and he admitted he was ready to settle it himself if the opportunity came. But that chance never arrived. “He did get his a– beat by the Muslim Brotherhood. They stole it from me because I was literally on my way to whoop this mother— a–,” Masvidal said, half-joking, half-serious.

According to him, everything started spinning the moment he left the VIP fan area after Bo Nickal’s knockout replay flashed on the screens and Danis appeared in it. He revealed, “As I start walking towards my seat from the VIP room, I run into Chanco. I’m like, what’s up, man? The police is all over me. I go, what happened, brother? And he’s like, nah, just chilling, bro. All good. And I see his hands are bloody. And I’m like, nah, something happened. What happened with you, man? Look at your hands. He goes, no, no. All good, bro. A little problem. I took care of it. And I go, all right, all right.”

But Jorge Masvidal made it only a few steps before UFC officials sprinted toward him as he continued, “And as I’m getting closer to the arena, to the stands, the UFC starts coming running at me. You stay right here don’t move. What just happened? What did you get into?”  and the staff began physically holding him in place. The only thing that saved him? The UFC’s own “babysitters”.

As he explained, “Luckily, the UFC always has me with two, glorified babysitter security guards because they just, every event, they got two bodyguards on me everywhere I go to make sure I don’t cause no trouble or get in no trouble.  So those guys vouched for me. They were like, nah man, he was with us. He ain’t do nothing. After that, another UFC executive by the name of Reed Harris came up to me he goes, man, what are you doing? Man, I literally, I just got here, brother. I wish I could have done something.”

Yet, their suspicion wasn’t baseless. The brawl had erupted because, reportedly, Danis spent all week mocking Islam Makhachev online, the same pattern that fueled the Khabib Nurmagomedov vs. Conor McGregor rivalry in 2018, which also ended in an all-out brawl after UFC 229. And now, Team Khabib’s legendary coach has also broken his silence on what triggered it this time around.

Javier Mendez slams Danis for “huge disrespect” that led to UFC 322 brawl

So what exactly pushed things over the edge this time? According to AKA’s (American Kickboxing Academy) Javier Mendez, it wasn’t just trash talk, it was a calculated walk into enemy territory. And honestly, can anyone be surprised by what followed? The longtime coach was preparing to corner Islam Makhachev for his main event bout when the chaos exploded.

As he told Submission Radio, “That guy, when is he going to grow up? What the hell is he doing, he was sitting in the fighters’ section and sitting where Team Khabib was, to boot. I mean, come on, dude. You know you’re asking for trouble.”

Why sit there when you’ve spent all week mocking the same people?  According to Mendez, Dillon Danis wasn’t just trolling online; he was flashing videos around, too. He highlighted that Danis was “showing Ali and Islam in a relationship-type embrace,” mixing in clips “with a p—n star and Islam embracing,” and layering it with more insults. It wasn’t harmless provocation, it was personal, disrespectful, and targeted.

Mendez continued, “What do you expect when you do that? You go and sit with the guys, and you’re riling them up with big, huge disrespect.” As such, Jorge Masvidal’s account showed how fast suspicion spread backstage, while Javier Mendez’s breakdown made one thing clear: this wasn’t random. It was a reaction to personal attacks, religious disrespect, and a history that has long defined one of MMA’s fiercest rivalries.