Dana White Claims Joe Rogan Deserves Much Credit For The Growth Of MMA, UFC

UFC president, Dana White has claimed that the organization’s longtime color-commenator, Joe Rogan deserves a lot of praise and credit for helping to build the sport of mixed martial arts during the last decade of the sport, as well as helping with the overall growth of the promotion.

Joe Rogan began his role as color-commenator for the Dana White-led UFC back in 1997

Rogan, a color-commenator for the promotion since UFC 37.5 back in 1997, is also a host of his own podcast, The Joe Rogan Experience – where he has featured many well-respected reporters, fighters, and other figures in the sport since its inception.

The Newark-born personality has taken somewhat of a step back from his role as color-commenatator in recent years for the promotion, in tandem with the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, which has seen him feature inside the booth just six times this year – for events in North America.

Despite his waning feature in the role, Rogan has received his fair share of criticism in recent months as the sport continually evolves, with many questioning his understanding of judging criteria, as well as his overall knowledge of newer fighters. Rogan has, however, maintained that regardless of the criticism he receives, he will always attempt to remain unbiased, and has immense respect for the fighters competing.

“I try to be very fair, always, with my commentary,” Joe Rogan told on his podcast, The Joe Rogan Experience. “And I’m also very respectful. Like, even if you think that my commentary was biased, or one way or another, you’ll never think I’m disrespectful, ‘cause I try to; unless someone’s doing something dirty.”

Speaking on the growth of both the sport and the UFC as a whole, the aforenoted White maintained that Rogan deserved a lot of praise for his part in the educating of spectators.

“Another guy who deserves a ton of credit for helping build this sport during our era is Joe Rogan,” White said during a recent appearance on THE Fight with Teddy Atlas. “The reality is that when we got into this, everybody understood standup fighter no matter what happened. Punching, kicking, elbows – we all get that. The big thing for us when it goes to the ground, how many people are really going to understand what’s going on and what they’re seeing?”

“Because if you’ve never done Jiu-Jitsu, you don’t know what the hell they’re doing. … Joe Rogan was, first of all, passionate about the sport, No. 1, (and) No. 2, so good at walking through what was going on before it even started to happen,” White continued. “To have a guy like him behind the mic, he was very instrumental in helping build the sport.”

White also recently confirmed that he had consulted Rogan after testing positive for the novel coronavirus earlier this month, claiming that the podcast host and comedian had offered him some advice which resulted in the lessening of his symptoms