Joe Rogan reveals desperate plea to UFC owner to abolish weight cutting: ‘Just stop it’
Veteran UFC color-commentator, Joe Rogan has revealed he pleaded with Endeavor CEO, Ari Emanuel to abolish the practice of weigh cutting when he penned a deal to purchase the promotion back in 2016, claiming the act of shedding weight before competition should be “eliminated.
Rogan, a long-time color-commentator during his lengthy tenure with the UFC, called the action earlier this month during UFC 311 — with a pair of championship fights closing the bill in California.
Joe Rogan lays out plea to stop UFC fighters cutting weight
And taking prime example from the weight cut of undisputed lightweight champion, Islam Makhachev en route to his dominant submission win over Renato Moicano via D’Arce choke, Rogan claimed the practice should be “eliminated” — and natural weight of combatants should be taken into consideration.
“I think weight-cutting should be eliminated,” Joe Rogan said during an interview with Jiri Prochazka on his podcast this week. “I said this to Ari Emanuel when they first bought the UFC. I said, ‘Listen man, you know what you should do? Get rid of weight-cutting, just stop it. Look, If you can randomly test people for drugs, you can randomly test their weight. Show up with a scale, say. ‘Hey, buddy. Step on the scale, you’re 190 pounds, how the f*ck are you making 145?’ Do something like that.
“And come up with more weight classes,” Joe Rogan explained. There should be a weight class every 10 pounds. This idea of these giant gaps like 185 to 205, that’s a 20-pound gap, that’s huge, that doesn’t exist in boxing. They should have every 10 pounds, 85, 95, 205, 225 and then unlimited… Find out what does Islam Makhachev weigh. Islam Makhachev is a UFC champion, the best pound-for-pound fighter on Earth. Find out what he weighs. What do you weigh if you were healthy? If weight cutting didn’t exist? Would it be 185, 190? Whatever that is. That’s how you fight now and we’re not going to weigh you in the day before and let you rehydrate. That’s crazy talk. Fight people your size,”
