Dana White Responds to Anderson Silva’s Recent Demands and Retirement Threats

As previously reported, former UFC middleweight champion Anderson Silva recently appeared on The MMA Hour and voiced his extreme displeasure with the UFC at the moment. Also, Silva threatened to retire from fighting if he doesn’t get a fight for an interim middleweight title. UFC President Dana White has now responded to Silva’s statements through TMZ. Below are some highlights.

White on how they won’t book an interim title fight for Silva: “We will not do an interim title. No. It won’t happen. Bisping’s ready, willing and able to fight the actual No. 1 contender, who is Yoel Romero. Anderson Silva’s ranked No. 7 right now. … Anderson’s mad. I didn’t pull Kelvin Gastelum out. Kelvin Gastelum smoked weed, and now he got busted, and we’ve done everything we could to make another fight for Anderson. So it’s nothing we did.”

White on dealing with Anderson Silva: “Every time for the last however many years, dealing with Anderson is always interesting. Obviously, he wants an interim title – obviously, we’re not going to do an interim title. He’s definitely coming out publicly (with his demands). You know my philosophy on that: If you ever say the ‘R’ word, you should probably do it, anyway. If you’re considering retirement, you should probably do it.”