Rashad Evans Advises Tyron Woodley Not to Waste His Career Fighting Dana White
Rashad Evans was once a UFC champion who found himself at odds with the promotion's president Dana White. When he looks at welterweight titleholder Tyron Woodley's back-and-forth with White, Evans can relate.
Woodley has been lobbying for a big money fight and said the he believes he'll face Nate Diaz next. White responded to Woodley by saying he was “full of s—.” Woodley returned fire by saying that he's not full of s— and that he was “pissed off” at White's reaction.
Evans has some advice for the 35-year-old champion.
“I was the original Tyron Woodley as far as the relationship with Dana. I understand where he's coming from, but he's going to learn what I learned. At the end of the day, it reminds me of something somebody told me when I got married. They said, ‘do you want to be right or do you want to be happy?' When I was arguing with my wife, do you want to be right or do you want to be happy, because if you want to be right then you're not going to be happy,” Evans said during an appearance on The MMA Hour.
“He can't win this. He fights for the UFC. Dana is the president of the UFC. There's no way he can win this. So at the end of the day, feel the way you feel, but you've got to know whenever the conversation comes up where Dana said this, don't even address it. Don't even go down that road.”
Sometimes remaining silent is the hardest thing to do. Egos get involved. And when you believe that you're right, it's even more difficult to hold your tongue.
“It's a hard thing to do because your ego gets involved, and you know he's wrong, and you want to prove it. You may feel this way because of this or that and you want to just expose the truth, but at the end of the day, at what expense? Your legacy? Your chance to be remembered in what you love to do? At the end of the day, it's these kind of things that make you hate fighting,” said Evans.
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Getting into a public argument with White isn't productive. A fighter isn't going to get anything positive from it. Most of the time, it's a detriment to an athlete's career.
“I took so many years off my fighting career arguing with Dana, trying to get a fight with Shogun Rua, not trying to fight this guy, trying to do all this stuff. At the end of the day, it didn't really matter much. I just lost time. I get what Tyron is saying, and he's right to feel the way he feels, but you've go to assess is it really worth it,” he said.
“What do you gain? Nothing. You lose a lot. If you're wrong, you lose; so why even play with it if you want to be a fighter and especially if two of your revenue streams are tied into something he controls?”
