Dana White recently reached out to Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg for help with improving the UFC rankings system, possibly using artificial intelligence.
The UFC boss confirmed his conversations with the Meta CEO during an interview Thursday with TNT Sports.
“I could go on and on and on but I won’t,” White said. “We literally had meetings this week to work on it. I actually talked to Mark Zuckerberg, too, about AI, so yeah. I’m totally going to fix the rankings. We’re going to make a lot of strong moves here coming into 2025.”
White previously expressed his frustration with the current rankings that are voted on by a UFC-selected group of media outlets, a system that has been in place since 2013.
“I just can’t handle incompetence,” White said earlier this month. “I just can’t take it anymore. It’s driving me crazy. I can’t let people that I don’t believe know what the f— that they’re talking about deal with the rankings anymore. I just can’t do it. I have to figure out a solution.”
According to MMA Junkie, recent complaints have included Max Holloway being ranked below Justin Gaethje, and Renato Moicano’s ranking remaining unchanged after his win against Benoît Saint Denis in September.
The UFC chose these outlets for the rankings. Dana’s problem is he hates criticism so he ostracizes any legit media member who disagrees with him.
Dana White reached out to a friend in a high place to address his latest grievance.
In recent weeks, White has made it no secret that he’s not happy with the current UFC rankings system, which is voted on by members of the media (though several of the outlets involved are obscure or appear to have been inactive for years). His aggravation peaked following Khalil Rountree’s valiant loss at UFC 307 to light heavyweight champion Alex Pereira, who knocked out Rountree in the fourth round after trailing on the scorecards.
White told TNT Sports that he and his team have gone as far as to reach out to Facebook founder and Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg for advice.
“We literally had meetings this week to work on it,” White said. “I actually talked to Mark Zuckerberg, too, about AI. So I’m totally going to fix the rankings. We’re going to make a lot of strong moves here coming in to ‘25.”
It’s not clear whether White plans to use AI to completely replace the current rankings panel, or use some mixture of human voting and AI-generated input, to create a new system.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, following White’s most recent rankings rant, two fighter evaluations that he was most displeased with were changed in the latest update (h/t Eurosport).’
White continued to use Rountree and Holloway as his most frustrating examples when it comes to the rankings.
“We’re working on it right now,” White said. “We’ve literally been working on it all last week and I will have some answers on that soon, but the rankings system drives me crazy. From the pound-for-pound to each division, there’s huge mistakes.
“First of all, Khalil Rountree, let’s start there. He fights the fight that he fought, if you look at Alex Pereira’s destroyed everybody that he’s faced. Going into the fourth round, Khalil was ahead on the scorecards and then he gets beat and he stays at No. 8. I’m not saying he should be in the top 3 or whatever, but he should definitely move up, for me. He might not be 2 or 3, but he’s definitely not 8.”
“Then you look at Max Holloway,” White added. “It just changed this last Tuesday, but he knocked out—If you really think about it, he beat Justin Gaethje twice that night. He beat him on the scorecards and he knocked him out with one second left. How is he ranked 13 or something [at lightweight]? How is he ranked that low when he beat Gaethje?”
Zuckerberg, one of the wealthiest and most powerful figures in the world, is an avid fan of combat sports, having attended several UFC events as a guest of White’s. He has also participated in amateur grappling competitions.
Put someone gay in the top!