UFC

UFC fighter Tommy McMillen is apparently ready to return to the octagon days after he was found unresponsive in an Arizona nightclub restroom as result of an overdose.

“Ready for a short notice call @ufc,” the undefeated featherweight wrote Thursday on Instagram.

At around 12:50 a.m. Sunday, according to a spokesperson for the Scottsdale Police Department, officers found “an adult man identified as “Thomas J. McMillen” on the bathroom floor of Cake Nightclub in the city’s Old Town neighborhood. A police report filed by the officers was titled “Overdose.”

“Responding officers pulled [McMillen] from bathroom and he was transported to the hospital,” the spokesperson said in a statement. “He was unresponsive, but still breathing when he arrived at the hospital. He was in stable condition and was not believed to have any life-threatening complications at the time officers checked on him at the hospital.”

TMZ reports that officers found a white, powdery substance on the ground near McMillen and administered the opioid antagonist Narcon before he was transported to the hospital.

Retired MMA fighter Tim Welch, who serves as a coach and mentor to McMillen, posted a photo of his 28-year-old protege on his Instagram Stories and wrote, “Tommy is completely ok and training yesterday.”

UFC did not immediately respond to a request for comment for this article.

McMillen has an overall record of 12-0 — with five knockouts, five wins by submission and nine first-round finishes — and is 3-0 since making his UFC debut in April. His most recent fight was a unanimous decision over Marwan Rahiki on Sept. 19. He doesn’t have any fights currently scheduled.

American Hokit is fifth in the UFC heavyweight rankings and is fighting for the title after only one year in the organisation.

The 28-year-old debuted in the UFC last November and has won all four fights since, with his last win coming against Derrick Lewis in June.

In a similar vein to Colby Covington, Hokit adopts various controversial personas and characters during interviews to generate attention from fans.

He has been accused of overstepping the line into discrimination, however, after making racially aggravating and misogynistic comments in his post UFC 324 interview in January.

After Hokit directed misogynistic comments towards former First Lady Michelle Obama in June, UFC president Dana White described his words as “gross”, “moronic”, and “inappropriate”.

Former NFL player Hokit is unbeaten since his MMA debut in 2023, winning all 10 fights with six of his wins coming via knockout.

Gane is the pre-fight favourite to beat Hokit and retain his heavyweight title.

U.S. President Donald Trump clarified that he was “kidding” when he suggested he had offered Ultimate Fighting Championship boss Dana White the position of White House press secretary.

“I was kidding, but I think Dana likes the idea, and he is a

US President Donald Trump has asked Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) boss Dana White to be White House press secretary, in a social media post.

“Dana will be a Press Secretary like none other,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “Dana, please take the job!”

It was unclear whether the president’s public job offer was genuine, although White said later on Saturday: “I’m going to meet with him, we have a meeting on Monday”.

The vacancy for White House press secretary has been open since mid-October, when Katie Zacharia quit less than five days into the job.

Trump’s post on Saturday afternoon comes after his fellow Republicans were routed in the US midterm elections, losing their congressional majorities.

The president called White “a violent Fighter and Warrior” and asked that he bring a number of high-profile UFC fighters with him on the job “even though some are not from our Country”.

“We need these people to defend us against the Lunatic Left,” Trump wrote, alongside photos of the six fighters.

Following Trump’s post, White posted an Instagram photo of himself behind the lectern in the White House press briefing room.

“On to the next chapter,” White wrote, though it was unclear if the post was tongue-in-cheek.

“Hell yeah! Do it, @DanaWhite!” White House communications director Steven Cheung posted on X, as he shared the president’s message.

Ultimate Fighting Championship CEO says he will meet with the US president on Monday to discuss the offer.

Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) chief executive Dana White has said he will meet with Donald Trump after the US president offered him the job of White House press secretary.

Speaking at a new conference after a boxing event in London on Saturday, White said he would meet with Trump at the White House on Monday to discuss the president’s offer.

“Dana will be a Press Secretary like none other,” Trump wrote on Truth Social earlier on Saturday. “Dana, please take the job!”

Trump also requested that White “bring with him assistants, even though some are not from our Country”.

Trump listed and posted pictures of six current and former UFC title holders to join White: Islam Makhachev and Khabib Nurmagomedov from Russia’s Dagestan region; Americans Justin Gaethje, Daniel Cormier and “Kayla Harris”, likely a reference to Kayla Harrison; and Amanda Nunes, a Brazilian who became a US citizen last year.

“We need these people to defend us against the Lunatic Left,” Trump wrote.

The White House press secretary role has been vacant since Katie Zacharia’s tenure ended ‌last ⁠month after just five days.

Zacharia succeeded Karoline Leavitt, who stepped down from the role at the end of August.

White and Trump first worked together in the early 2000s, but they grew closer since ⁠the UFC chief publicly backed Trump’s presidential campaign in 2016.

In recent years, Trump has attended several UFC events, and in June, the White House hosted a night of UFC fights as ⁠part of celebrations marking the 250th anniversary of US independence.

The White House press office already has a former UFC spokesperson among its ranks: Director of Communications ⁠Steven Cheung, who worked for White’s organisation from 2013 to 2016.

Cheung shared the president’s message on X and said, “Hell yeah! Do it, @DanaWhite! It’ll just be like old times!”

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — President Trump said Saturday that he has offered the job of White House press secretary to his friend and UFC boss Dana White, an announcement unconventional even for the norm-busting president and one that nobody in the White House immediately confirmed.

Trump, while he was at his golf club in Florida, posted on social media that he made the offer to “the Great Dana White, a violent Fighter and Warrior” to become the Republican president’s chief spokesperson.

Trump said he requested that White bring along several UFC fighters as “assistants,” adding, “We need these people to defend us against the Lunatic Left. Dana will be a Press Secretary like none other. Dana, please take the job!”

The White House did not respond Saturday to messages inquiring about the president’s social media post.

White was in London on Saturday for a boxing event. A spokesperson for UFC did not immediately respond to messages seeking comment.

The UFC head shared an image of Trump’s post on Instagram, along with an image of White standing behind the lectern in the White House press briefing room with the words “On to the next chapter.”

Trump’s post came as his White House is in a period of major transition and struggling with his party’s deep losses in Tuesday’s midterm elections. The historic wins by Democratic candidates, including in areas that Republicans had held for decades, led to the GOP losing control of both chambers of Congress.

Trump on Friday announced he was replacing his longtime advisor Susie Wiles, seen as something of a tempering force on the president’s impulses, as White House chief of staff. He replaced her with Stephen Miller, the chief advisor behind the administration’s hard-line immigration policies and among the most pugilistic of Trump’s inner circle.

The shake-up at the heart of his administration follows the brief but tumultuous week when Trump tried out a new press secretary in Katie Zacharia, who seemed uncomfortable in her sole appearance before reporters left the job after five days amid revelations she had called herself an attorney despite lacking legal credentials.

The post had been vacant since Karoline Leavitt left at the end of August. Trump remains without a chief spokesperson.

Trump is close friends with White and has attended several UFC events with him since returning to the White House in January 2025.

He brought White and the sport to the White House’s South Lawn in June for a celebration of America’s 250th anniversary and the president’s 80th birthday. A wire-mesh octagon was constructed near the executive mansion under “The Claw,” a spaceship-like metal arch fitted with lights, sound equipment and large screens.

“It was an amazing experience. This was a one of one,” said White afterward.

White also spoke at the Republican National Conventions in 2016, 2020 and 2024.

Price writes for the Associated Press. AP writers Daniel Gelston in Philadelphia and Jesse Bedayn in Austin, Texas, contributed to this report.

Alexander Volkanovski secured a total knockout in the closing seconds of second round at UFC 333 in Abu Dhabi.

Australia’s Alexander Volkanovski has retained his featherweight title after making short work of Russia’s Movsar Evloev in the UFC 333 main event in Abu Dhabi.

Volkanovski secured a technical knockout (TKO) with a right hand, followed by a ground-and-pound move in the closing seconds of the second round of their scheduled five-round fight on Saturday.

The official time was 4:54, as the fight was called off with six seconds left to the jubilation of the Etihad Arena crowd in the United Arab Emirates capital.

It was Evloev’s first professional loss and he remained classy in defeat.

“Like I said, Alex is a great champion and it was an honour to share the cage with him,” Evloev said after the loss.

Meanwhile, Volkanovski said he wants to keep stacking wins for as long as he can.

“I’m choosing to do [fight], I don’t have to. I said if I didn’t take too much damage, we will probably keep going. So maybe we keep going,” Volkanovski said.

In the co-main event, Petr Yan won his three-fight series against Merab Dvalishvili in a Russia vs Georgia showdown as Yan swept the scorecards 48-47, 48-47, 48-47 with a mix of a gruelling pace, wrestling, dirty boxing and keeping Dvalishvili at distance to defend his UFC bantamweight title.

Yan beat Dvalishvili last December to regain the title for the second time, having previously won it in July 2020 against Jose Aldo at UFC 251.

The finishes kept coming, but this time in the flyweight division. England’s Lone’er Kavanagh secured a TKO stoppage against Uzbekistan’s Ramazan Temirov with an uppercut, followed by strikes, at 4:28 of Round 1.

At heavyweight, Russia’s Alexander Volkov won a unanimous decision over Rizvan Kuniev utilising dominant wrestling and top control to earn his third-straight win. Volkov called for a title shot at Thursday’s presser, which may have stumped UFC CEO Dana White when addressing him.

Kuniev had his two-fight winning streak snapped.

Opening the main card, Aaron Pico needed just over a minute to TKO Losene Keita of Guinea in their featherweight fight. Pico has won back-to-back fights, while Keita has split his last four.

Merab Dvalishvili says he has gained 19lb (1st 5lb) in just five hours after weighing in for his bantamweight title fight against Petr Yan at UFC 333 on Saturday.

The Georgian weighed 135lb (9st 9lb), which was the same as Russian champion Yan, before the pair’s co-main event fight in Abu Dhabi.

Dvalishvili later uploaded a video to Instagram showing the 35-year-old stepping on scales and weighing 154lb (11st 0lb).

“I’ve been drinking water and in only five hours I gain back 19 pounds, that’s what we do, let’s go,” he said.

“Now I’m back drinking and recovering. Now I’m going to start eating. Eat food first, then tomorrow you guys already know who I’m going to eat.”

Fighters typically cut weight by shedding water in the days before a bout, before rehydrating to regain weight – a process that can provide a physical advantage inside the octagon.

The UFC has taken a number of steps to make weight cuts safer over the years, including banning IV drips, which forces fighters to hydrate in a healthier way, and building the Performance Institute, which provides guidance for its athletes from professional health experts.

UFC fighters are recommended to lose no more than 8% of their body weight during fight week.

On fight night they are recommended to stay within 10% of their weight class.

Dvalishvili is aiming to win back the title he lost against two-time champion Yan last December.

During their face-off, the pair engaged in an intense but respectful stare-down.

In the main event, champion Alexander Volkanovski and Movsar Evloev both made weight before their featherweight world title contest.

Australia’s Volkanovski is looking to earn a record ninth win in UFC featherweight title fights against Russia’s Evloev, who is undefeated in 20 bouts.

On the undercard, British flyweight Lone’er Kavanagh takes on Uzbekistan’s Ramazan Temirov.

The 27-year-old Kavanagh is aiming to bounce back from defeat by American Brandon Royval in July.