White on holding Canelo vs. Crawford at Allegiant Stadium: ‘I hate it’

Dana White usually has the last word when it comes to promotional decisions, but he’s having to make some accommodations for his Saudi business partners coming into a September boxing superfight between Saul “Canelo” Alvarez and Terence “Bud” Crawford.

Riyadh Season head Turki Alalshikh recently revealed that White would be taking the lead on promoting Crawford vs. Canelo, which is set for Friday, September 12th at Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas. That’s an interesting location choice, given White’s well known aversion to stadium events.

“I hate it. I hate it!” White declared when asked about the decision by ESPN Desportes. “So because I hate it so much, you know I’m gonna have to try and figure out how to make it an incredible experience inside Allegiant.”

Boxing promoters haven’t had any issues putting together crowd-pleasing cards in stadiums. Chris Eubank Jr. vs. Conor Benn just went down at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium in front of 65,000 fans, and we doubt there was one who left unhappy. Hopefully the September experience softens White’s opinion on larger venues, but we doubt it will given how arena shows maximize UFC’s cost to profit to effort ratio.

It’s unclear who forced White’s hand on the venue and date — it could be Alalshikh, or it could be Netflix, who are rumored to be the broadcast partner for this fight. It will be interesting to see if White has to bend any further or if he really does get to promote the fight to his standard.

“This is one of the biggest fights ever and, obviously, I’m honored to be promoting,” White said. “When they say we’re promoting it, I’m doing the promotion. We’re doing the production, the event ops, PR. I mean, everything to do with the fight, just like a UFC fight — while at the same time, promoting UFC Noche. So it’ll all be the same weekend. It’s a bad ass weekend of fights.”

UFC Noche 2025 is set to go down Saturday, September 13th from Guadalajara, Mexico, although there are questions as to whether the new arena booked for that show will be ready in time for the show. White denied there was any consideration to moving the card and confirmed they were hoping to keep the same big event feeling that 2024’s Sphere show provided.

“Noche is gonna be a special event every year for us to celebrate Mexico and Mexican Independence Day,” the UFC CEO said. “And yeah, it’s gonna be big from here on out, forever.”

“It’s an absolute honor,” White said of stepping into a boxing fight between two of the sport’s greatest athletes. ”Canelo and Crawford have both been great about this too, and I look forward to working with these guys from now till September. So it’s gonna be fun.”