As expected there was a lot of trash-talking back-and-forth between UFC welterweight champion Kamaru Usman and the challenger Colby Covington.
Kamaru Usman and Colby Covington UFC 268 Trash Talk
They had all six of the big fighters on stage, along with Dana White. We got to see several interesting outfits led by Covington and his king of Miami jacket, as well as Rose Namajunas in a set of overalls. That being said though, clothes would remain a topic of discussion as well as so many other fun topics as both Usman and Covington would start the war of words quickly and let it go the whole press conference.
UFC 268 Press Conference Takeaways
The first takeaway would be from Colby Covington, who wasted no time, in not getting personal on the attacks of Kamaru Usman, but first he would go after MMAJunkie’s John Morgan, calling him a “flabby butt” and stating he wouldn’t answer questions from him unless he did pushups.
When targeting Usman though, he got very specific in going after his father who he referred to as the “jailbird.”
Covington would tell Usman that he had connections with parole officers and that if he needed help getting his dad to the fight on Saturday he would be more than happy to oblige. Usman, ever the sportsman, took that insult in stride and said he would love to get help from Covington in getting his dad to the fight so he’d be there to “see him get his jaw broke again.”
Both men would continue to hurl insults back-and-forth at each other with Covington using the jailbird term a lot, almost to an oversaturated point. For Usman, he would constantly bring up the broken jaw of Covington which would garner a response of political jokes and comments from the challenger.
As for the rest of the card and the combatants that were on the stage, Rose Namajunas was excited to be back in New York after having had success there in the past. Her opponent Zhang Weili was excited to be in New York as well, because of the cultures and mix of people that make the city great. Both women appeared uber-confident heading into Saturday but visibly Namajunas seemed to be already in a different gear mentally.
To round out the questions, Dana White was asked if Islam Makachaev was going to get the “Dana White favor” and jump over the winner of Michael Chandler and Justin Gaethje on Saturday. Of course, White took objection to that statement and said “I have no idea what you’re talking about” when it came to the Dana White favor he was referring to.
Both Chandler and Gaethje would then jump in and exclaim that the winner of their fight would be the number one contender for the lightweight title.
The press conference ended with faceoffs going smoothly up until of course Covington and Usman with the champion shoving Covington and both men needing to be separated. Both men did a tremendous job of selling the fight and backstage we are all sure Dana White was grinning ear to ear.
