The Ultimate Fighting Championship is among other things a brilliant marketer of itself. This is embodied by longtime UFC President Dana White, by design the promotion’s biggest star. White has so successfully mythologized his role in the rise of the UFC that it may be now be functionally fact.
That’s the genius behind the craft, though. Not only does White repeat the Myth with enough frequency and conviction to drown out reality, but he weaves it into the promotion’s present-day narrative, perpetually in motion nearly every weekend of the year. The Zuffa Myth is one chapter in an ongoing story where White plays the protagonist, bearing the weight of the sport on his shoulders so that it might live another day. Another chapter of that story is being written, and it was taking root in real time at UFC on ESPN 11 on Saturday…
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