Alexander Volkanovski has a gripe, and for once the nicest guy in the fight business sounds a little bit annoyed. In comments that made the rounds on r/MMA on Oct. 31, Volkanovski talked about the mainstream sports fans and media who don’t give him his flowers. Even his complaint came with a thank-you card attached. He said he isn’t claiming those people are hating on him. Maybe it just isn’t their sport, he figured, and they don’t understand it or know enough about it, so he’s trying to give them the benefit of the doubt. Then he made a point of saying how thankful he is for the people who do get it.
That is the most Volk rant imaginable. He airs the grievance, forgives the people responsible, and thanks everyone else before he’s done. Gordon Ramsay could never.
He’s right about the diagnosis, too. The people who don’t follow this sport genuinely don’t see what he does in there. My issue is with the treatment. Benefit of the doubt doesn’t move anybody. And the funny part is that Volkanovski already said the cure out loud three days earlier.
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Inside the Bubble, He’s the Measuring Stick
Start with how big Volkanovski is to people who actually watch fights. When UFC 333’s estimated fighter salaries made the rounds, an X account posted that Volkanovski led the card with a reported $1.18 million payday. Those are estimates, so treat the exact number with some caution. But the guy at the top of the pay sheet does not have a recognition problem with the people signing the checks. That post even got quoted by Muhammad Mokaev, who used it to vent that HypeFC paid him half of what Merab got for a grappling match. Even fighters’ unrelated pay complaints are getting launched off Volkanovski’s number.
Then there’s Alex Volkov, who told Ariel Helwani he doesn’t think Dana White actually recognized him at the UFC 333 press conference and just played it off. Volkov’s punchline was perfect:
“I’m not even sure he can remember my name and I bet every time he hears my name, he thinks they’re talking about Alexander Volkanovski.”
Read that again from Volkanovski’s side. A heavyweight’s go-to bit about being forgettable is that the boss confuses him with you. When the joke is that everyone assumes the other guy is you, you’re the famous one in the room.
And my personal favorite piece of evidence: on Oct. 31, a fan account posted what it billed as a fun fact, announcing that Volkanovski is the first ever Australian, and the tweet just ends there. Either the stat got cut off or somebody is crediting him with founding a continent. Either way, that’s the kind of devotion casual sports fans don’t give anyone.
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Casuals Don’t Buy Nuance
What Volkanovski wants the outside world to appreciate is the craft. The feints, the reads, the pace he keeps for 25 minutes, the adjustments between rounds that his corner and every hardcore fan clock in real time. That stuff is gorgeous. It also doesn’t translate to someone flipping past a fight on the way to a ballgame.
People who don’t watch MMA don’t tune in for footwork. They tune in for a story they can explain at a bar in one sentence. Big money, big risk, somebody doing something everyone says he shouldn’t. Volkanovski thinks they don’t know enough about the sport. Fine. So stop asking them to learn the sport and hand them a headline instead.
He Already Has the Pitch
On Oct. 28, Volkanovski told Helwani he’d give up his featherweight title and move up to fight Arman Tsarukyan for the lightweight belt if Justin Gaethje retires.
“I’ll vacate the featherweight belt and fight Arman for the title. There it is.”
He kept going: “If I was champion at lightweight, I’m fighting Arman. 100%. If Gaethje doesn’t wanna [fight Arman], I’ll do it. That excites me.”
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That is the one-sentence story. A reigning champion walks away from his belt to go up a division and fight a guy the other champ might not want to face. My mom could explain that one. It’s also the fighter I love most in this sport: the guy who calls his shot and volunteers for the hard night. If he goes and wins, he never has to explain his footwork to anybody again. The highlight explains it for him.
MMA Fighting is already running a poll asking fans if they want to see it, which tells you the hook works even before anyone signs anything.
The catch is a big one. All of this depends on Gaethje retiring, and nothing in the reporting says that’s happened or that a fight is booked. Right now this is a conditional offer from a fighter who sounds fired up, nothing more official than that.
But if Gaethje does walk, the UFC should stop typing and send the contract. Volkanovski has spent years giving the mainstream the benefit of the doubt. A smaller champion vacating his title to fight Arman Tsarukyan for lightweight gold is how he stops needing it.
