Brock Lesnar was pitched for the UFC Hall of Fame in 2016 prior to return announcement – POST Wrestling
Brock Lesnar’s return to the UFC in 2016 was lately mentioned when UFC’s former head of public relations that interval since a decade in the past.
Lesnar made his UFC debut in February 2008 and have become the promotion’s prime attraction and his heavyweight champion earlier than the finish of the yr. Lesnar would headline UFC 100 in a huge rematch with Frank Mir, the place he avenged his loss from the earlier yr and had excessive-profile fights with Shane Carwin, Cain Velasquez, and Alistair Overeem earlier than returning to WWE in 2012.
By 2016, Lesnar was about to flip 39 and acquired an enormous supply to return at UFC 200 and combat Mark Hunt, and acquired the blessing from WWE to compete yet one more time.
Lesnar’s return was meant to be a significant shock announcement at UFC 199 in June 2016, nevertheless it was reported several hours earlier by Ariel Helwani for the MMA Fighting outlet. The fallout noticed Helwani and colleagues Esther Lin and E. Casey Leydon ejected from the Forum in Inglewood, California, that night time with the menace that Helwani can be banned from protecting UFC’s occasions in particular person. The media scrutiny of UFC’s determination led to a backtrack, and the ban was lifted as Helwani would cowl UFC 200 in particular person.
Ant Evans, who led the UFC’s public relations division and moved to Fight Pass, lately appeared on the MMA History Podcast with Mike Davis and Joey Venti. Evans defined how a lot of a secret it was and described pitching Lesnar to be half of the UFC’s Hall of Fame induction class earlier that yr.
Brock Lesnar was coming again to the UFC at UFC 200. He was stored utterly underneath wraps. How underneath wraps? Well, I pitched to Dana (White) inducting Brock Lesnar into the UFC Hall of Fame for UFC 200, which was going to happen a pair of days earlier than and Dana White, I imply poker face on the man, he simply type of checked out me and stated, ‘Maybe not this yr for Brock, perhaps one other yr’ and I stated, ‘No, come on he was the headliner of UFC 100 and 100 occasions later…it might be nice’ and Dana goes, ‘Yeah, I do not see it this time perhaps one other time. What I did not know was that he was already signed to combat Mark Hunt at UFC 200, they usually had been going to hold it a shock, they usually had been going to drop this promo throughout UFC 199.
While Helwani’s report was affirmation of Lesnar’s return, there had been hypothesis the day earlier than, after Lesnar’s profile appeared on the UFC web site and triggered individuals to query if that they had fired the gun and spoiled their very own shock. ESPN’s Brett Okamoto requested White the day earlier than throughout a scrum, and White vehemently denied there was something to the web site point out.
Lesnar’s return led to many issues as he bypassed the USADA testing protocol {that a} retired fighter is required to bear earlier than a combat. Lesnar beat Hunt by unanimous determination, nevertheless it was revealed that Lesnar failed a pre-combat drug check, and his combat night time drug check with anti-estrogen medicine clomiphene and hydroxyclomiphene was detected.
Lesnar was fined $250,000 and suspended for one yr, however by no means fought once more.
His disclosed purse for the combat was $2.5 million nevertheless it was revealed in the antitrust lawsuit that Lesnar made $8 million for the combat.
