The Ultimate Fighting Championship is willing to take a flyer on a 41-year-old heavyweight ex-boxer.
The Ultimate Fighting Championship is willing to take a flyer on a 41-year-old heavyweight ex-boxer.
“A lot of pro boxers have made a lot of noise about how they would do in mixed martial arts, but nobody on the level of a James Toney has been willing to back up his talk,” UFC President Dana White said in a statement. “He’s a legend whose boxing record speaks for itself, and he’s a guy who I’ve got a lot of respect for.”
UFC recently announced a multifight deal for  Toney, who has been agitating for a UFC contract for awhile. He harangued White about it following UFC 108 in January, but recently dismissed a five-fight offer from the organization as “chump change.”
White last month criticized Strikeforce’s decision to put 47-year-old football veteran Herschel Walker on a televised card, but unlike Walker, Toney has plenty of experience in combat sports, with a 72-6-3 record as a boxer and major boxing titles at 160, 168 and 190 pounds. Ring magazine named Toney its Fighter of the Year in 1991 and 2003.
Regardless of how Toney or Walker perform for their respective organizations, signing past-their-prime athletes with no MMA experience harkens back to freak show fights in Japan and the earliest days of UFC tournaments.
If they succeed, critics can say the sport is a joke because middle-aged men can come in as rookies and win fights for the largest organizations. If they fail, it’s simply two old guys getting beat up for cheap thrills. It’s hard to see how either scenario helps a sport still trying to gain legitimacy in most of the world.
UFC doesn’t have any firm plans for Toney yet, but he won’t be treated as a carnival act, White told Yahoo Sports’ Kevin Iole:
“Hey, I don’t want this to be seen as a joke, and it’s not like Herschel Walker or Canseco or any of those guys. James Toney is a fighter. …
“We know how much talent he has as a boxer and he insists he’ll surprise people by how much MMA he knows. I’ve still got some thinking to do. … But James came to me and he literally chased me around the country to do it, so I’m giving him the chance.”
With thanks to USA Today
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