Brock Lesnar Returning to UFC, According to Dana White

Yep: Dana White, the president and chief mouthpiece of the Ultimate Fighting Championship, said in an interview on Fox Sports tonight that Brock Lesnar will be returning to UFC.

This isn’t the best timing for that news to get out to the public, of course. This upcoming Sunday Lesnar will be wrestling in the main event of WWE’s WrestleMania 34, defending his WWE Universal Championship against Roman Reigns. Lesnar’s desire to return to MMA, and general disinterest in pro wrestling, has become the focal point of the build to that match, with his manager Paul Heyman straight up saying on Raw this week that Lesnar would leave WWE for UFC if he lost at WrestleMania. Lesnar’s departure has seemed more and more likely the closer we get to his big match with Reigns, so what White said isn’t exactly a surprise.

It’s easy to read too much into this, though. Dana White absolutely told Fox Sports tonight that Brock Lesnar would be coming back to UFC. There’s video embedded below to prove it. He didn’t say when Lesnar was returning, though, or if he’d be working exclusively for UFC. It’s possible White means that Lesnar will return some day, in the future, whenever the two sides work out a deal. Perhaps he means that Lesnar might have another one-off UFC fight on loan from WWE, as happened with UFC 200 in 2016. Maybe he’s just speaking out of confidence or hope that he’ll definitely be able to sign Lesnar after losing out to WWE three years ago. Or maybe White means what many people want the headline to mean, that after dropping the WWE Universal Championship to Roman Reigns at WrestleMania on Sunday the free agent Brock Lesnar will be signing a deal to return full-time to UFC. If Lesnar is serious about a full return to MMA, he pretty much needs to make it happen now; he turns 40 in July and the window to be an effective fighter typically doesn’t stay open too much longer after that milestone.

Expect White to be asked to clarify his statement many times over the next few days, as UFC prepares for a big show on Saturday night. In the meantime check out White’s interview on Fox Sports below.

“Yeah, Brock Lesnar’s coming back.”

— Dana White with the HUGE @ufc news pic.twitter.com/YXUtn0uUxE

— FOX Sports (@FOXSports) April 5, 2018