UFC lightweight competitor Al Iaquinta made his return to the octagon last weekend, two years past his most recent fight. The fighter put on a dominant performance in the co-main event of UFC Fight Night 108 on Saturday.
Al Iaquinta scored a first round knockout over Diego “The Nightmare” Sanchez, making him the first fighter to knock “The Nightmare” out cold. Still, Iaquinta was met with a series of boos after his performance. Following the event, the fighter took to Twitter to blast the UFC.
Now, Iaquinta has appeared on The MMA Hour podcast to explain himself. As it turns out, the fighter was not awarded a “performance of the night” award bonus for the bout and it left him quite irked.
As transcribed by MMA Mania, “I don’t know whether they didn’t give it to me because I didn’t deserve it or whether they didn’t give it to me to kind of shaft me. They said in the past I wasn’t eligible to win bonuses, and maybe they are just sticking it to me. The whole bonus thing is just retarded to me; excuse me, the whole bonus thing is just ridiculous. The fact that they are giving $50,000 bonuses is their little way to control everybody. I don’t know, I don’t like it, the way the whole thing happened.”
Following suit, Iaquinta explained “For a guy that puts it out there like me, they should, I don’t know. I’ve never had a boring fight, I come to fight every time, I put on a show. Five fights in a row, four knockouts in the last five, and no bonus money, no (expletive), nothing. They suck. Whatever.”
“Joe Lauzon, the bonus king, I knocked out the bonus king to get a bonus and nothing. Diego Sanchez, the guy is a legend that’s been around forever and how many bonuses has he won? I beat him and no bonus. (expletive) them.” He said.
Ragin' Al Iaquinta on #TheMMAHour "And [Dana White] gonna say 'the best part is the ride home'? Kidding me? Go f*** yourself." pic.twitter.com/cdy93adTqI
— MMAFighting.com (@MMAFighting) April 24, 2017