{"id":417881,"date":"2026-01-16T23:17:11","date_gmt":"2026-01-16T23:17:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/417881\/"},"modified":"2026-01-16T23:17:11","modified_gmt":"2026-01-16T23:17:11","slug":"stephen-thompson-teases-ufc-retirement-at-upcoming-white-house-card","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/417881\/","title":{"rendered":"Stephen Thompson teases UFC retirement at upcoming White House card"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Former UFC welterweight title challenger Stephen Thompson envisions a huge send-off for his final appearance in the Octagon.<\/p>\n<p>UFC fan favorite Stephen Thompson is likely on the last leg of his MMA career after losses in five of his last six fights. He hasn\u2019t fought since a controversial split decision loss to Gabriel Bonfim last July, after back-to-back stoppage defeats to Shavkat Rakhmonov and Joaquin Buckley.<\/p>\n<p>Despite his recent struggles in the Octagon, the 42-year-old Thompson wants to fight at least one more time before considering retirement. His next fight will be the final bout on his current UFC contract, with a potential re-signing uncertain.<\/p>\n<p>As of this writing, Thompson <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bjpenn.com\/mma-news\/stephen-thompson\/stephen-thompson-reveals-plans-for-ufc-comeback-fight\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">hasn\u2019t been booked for his next Octagon appearance<\/a>, despite some recent callouts from around the welterweight division. As 2026 kicks off for the UFC next week, Thompson publicly called for the UFC matchmakers to get him on the upcoming White House card for a final sendoff.<\/p>\n<p>Stephen Thompson: I want retirement fight at the UFC White House event<\/p>\n<p>In a recent interview with <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=1pGwz1c424s\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">MiddleEasy<\/a>, Thompson revealed his UFC plans and called for his last hurrah on the White House lawn.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI don\u2019t have anything scheduled yet. There is a fight card \u2014 I have one fight left on my contract, and I want to see it through. Everybody\u2019s trying to get on it, obviously, the White House card,\u201d Thompson said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThat would be a prime time to really lay down the gloves,\u201d he continued. \u201cThat would be my dream, right there. I feel like I can keep going, man. But it\u2019s really what the UFC wants. If they don\u2019t want me, I understand.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf they decide to allow me to keep going, I\u2019ll keep going.\u201d (h\/t <a href=\"https:\/\/bloodyelbow.com\/2026\/01\/16\/ex-ufc-title-challenger-plans-to-retire-from-mma-at-the-white-house-if-not-offered-a-new-contract\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Bloody Elbow<\/a>)<\/p>\n<p>Thompson is one of several top names to call for spots on the upcoming White House card. Conor McGregor, Jon Jones, and Kayla Harrison are a few top names to express profound interest in fighting in Washington D.C.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Former UFC welterweight title challenger Stephen Thompson envisions a huge send-off for his final appearance in the Octagon.&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":417882,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[570],"tags":[64,63,786,785,85,114272,787,19542],"class_list":{"0":"post-417881","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mma","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-fighting","11":"tag-mma","12":"tag-sports","13":"tag-stephen-thompson","14":"tag-ufc","15":"tag-white-house"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/417881","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=417881"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/417881\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/417882"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=417881"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=417881"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=417881"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}