{"id":455421,"date":"2026-02-03T09:31:10","date_gmt":"2026-02-03T09:31:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/455421\/"},"modified":"2026-02-03T09:31:10","modified_gmt":"2026-02-03T09:31:10","slug":"should-daniel-cormier-be-removed-from-commentary-during-certain-fights","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/455421\/","title":{"rendered":"Should Daniel Cormier be removed from commentary during certain fights?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Australian Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) Middleweight Jacob Malkoun returned from a two-year layoff in emphatic fashion at UFC 325<\/a>, dominating Torrez Finney across three rounds to earn a unanimous decision inside Qudos Bank Arena in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. In the process, Malkoun handed Finney the first loss of his professional career.<\/p>\n

But according to Malkoun, the fight wasn\u2019t just against an undefeated opponent<\/a> \u2014 it also came with an unexpected wrinkle at the commentary desk.<\/p>\n

Former UFC Heavyweight champion Daniel Cormier was cageside calling the action, while simultaneously serving as Finney\u2019s coach. And Malkoun says he could hear it.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo be honest, I could hear him commentate when I was moving,\u201d Malkoun said during his post-fight media scrum. \u201cFor some reason in my brain, I was listening to my corner, but I could hear DC because I know he was coaching him. I\u2019m not letting this guy beat me because DC is in his corner. I was going to smash him.<\/p>\n

\u201cI couldn\u2019t lose a grappling exchange in front of him either. I wanted to show that I\u2019m better than his guy,\u201d Malkoun continued. \u201cJust him being there commentating, I\u2019m listening and wondering whose side you\u2019re on \u2014 because that\u2019s bias, you know what I mean? Commentate what you see. It is what it is.\u201d<\/p>\n

Finney relocated his entire training camp to Gilroy, California, ahead of UFC 325 and is currently training under Cormier, who has leaned back into coaching after his stint on The Ultimate Fighter. That relationship, combined with Cormier\u2019s role as a broadcaster, has reignited a familiar debate among fans and fighters alike.<\/p>\n

Should Cormier \u2014 or any commentator \u2014 be removed from the desk when one of their active fighters is competing?<\/p>\n

Cormier has faced accusations<\/a> of alleged favoritism toward former American Kickboxing Academy (AKA) teammates like Islam Makhachev and Khabib Nurmagomedov. However, those situations differed in that Cormier never actively coached them.<\/p>\n

Cormier has repeatedly dismissed claims of bias.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t mind addressing this whole bias thing. I think it\u2019s absurd,\u201d Cormier said previously. \u201cI\u2019ve called Khabib\u2019s fights, Luke Rockhold, Deron Winn, and Islam Makhachev. I\u2019ve called all of their fights, and I feel like I have done their opponents justice. I go out of my way to make sure that we do their opponents justice. I\u2019m a professional, and for as much as I love my teammates, I understand the difference to separate myself from that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Still, the optics of openly coaching a fighter while simultaneously calling their bout live may hit differently.<\/p>\n

Finney fell to 0-1 under Cormier and lost his undefeated record, while Malkoun improves to 5-3 inside the Octagon \u2014 and may have unintentionally reignited a debate the UFC can\u2019t ignore forever.<\/p>\n

For complete UFC 325 results and play-by-play, click here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Australian Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) Middleweight Jacob Malkoun returned from a two-year layoff in emphatic fashion at UFC…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":455422,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[570],"tags":[64,63,786,40762,785,85,188424,1396,6656,14855],"class_list":["post-455421","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mma","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-fighting","tag-latest-ufc-mma-news","tag-mma","tag-sports","tag-ufc-325","tag-ufc-news","tag-ufc-results","tag-videos"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/455421","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=455421"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/455421\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/455422"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=455421"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=455421"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=455421"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}