{"id":899336,"date":"2026-09-17T15:46:12","date_gmt":"2026-09-17T15:46:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/899336\/"},"modified":"2026-09-17T15:46:12","modified_gmt":"2026-09-17T15:46:12","slug":"arman-tsarukyan-reveals-the-career-he-wanted-before-mma","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/899336\/","title":{"rendered":"Arman Tsarukyan reveals the career he wanted before MMA"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Trending:<a class=\"exactmetrics-inline-popular-posts-title\" href=\"https:\/\/www.bjpenn.com\/mma-news\/jose-aldo\/jose-aldo-set-fighting-return-former-ufc-title-challenger\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Jose Aldo set for October 4th fighting return vs. former UFC title challenger<\/a><img decoding=\"async\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/Screenshot-2026-09-17-132527-Cropped-1024x576.jpg\" class=\"nlz w-full h-auto wp-post-image\" alt=\"Arman Tsarukyan\" fetchpriority=\"high\"   data-eio=\"p\"\/>arm_011 on Instagram<\/p>\n<p>UFC 331 star Arman Tsarukyan has revealed the career he initially wanted to pursue prior to getting involved in mixed martial arts.<\/p>\n<p>This weekend, Arman Tsarukyan will go head to head with Mauricio Ruffy. If he wins, which many believe he will, there\u2019s an excellent chance that he <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bjpenn.com\/mma-news\/ufc\/arman-tsarukyan-admits-he-may-never-get-title-shot-if-he-loses-ufc-331-bout-against-mauricio-ruffy\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">will go on to fight<\/a> for the UFC lightweight championship \u2013 something fans have been expecting to see for a while now.<\/p>\n<p>RELATED: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bjpenn.com\/mma-news\/mauricio-ruffy\/mauricio-ruffy-toughest-rival-predicts-win-arman-tsarukyan-ufc-331\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Mauricio Ruffy\u2019s toughest rival predicts win over Arman Tsarukyan at UFC 331<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Arman Tsarukyan is certainly a polarizing figure among many mixed martial arts fans, but nobody can deny that he is one of the most naturally talented fighters the division has seen in a long time.<\/p>\n<p>In a recent interview, though, Arman Tsarukyan let the masses know that he had another passion when he was younger.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p>Arman Tsarukyan discusses original career desire<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI wanted to be a hockey player,\u201d Tsarukyan told MMA Junkie and other reporters at a pre-fight news conference Wednesday. \u201cMy dream was to go to the U.S. and play in the NHL. But I couldn\u2019t be a good hockey player, and then I started working. I didn\u2019t like working, and I became a fighter. Because of fighting, now I\u2019m in U.S. and fighting in the best promotion in UFC. My hockey career was so good. I love hockey and when I have time even now sometimes I play.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI like (Alexander) Ovechkin,\u201d Tsarukyan said.<\/p>\n<p>Arman went on to touch on what could happen if he picks up the win on Saturday night.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cYeah, 100 percent,\u201d Tsarukyan said of what his odds are of fighting for gold should he win Saturday.<\/p>\n<p>Quotes via <a href=\"https:\/\/mmajunkie-eu.usatoday.com\/story\/sports\/ufc\/2026\/09\/16\/ufc-331-arman-tsarukyan-nhl-player-origin-media-day\/91801215007\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">MMA Junkie<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Do you believe Tsarukyan will fight for a UFC world title at some point in the next twelve months? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below, BJPENN Nation!<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-1 mt-0 os-source\">This article appeared first on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bjpenn.com\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">BJPENN.COM<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Trending:Jose Aldo set for October 4th fighting return vs. former UFC title challengerarm_011 on Instagram UFC 331 star&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":899337,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[444],"tags":[49,48,641,638,82],"class_list":["post-899336","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mma","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-fighting","tag-mma","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/899336","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=899336"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/899336\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/899337"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=899336"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=899336"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=899336"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}