UFC president Dana White
UFC president Dana White
Elimination bouts return for 14th season of reality show
The Ultimate Fighter will once again feature elimination bouts that require competitors to fight their way into the vaunted reality show house.
Sources close to the show confirmed the news to HeavyMMA.com over the weekend.
The elimination round was removed prior to season 13. UFC President Dana White cited a smaller amount of episodes as the reason for eliminating the round and was not a fan of the removal. White pinpointed the blame on season 13’s lack of overall action and intensity on the lack of elimination round.
“We had other obstacles we were dealing with this season. I don’t even know if I should talk about this, but I will because I’m me,” White said. “In our deal with Spike for this season, we don’t have as many episodes as we’ve had in the past. So we figured we would be killing some of the reality and we wouldn’t have enough time to tell stories. We really made a big mistake in not having these guys fight to get into the house.”