That’s despite the promotion announcing a full fight card for UFC 249, which is set to be headlined by an interim UFC lightweight championship fight between Tony Ferguson and Justin Gaethje on 18 April.
ESPN’s Brett Okamoto spoke with White after the UFC 249 fight card was announced and White didn’t reveal the location of the event and those that follow.
“On ESPN. On April 18th, live on ESPN,” White jokingly replied to Okamoto after being asked about the venue holding these fights.
“It doesn’t matter where it’s happening because nobody can go anyway. Nobody can show up and nobody can go. There are some media members who have reached out to me and do want to go and I’ll bring them.
“Other than that, it’s not open to the fans and it’s live on ESPN. That’s it. That’s all anybody needs to know.”
Okamoto pressed White and asked why he isn’t revealing the location of UFC 249.
“Because there are a lot of creepy people out there,” White retorted. “When they find out the location, they start attacking the location and make phone calls. This keeps the creeps at bay.”
One thing White did reveal to Okamoto is that he’s close to securing a private island which can serve as a location for fights involving international fighters in the future during this public health crisis. However, this won’t be the undisclosed location of UFC 249.
“I can tell you this, I am this close to getting a deal done,” White said to Okamoto. “The place where this fight is going to be on April 18th I have locked up for two months. We’re going to continue to pump fights out.
“I’ve also secured an island, I’ve got an island. The infrastructure is being built right now. We’re going to do all of our international fights on this island.
“So when we do this fight on April 18th, international and local… we’re going to start cranking. The UFC will be back up and running, internationally and here in the United States.”
This means that White expects the UFC schedule to resume from UFC 249, including an event on 25th April the week after the show set to be headlined by Ferguson and Gaethje.
“We’re going back-to-back-to-back. We’re getting back to our regular schedule,” White told Okamoto. “We will have postponed three fights, we’re going to make all those fights up and we will be back on schedule starting April 18th.”
White said those upcoming fight cards from 25th April onward are still under construction.