Covington: Machida threatened to ‘f—k me up’ after post-fight interview

Colby Covington claims Lyoto Machida threatened violence against him for his lambasting Brazilians during his post-fight interview

UFC welterweight Colby Covington drew the ire of Brazilians for his post-fight interview on Saturday night in Sao Paulo. After defeating Demian Maia via unanimous decision, he decided to trash both Brazil and its people by addressing the crowd in attendance as “filthy animals” living in a “dump.”

The passionate people of Brazil, of course, did not take these words any lightly. As he made his way outside the arena floor, Covington was met with resounding boos, incendiary words, and random objects thrown at him by fans in the stands. As soon as he got to the backstage area, Covington was also apparently met by an insulted Lyoto Machida, whom he claimed threatened violence against him.

“When I went backstage there were still a lot of Brazilian people mad,” Covington said on MMAUno.com’s MMA Jim Podcast. “All the Brazilian fighters were like ‘F--k you, I’m going to kill you if I see you. You’re dead.’ Even Lyoto Machida was focused on me saying ‘You disrespected Brazil. F--k you, I’ll f--k you up.’ I was like, ‘why are you worried about me, you got a fight with Derek Brunson in two seconds?’”

“And like, he should know better than anybody that there’s going to be heels in this game and there are going to be people that play the villain role. He’s been around it a lot so he should know. He should’ve learned his lesson.”

Covington further argued that he should not be castigated since he feels that the likes of Chael Sonnen and Conor McGregor were able get away with far worse. He also believes that the issue is being blown out of proportion, especially after UFC officials brought it up to its code of conduct committee to discuss if a possible sanction would be implemented.

“I think it’s ridiculous, I can’t believe we’re even talking about this,” Covington said. “Chael and Conor, like what have they said? They’ve said like ten things, homophobic, racial.”

“I’m poking fun man. No one knows what happened to me on the walkout,” he continued. “They’re f----ng spitting at me, telling me I’m going to die, telling me f--k you and your mom and this and that. They’re throwing cups at me on the walkout, they tried to grab me as I walked out. I mean are you kidding me? I said they were filthy animals because they were being animals spitting at me and throwing stuff on me before the fight. This is on the walkout. But I’m the bad guy because I say the country is a dump?”

“You know, at the end of the day this is all just fun and games. I’ve got a lot of respect for Brazil. I don’t think this is a serious matter and we shouldn’t even be talking about any punishment.”