‘Disheartened’ Alex Pereira Clears Air Around ‘Hack’ And Tweet Attack on UFC

Alex Pereira rose in the ranks as the UFC’s fastest two-weight titelholder. Pereira’s record-setting PPV title defense at UFC 307 came at 175 days. Ronda Rousey had the previous quickest turnaround between 3 defenses at 189 days. The UFC LHW also saved face when big superstars pulled out, and pitched in on short camps at UFC 300 and UFC 303.

Matter of fact, Jamaha Hill, who was an 11th-hour-esque rival at UFC 300 PPV along with Pereira, took umbrage that the UFC LHW class got a ‘D-‘ ESPN rank. Jiri Procházka and Aleksandar Rakic were also part of the PPV late prelims at UFC 300.

‘Poatan’ himself acted as a saving grace many times, and recently, it felt like Pereira and UFC weren’t on the same page. Back in May, Alex Pereira shared on his X handle that he was “disheartened” by the UFC Execs. This was due to the fact that, subsequent to a title snub, Procházka could have challenged the title against Magomed Ankalaev at UFC 317 PPV, but he decided not to fight.

The post also expressed Pereira’s retirement plans, given he thought he’d rematch Ankalaev for the light heavyweight gold he lost. Pereira later said he was hacked; now, he regressed that he actually wasn’t:

A little bit was miscommunication because I kind of found out through social media… I was kind of upset [then] when it happened…that’s why I sent a Twitter but I regretted it. I was wrong because I didn’t know the talks that [were] going on. It’s kind of miscommunication between camp, manager, and the UFC.

Alex Pereira told on “The Ariel Helwani Show’ for ‘Uncrowned’, via his translator Plinio Cruz

Newly crowned UFC light heavyweight king Ankalaev has lofty goals ahead in mind. All the while, he poked that Pereira was still splintered due to his fame and wouldn’t even make a PPV title rematch and would rather duck it out. Then came the UFC 320: Ankalaev vs Pereira 2 PPV main event booking for October 4th.

That necessitated that Pereira come clean and back into the good graces of the UFC brass. This is a chance to get back to his former glory, and he credited it to miscommunication as to why he lashed out. Recently, Women’s SW Mackenzie Dern also highlighted some miscommunication where she wasn’t straightforwardly told she’d fight for UFC undisputed gold.

Former champ Pereira says he is on good terms with the brass now. But, unlike Dern, Pereira’s case of mild pettiness is different, and one UFC legend even predicted as much: that he was never hacked.

UFC analyst billed Alex Pereira ‘a liar’ about being hacked

Alex Pereira went more than just viral when a tweet went live with him saying UFC Execs/matchmakers “played with me” for a possible title snub during IFW Festivities. It was a do-or-die situation that Poatan made an immediate title rematch against Ankalaev to get back to his glory days.

Pereira had wanted to take advantage of the apparent “emotional” Big Ank for constantly poking him for a fight. Instead, an Akhmat FC Light Heavyweight Grand Prix winner and Combat Sambo master, Ankalaev is quite the prolific wrestler and stuffed down Pereira’s efforts quite easily.

The wrestling holes in Alex Pereira’s game have never been as vibrant, and he wanted to change the narrative. However, he said there was no UFC dispute, and he didn’t send out a tweet, fearing a PPV top spot defense went to Procházka instead.

It’s not uncommon for such major accounts with Cloudflare backups to get phished. But Daniel Cormier was not keen on buying this narrative.

First off, Pereira’s a liar…Pereira might’ve tweeted something, and then somebody called him and was like, ‘Yo, calm down [Chill]’… So, I don’t believe the, …this, this hack thing, bro. It’s too convenient. It was too specific. I’m saying it publicly.

Daniel Cormier on his ‘Good Guy/Bad Guy’ Show (@ESPNMMA)

The topic came up when UFC CBO/litigator Hunter Campbell paid a visit to Dagestan to discuss Islam Makhachev’s trajectory forward and entry into the UFC welterweight scene. Along with him, manager Rizvan Magomedov also reps Ankalaev and rumors went rampant that a LHW title booking would come during International Fight Week. Cormier surmised that is why Pereira lashed out.

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