He called the people of Brazil “filthy animals”, he enraged fans by spoiling the ending to Star Wars: The Last Jedi and he said Kamaru Usman’s deceased former manager Glenn Robinson would be “watching from hell” when the pair fought.
His MAGA-hat wearing, larger-than-life Donald Trump acolyte persona certainly rubbed a lot of people up the wrong way, too.
However, while he was winding up all and sundry with his antics away from the cage, inside it he was producing the best performances of his career.
But that all changed on Saturday night when, despite fighting impressively, Covington was finally humbled.
The man dishing out the humbling was UFC welterweight champ Usman, who fought toe-to-toe with Covington before finishing him with 50 seconds to go after a pair of hard knockdowns and a plethora of ground strikes.
It meant Usman retained his UFC welterweight title and ensured Covington didn’t get his hands on the undisputed title. But even more appropriately, the man who spent the last two years running his mouth in a bid to enrage and upset so many people ended up with a broken jaw.
Colby Covington suffered a broken jaw against Kamaru Usman… #UFC245 https://t.co/k8wjhITZFz
— SMH (@BigSE5) December 15, 2019
That means he may well have to have his mouth wired shut. Oh, the irony.
Covington was always setting himself up for a fall. Polarising the fans the way he has left him with no wriggle room if he lost, and when he did lose to Usman at UFC 245 this weekend, his reaction was one of a spoilt child.
He charged out of the cage and ran backstage, nearly knocking over arena staffers in the process.
It remains to be seen where he’ll end up next.
Covington told me during the week that he’d love to face Georges St-Pierre or Khabib Nurmagomedov in a superfight. But now, thanks to Usman’s huge finish, Covington finds himself on the outside, looking in.
What happens next for him will be fascinating as we see whether Colby bounces straight back or looks to get out of the UFC and pursue opportunities in professional wrestling (he’s keen on joining the WWE).
It will also be interesting to see if he eases back, or simply bins off, his MAGA gimmick.
It helped him get to a title fight, but it didn’t help him win. And with half of MMA Twitter seemingly rejoicing at Covington’s future, it will be very interesting to see what’s next for the man known as “Chaos”.
Find a full range of odds on all these fights over on paddypower.com* All odds correct at time of posting.
