Muhammad Mokaev says leaving the UFC should not mean having to fight for a reputation afterward. The former flyweight contender accused the promotion on Tuesday of damaging departing athletes’ prospects with other organisations, responding to the decision not to offer undefeated bantamweight Farid Basharat a new contract.
Mokaev’s criticism went beyond whether Basharat deserved another fight. He alleged that officials warn athletes against wrestling-heavy performances, then describe departing fighters in ways that could discourage another promoter from signing them. Those are Mokaev’s allegations, not established findings about the UFC’s conduct.
“When fighters are getting phone calls from bosses telling them, ‘If you keep wrestling like that, you’re going to get cut,’ then you’re basically telling fighters how you want them to fight,” Mokaev wrote on X, according to Danny Segura’s MMA Junkie report carried by Yahoo Sports.
He then asked whether that amounted to influencing competition. The published remarks did not identify the recipients of the alleged calls or provide recordings or correspondence that would independently establish what officials told them.
That evidentiary gap matters because the dispute contains two different questions: why a fighter was not retained, and whether public comments about him were justified. An unbeaten record answers neither question by itself, although it explains why Basharat’s departure has attracted attention.
Basharat finished his UFC run with seven wins and no defeats, and a 16-0 professional record. His last appearance came against John Garza at UFC 329 in July, after which the promotion did not re-sign him, Alexander K. Lee reported in an account also published by Yahoo Sports.
The distinction is important: the reporting describes a completed contract followed by non-renewal, not a dismissal while fights remained on that agreement. Basharat believes his style and lack of finishes contributed to the decision.
UFC chief executive Dana White has offered a different explanation, while leaving its substance undisclosed. MMA Junkie reported that White said there was “definitely a reason” Basharat was not re-signed and that it had nothing to do with his fighting style. That position does not resolve Mokaev’s separate allegation about reputational damage.
Mokaev’s argument is that a promotion can choose not to retain someone without attaching a damaging public characterisation to the departure. “Release fighters if you want. Just don’t try to damage their careers on the way out,” he wrote.
Combat Sports Today shared his criticism, attributing the remarks to Mokaev:
Mokaev has his own history behind the complaint. His UFC run also ended in 2024 despite seven victories without a defeat. The promotion’s official record of his appearances lists a unanimous-decision win over Manel Kape at UFC 304 on July 27, 2024, as his final UFC contest.
That record also complicates any shorthand description of Mokaev as a fighter who merely controlled opponents without finishing them. Four of his seven UFC victories came by submission, against Cody Durden, Malcolm Gordon, Jafel Filho and Tim Elliott. The other three were decisions.
There was also more to his final UFC appearance than the result. Lee’s report recounts a fight-week altercation with Kape in which Mokaev admitted throwing the first punch. That context belongs alongside the unbeaten record, rather than being omitted from an account of his departure.
The comparison with Basharat is therefore strongest on the narrow point both men share: winning every UFC appearance did not secure another contract. It does not establish that the same circumstances drove both decisions.
The Yahoo Sports reports reviewed for this article do not include a new UFC response specifically addressing Mokaev’s Tuesday allegations. White’s earlier comments explain the promotion’s stated position on Basharat’s fighting style, but the underlying reason for the non-renewal remains undisclosed in those accounts.
