Several factors, some public and some private, led to the development of a bittersweet relationship between former UFC champion Demetrious Johnson and company boss, Dana White. However, ‘Mighty Mouse’ recently revealed that he also received some genuinely practical advice from his former employer, which he believes played a major role in post-fighting career success.

How’s life after fighting? That’s been an important question for fighters in the MMA space. It’s a documented fact that the difference in the payouts between the biggest and lowest draws is enormous. To sustain life after fighting, Demetrious Johnson, on his YouTube channel, claims Dana White, who’s often under fire for fight pay issues, taught him to extend his reach to the masses through social media during a massive fighter meetup, which in turn, proved to work in his favor after he hung his gloves up. “Use social media. It’s incredible. It costs you nothing,” White stated many years ago.

Claiming that he’s grateful for the advice Demetrious, Johnson said, “That’s one thing I will say that I appreciate about Dana White. Every year, we’d do UFC Fighter Summit, and he’ll bring the fighters all together, all of us, and we’d all share stories.” The former flyweight champion also added that there were certain issues that Hall of Famer Donald Cerrone went through financially, and such stories would pop up during these meetings. Dana White would end up explaining to his contracted fighters that, for them, trying to stuff as much money as possible in their bank accounts should take more precedence than worrying too much about what happens inside the Octagon.

“Dana White says, ‘Fighting’s a small, small piece of your life. Very small’. He goes, ‘You guys need to make as much money as possible and then you need to save it for a rainy day’.” Demetrious Johnson further quoted White stating, “‘Because, after it’s all done and said, you have 40 years to live out your life. Learn how to build your brand. Be ready for that next step in life.'”

In addition to that, the 11-time defending former UFC champion revealed that Dana White preferred to keep things real with his fighters from the very onset of their UFC run apart from motivating them to be the best versions of themselves as athletes. “He was telling us this right when we got in the f***ing organization! He was not like, ‘You’re going to be the best fighter.’ I mean, he did that too, but he was also a realist,” Demetrious Johnson added.

Dana White’s advice clearly worked out for Demetrious Johnson, who built quite a large presence on social media, especially YouTube. His channel, ‘Mighty’, is about to hit a million subscribers as we speak. Moreover, it has been years since he had that uncomfortable relationship with the UFC CEO. As Johnson recently announced his retirement, White shared a few words of praise for ‘DJ’ and a guaranteed spot on the list of his promotion’s best ever.

Demetrious Johnson gets Dana White’s approval for a spot in the Hall of Fame

Dana White claims that he never had any personal issues with the greatest flyweight champion in history. He even went on to claim, during an interview, that he was the one who tried to shield ‘Mighty Mouse’ from the criticism of the MMA community. “When he was here, I was defending him from the fans… Good for him. You know, incredible career he had. I’ve never had a problem with Demetrious Johnson,” Dana White told Grind City Media.

But then the real question came. Given how much Demetrious Johnson has achieved in his career, in and outside the UFC, and being an icon of the sport, it shouldn’t be an issue to place him in the Hall of Fame. But what does Dana White feel? Well, he’s in the affirmative as the UFC CEO responded to that query by simply stating, “Absolutely.”

Demetrious Johnson was recently called out for a title fight against Alexandre Pantoja, and Dana White kind of liked the idea. But ‘Mighty Mouse’ claims to be done fighting and is rather interested in pursuing BJJ competitions. But what do you think? Could Johnson come back for one big fight for the biggest UFC payday of his career? Let us know in the comments down below.