Daniel Cormier and Josh Thomson argue over how the UFC is handling coronavirus pandemic

Daniel Cormier and Josh Thomson, teammates at American Kickboxing Academy, argued on social media over the UFC’s handling of the coronavirus outbreak.

The UFC is the only major sports league who is still holding its events while the rest of the sporting world has gone into lockdown due to the coronavirus pandemic. Even Bellator, who currently employs Thomson, postponed its recent Bellator 241 event. The UFC, meanwhile, decided to go ahead with its card in Brasilia, which led to a little spat between Cormier and Thomson on Twitter.

While the UFC had its fighters compete in order to earn their paychecks, Bellator decided to postpone its event and still pay its fighters anyways. That led to Thomson tweeting that he had three UFC fighters reach out to him asking how much the Bellator fighters got paid, leading to Cormier saying the fighters wanted to still fight. Thomson didn’t agree with what Cormier had to say about it, and the two got into a little argument on Twitter. Check out below how it played out.

You’re wrong, every fighter on that card and even the ones that weren’t on that card sent out appreciation to @ScottCoker for what he did for our athletes by paying them their full purses. Athletes need to be protected from themselves sometimes, u should know this more than most

— Josh Thomson (@THEREALPUNK) March 15, 2020

“Josh, the fighters wanna fight josh. Hats off to Coker and crew yesterday but those fighters wanted to fight. That’s what they do! I see what you’re doing Thomson,” Cormier wrote.

“You’re wrong, every fighter on that card and even the ones that weren’t on that card sent out appreciation to @ScottCoker for what he did for our athletes by paying them their full purses. Athletes need to be protected from themselves sometimes, u should know this more than most,” Thomson replied.

The back-and-forth is interesting because of Cormier and Thomson being long-time teammates at AKA. At the same time, Cormier works for the UFC while Thomson works for Bellator. Clearly, both men have other vested interests at heart here with their comments. At the end of the day, both men made good points. The fighters do want to fight, but Coker did do the right thing and pay them regardless, an option the UFC probably should have given its athletes as well.

Who do you side more with on this issue, Daniel Cormier or Josh Thomson?