When the UFC unveiled its custom Freedom 250 kits ahead of its historic White House event, Ariel Helwani and his panel on The Ariel Helwani Show did not hold back. The reaction was immediate and unsparing, with Helwani leading the charge against what he and his co-hosts described as a deeply disappointing design effort.
“These are a*s. Be for real,” one of the panel members said. The panel wasted no time zeroing in on the aesthetics.
Another member said, “The white is just like, dude, they’re looking at like some basic kits with like some stripes on them. It’s really bad. Like, honestly, this is terrible.”
Helwani agreed, saying, “It’s really bad.”
Beyond the look of the kits, Helwani took issue with the concept of non-American MMA stars being outfitted in Stars and Stripes-themed gear.
“Every time we get a new kit, a variation on a kit, it’s just a redesigning of swapping color palettes and moving stuff around,” a member said.
Helwani agreed and continued, “It’s particularly weird because it’s American. It’s very American and I understand, but I kind of feel like only the Americans should wear it.”
He pointed specifically to stars like Ilia Topuria and Alex Pereira as glaring examples of the disconnect. “Topuria should not be wearing American colors… It just seems weird to see Ilia in those colors or Alex in those colors.”
Helwani pushed back against the idea that the White House setting justified the design choices. “It just seems a little bit out of touch to be like, ‘Yeah, guys, you’re competing on these. You got to wear the…’ You know what it looks like? It looks like they’re wearing like a World Cup jersey.”
A panel member also offered an alternative vision. “In my humble opinion, the way that they could have made this cool was their own kits and some kind of like patch, or what the NBA does, like a Freedom 250 version. A variation of what they have existing.”
Helwani also floated special gloves as another option, adding, “These dudes wearing shorts in there that have stars and stripes that aren’t from America, to me, seems weird. There’s enough Americans on this card where they would have stood out.”
