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Fighters react to Covington's 'bad guy' persona ahead of UFC 245

Josh Hedges / UFC / Getty

Colby Covington took over a "bad guy" persona, as he describes it, when the UFC threatened not to re-sign him - win or lose - leading up to his October 2017 fight with Demian Maia. "Chaos" says the promotion wasn't a fan of his style or personality.

So, after Covington beat Maia in Sao Paulo, he called Brazil "a dump" and its fans "filthy animals," a promo that he believes saved his career and marked the beginning of Covington as we know him today - a Donald Trump-loving heel who's made far more enemies in this sport than friends.

Ahead of his welterweight title fight against champion Kamaru Usman at UFC 245 on Saturday, theScore asked some fighters what they think of Covington's persona.

Max Holloway, featherweight champion: It is what is. He gonna do his persona. That's him, and that's his character. That's what he thinks he needs to get to a certain spot. Fair shake to him. Just like the way I dress, my shoes. Some people love my shoes, many people don't like certain shoes, but then half the people like it. It's just your taste. He's doing him. Good for him.

Alexander Volkanovski, featherweight title challenger: That's where he wants everyone to be. That's success to him. If there's cameras around him for hating him, that's success. He's playing the bad guy on purpose. I made him break yesterday, you see that? Did you see that? I made him break. He broke character. That's the thing - it just shows you that, look, man, he's probably a nice guy. I guarantee you his family and friends know exactly who he is, and he knows that, so he can be like, 'All of you can hate me, I know my family knows who I am.' If that's the case, good on him.

Matt Brown, welterweight: Good for him. He's playing a character, admittedly so. And he's getting paid, doing a good job at it. Good for him. He's crossed the line a couple times, I think. He doesn't seem to have a boundary, and that's my main issue with it. ... He was friends with Jorge, and now they're not friends because of a couple of paychecks or something. I'm not about that life, but that's his path, that's what he wants to do. Good for him, man. He's making more money than me, so what can I say?

Ben Saunders, welterweight: His legacy is going to be known as trash. There's a way to talk. You got the Chael Sonnens, and you got the people that do it in good humor that have people understand that it's funny. And then you got someone like him, who chose a path and chose a role that, honestly, dude, if you die and the world finds out and they all just meme you and possibly laugh, I think you're living your life wrong.

Chase Hooper, featherweight: I feel like you have to take the entertainment aspect of it. He was about to get cut before he kinda started his act, so you gotta kinda respect him for that, for finding what works for him. Some people like to be that guy and he fills that role pretty well. I kinda look at people more for their fighting style, and it's not my preferred type of style, but he's got world-class fighting, obviously, because of where he's at right now.

Gilbert Burns, welterweight: I have no hate for nobody. I think he's doing his job. He's doing good. I still get the animosity, that he talked so much shit about Brazil, I get it. But he still gotta pay for that. I don't have no hate, I hope he does good in his career, but ... I gotta face him once. I gotta fight Colby once.

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