A year and a half ago, the UFC held a Fight Night event in Seoul, South Korea headlined by Benson Henderson and Jorge Masvidal, the first UFC show to be held in the country. Other than that distinction, history largely views it as just another event in the UFC’s busy schedule. But if reports coming out of South Korea are true, it may now be known as the first UFC card to result in a criminal investigation into fight fixing.
According to major South Korean web portal Naver, an unnamed participant on the card made a deal with shady underground figures a police report refers to as ‘gambling brokers’ to lose his fight. The fighter was paid 100 million Won (about $88,000) to throw the match, $44,000 of which he reportedly bet on his opponent. The ‘brokers’ are said to have bet 2 billion Won (almost $2 million dollars) on the fight.
But that much money flooding the betting line on a minor undercard fight immediately sent up red flags with sportsbooks and the UFC itself. The promotion questioned the fighter regarding the suspicious amount of betting against him, and while he denied knowing anything about it at the time, the scrutiny caused him to change his mind on throwing the fight, which he ended up winning via decision.
We know this because that’s what he allegedly told the authorities after the people who bet on him losing started threatening to kill him. At that point he came clean about the whole scheme and now there is an open investigation by South Korean police into the matter.
While official news reports out of Korea have not released the fighter’s identity, it’s not hard to figure out who it may be based on the details provided in the story. There was only one Korean male on the card that won his fight by decision: Tae Hyun Bang, who defeated Leo Kuntz via split decision. There was also a massive last minute shift in the betting odds on his fight as well: Bang started off the fight a -180 favorite to +140 underdog Kuntz. But so much money came in on Kuntz in the days before the fight that he ended up a -475 favorite to Bang’s +225. The most movement you’ll typically see on a fight’s odds is around 20%. For Bang vs. Kuntz, the movement hit nearly 60 percent.
At this point, the UFC hasn’t commented on the story, and who knows … maybe they’re just learning about this right now, too. Since the UFC Fight Night: Seoul card at the end of 2015, Tae Hyun Bang has fought once more for the company once more in September of 2016. We doubt they’d allow him to compete for them again if they believed he tried to throw a previous fight fight. But if these reports coming out of Korea are correct and Bang is confirmed as the fighter in question, we imagine that will be the last we’ll ever see of him in the Octagon.
