There has been a new zero tolerance trash-talking policy put in place at American Top Team (ATT), after one of the gym’s top fighters, Colby Covington, broke a promise with his manager, and owner of the gym, Dan Lambert.
Colby broke the promise when he spoke poorly about Dustin Poirier, once again, while making his rounds with multiple media outlets, last week. This came after he and Poirier had already made a deal with Lambert, that they would not say anything negative about each other anymore.
“It’s something I should have done a long time ago, my bad,” said Lambert, in an interview with John Lynch, on The Score MMA podcast. “I think I probably under estimated the effect it would have on you know, other coaches, and other training partners, and you know, just some bad vibes. So, finally got around to it. Better late than never.”
Despite Covington apologizing immediately after, in an interview with the guys at Submission Radio, Lambert decided it was time that he took a stand, to ensure this kind of mistake didn’t happen again.
Lynch wanted to clarify whether this policy was put in place before, or after Colby’s media rounds, last week.
“It took place after,” said Lambert. “Kinda had a calm period in the gym where things had slowed down a little bit, and kinda out of sight, out of mind,” he added. “Then, you know, he just opened up some old wounds again, and I decided it was time. I talked to some of the coaches, and I said, let’s take a stand on this one.”
Lambert had some choice words when referring to Covington, and the newly implemented zero tolerance trash-talking policy.
“There’s plenty of fish in the sea out there,” said Lambert. “There’s plenty of people that Colby can shit on. You know. I mean, he can go talk all the sh*t he wants on Usman, and everybody else in the division that he wants to fight. But unless you have a bout agreement to fight someone else in this gym, shut the fu*k up.”
Lambert admitted that depsite his previous position he took on Covington’s trash-talking tendencies, it’s “team first,” moving forward.
“Nobody’s bigger than the team, and I gotta take the team first. It’s don’t talk trash on anybody on the team, or just go find another place to train. There’s no middle ground. There’s really no place to negotiate on that.”
It is clear that Lambert means business. With Covington having drama with multiple fighters and coaches in the gym, time will be the ultimate test in seeing whether he can keep himself out of trouble moving forward, or if he will end up having to seek out a new place to train in the near future.
