The whole MMA community came together to pray for former UFC fighter Ben Askren, who recently went through a near-death experience. The welterweight veteran had to undergo a double lung transplant, which was successful, and the good news brought relief to a lot of Askren fans. But now, the fans may not side with him after a recent report emerged about ‘Funky’ being involved in a crypto scam.

Well, as good a person as Ben Askren is usually known to be, it may come as a surprise that he would scam someone for money. But according to a report from decrypt, the former UFC fighter collaborated with a meme coin creator named Sahil Arora, who has over a million followers on Instagram. If we take a look at the meme coin creator in question, he appears to have deep connections with some of the biggest celebrities in the world.

While there was nothing shady on Sahil Arora’s social media accounts, it was he who spoke about the crypto controversy. Ben Askren shared a tweet promoting a Solana meme coin that rugged a lot of investors. “Always play to win in life, you can bounce back from anything with conviction! $100 in SOL or USDC if you play,” his tweet read. As fans started to wonder if ‘Funky’s account had been hacked, Arora would tell the aforementioned media outlet that he had paid the former fighter an undisclosed amount of money to promote the coin.

The meme coin creator has collaborated with many other celebrities, and in the case of Ben Askren, the money he got paid, according to Sahil Arora, was to help him cater to his medical bills. Well, so far, there has been no response to these allegations of what people are claiming to be a “rug-pull” from Askren’s media team, nor from his wife, who had been very active on social media while sharing updates on his medical condition recently.

Recent fan discussion on X (formerly Twitter) and Reddit shows outrage at the timing of the promotion: many initially assumed Askren’s account had been hacked given his vulnerable condition. One user wrote, “Whoever hacked Ben after everything… is a S–MBAG.” Others questioned whether he fully understood what he was promoting amid recovery.

Ben Askren’s tweet is still available on his profile on X, as we wait to hear his side of the story. Meanwhile, this is not the first time a UFC fighter has found himself in a crypto deal gone wrong. Not too long ago, UFC middleweight title contender Khamzat Chimaev also found himself in such a mess.

Before Ben Askren, it was Khamzat Chimaev

As we all know, Khamzat Chimaev loves to talk about ‘smashing’ his opponents, and as such, a meme coin by the name SMASH came to the fore last year. ‘Borz’ shared a tweet similar to Ben Askren, where he promoted the coin. And guess what? Chimaev even wanted to be sure if investing in meme coins was the right move, asking fans on social media for advice.

Well, the Chechen-born star went ahead with it, urging fans to buy the SMASH coin, but things turned out for the worse. Many people lost their invested amounts, as the coin’s value plummeted to zero. After this happened, reports surfaced, claiming Chimaev’s coin was a classic case of ‘pump and dump’, which resulted in a scam involving millions of dollars.

Later, Khamzat Chimaev acknowledged that his management was to blame. We still haven’t heard anything from Ben Askren concerning his support of the Solana coin. While we wait for him to respond, please leave a comment below with your thoughts.