MMA News

Tom Taylor - January 1, 2020

The Professional Fighters League (PFL) closed out its 2019 season on New Years Eve, meaning another group of fighters pocketed $1M prizes. In the card’s main event, Kayla Harrison won the lightweight championship by dominating Larissa Pachecho to a unanimous decision win.

Tom Taylor - January 1, 2020

Rampage Jackson tipped the scales at 265 pounds for his Bellator Japan-headlining showdown with fellow MMA legend Fedor Emelianenko. While that’s certainly not an unheard of weight for the heavyweight division, it was quite heavy for Rampage, who previously ruled the UFC’s 205-pound light heavyweight division. To make matters worse, Rampage lost this fight by first-round knockout, so the extra mass did little to benefit him.

Adam Martin - December 31, 2019

PFL’s CEO says that he expects the tournament-based promotion to make more free-agent signings after recently inking former Bellator welterweight champion Rory MacDonald. PFL recently signed MacDonald to a lucrative contract and he immediately became the biggest name on the entire PFL roster. He’s by far the biggest free-agent signing the company has made in its two years of existence.

Natasha Hooper - December 31, 2019

Michael Bisping recently down with co-host Luis J Gomez on his podcast to announce the long-awaited results of his Believe You Me 2019 awards. Here are the former middleweight champ’s awards:

Tom Taylor - December 31, 2019

CB Dollaway’s RIZIN debut, which went down on Tuesday’s action-packed RIZIN 20 card, didn’t go the way he had planned. Instead, the 20-fight UFC veteran was decimated by the promotion’s ferocious light heavyweight champion Jiri Prochazka in the first round. See Prochazka’s crushing knockout victory below (via Kyle Johnson on Twitter).

Harry Kettle - December 31, 2019

Patricky Freire secured his place in the final of the Lightweight Grand Prix wit a superb soccer kick knockout over Luiz Gustavo at RIZIN 20. Coming into the event the expectation was that Freire would be viewed as one of the favorites, especially after his dominant quarter-final win over Tatsuya Kawajiri back at RIZIN 19 in October. In the semis earlier this evening he was able to live up to the hype in a big way as he finished Gustavo off in less than half a minute.

Harry Kettle - December 31, 2019

The final fight card and lineup of the upcoming UFC 246 event in Las Vegas, Nevada has been confirmed. The highly anticipated fight card is set to go down at T-Mobile Arena on January 18 in what is expected to be the event that plays host to Conor McGregor’s return to the Octagon. McGregor, who will compete for the first time since his loss to Khabib Nurmagomedov at UFC 229 in October, 2018, will be going toe-to-toe with Donald “Cowboy” Cerrone who will be going in search of the biggest win of his career.

Tom Taylor - December 31, 2019

Early on Tuesday morning, RIZIN Fighting Federation promoted its final MMA card of the decade in RIZIN 20, and it was an absolute thriller. Topped by a bantamweight title fight between Kai Asakura, who recently stunned Kyoji Horiguchi, and Manel Kape, it also featured appearances from names like Tenshin Nasukawa, Seo Hee Ham, Rena Kubota, Patricky Freire, Jiri Prochazka, and CB Dollaway.

Adam Martin - December 30, 2019

According to a new report, top-ranked UFC middleweight contender Paulo Costa was the most-tested athlete on the UFC roster by USADA in 2019. Yahoo! Esportes recently reported that with 14 blood and urine tests, Costa was tested more than any other male fighter on the entire UFC roster by USADA. Women’s strawweight contender Claudia Gadelha tied Costa with 14 USADA tests as the most-tested female fighter on the UFC roster. That means both Costa and Gadelha were tested more than once a month over the last year — and they both passed all of their tests.

Cole Shelton - December 30, 2019

Dana White believes current UFC strawweight champion, Weili Zhang can be one of the biggest stars in UFC history. Zhang had a massive 2019 where she dominated Tecia Torres at UFC 235 and then headlined a UFC event in her home country of China. There, she was taking on Jessica Andrade for the title. She ended up knocking out the Brazilian out in under a minute to become the UFC champ.

Adam Martin - December 30, 2019

Top contender Yoel Romero asked UFC middleweight champion Israel Adesanya if he needs a pen to sign a reported fight contract against him. UFC president Dana White recently told ESPN that the UFC is planning on booking a middleweight title fight between Romero and Adesanya. Rumors out there have suggested that the bout could take place at UFC 248, which is set for March 7 at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada. The co-main event is set to be a women’s strawweight title bout between champion Weili Zhang and challenger Joanna Jedrzejczyk.

Adam Martin - December 30, 2019

UFC president Dana White confirmed that the promotion’s matchmakers are speaking to Nick Diaz about a possible comeback to the Octagon. Diaz has not fought since January 2015 when he fought Anderson Silva to a No Contest (originally a decision loss). He hasn’t fought since then but every so often his name comes back up for a possible comeback fight. Diaz recently remarked that he wants to return to the Octagon after five years away from it.

Adam Martin - December 30, 2019

UFC president Dana White has confirmed the promotion is working on booking UFC middleweight champion Israel Adesanya against Yoel Romero. For months we have heard rumors that Adesanya could fight Romero but so far nothing has been made official. White said that he didn’t have anything official to announce just yet, but hinted an announcement for Adesanya vs. Romero could come soon.

Tom Taylor - December 30, 2019

The UFC has always caught flack for fighter pay, which tends to pale in comparison to what athletes make in other similarly dangerous sports like boxing or football. According to UFC President Dana White, however, fighter pay has skyrocketed over recent years — in 2019 in particular.

Tom Taylor - December 30, 2019

Former Olympic judoka Kayla Harrison is a little over a day out from a championship clash with Larissa Pachecho. The winner of this bout, which headline the final Professional Fighters League (PFL) event of the year, will pocket a whopping $1M prize. In addition to this $1M prize, which is awarded to the champion of each weight class at the end of each PFL season, Harrison also has a lucrative, long-term contract with the league. She suspects this contract is among the most valuable in all of MMA. At the very least, Harrison believes she is probably the highest paid female fighter in the sport.

Natasha Hooper - December 30, 2019

Tyron Woodley has shut down Leon Edwards’ trash-talking on social media by threatening to withdraw from their anticipated fight. Earlier this month, it was announced that the former champ and No. 1 contender Woodley is being targeted for a fight against Leon Edwards at UFC London in March of 2020.

Harry Kettle - December 30, 2019

Over the weekend, Bellator made its debut in Japan with an action-packed card. This Bellator Japan card produced some memorable moments, but unfortunately, many of those moments didn’t make it onto our screens, as some segments of the card were not aired outside of Japan.  That included the Bellator Japan postlims. Thankfully, the beauty of the Internet ensured that fans were able to watch the highlights of the postlims from a retrospective point of view.

Tom Taylor - December 30, 2019

There are several MMA stars with claim to 2019’s Fighter of the Year honors. Two of those fighters are Jorge Masvidal and Henry Cejudo. Masvidal had an epic year, first rebounding from a two-fight losing-streak with a knockout of Darren Till, then producing a record-shattering, five-second knockout of Ben Askren, and lastly battering Nate Diaz to a doctor’s stoppage to earn the BMF title.