MMA News

Drake Riggs - August 15, 2018

If you thought that ‘The Spider’ was done when it came to MMA…then you better think again. The once middleweight king still has some fight left. After Anderson Silva received his one-year suspension from USADA recently, the time frame for the said suspension to end now lands in October.

Tom Taylor - August 15, 2018

Just days after it was announced that the UFC’s September 22 return to Sao Paulo, Brazil would be headlined by a light heavyweight bout between Jimi Manuwa and Glover Teixeira, Teixeira was forced out of the fight an injury. From there, the UFC began a frantic search for a replacement opponent for Manuwa. One of the options in this regard is middleweight knockout artist Thiago Santos, who has recently been flirting with a move up to Manuwa’s 205-pound light heavyweight home. According to a report from MMA Brasil’s Tarso Doria, however, Manuwa turned down this prospective bout with Thiago Santos.

Tom Taylor - August 15, 2018

Just days after it was announced that the UFC’s September 22 return to Sao Paulo, Brazil would be headlined by a light heavyweight contender bout between England’s Jimi Manuwa and Brazil’s Glover Teixeira, Teixeira was forced out of the fight an injury.  ”I visited (the doctor) before, but since I got injured again, I’ll see if something (got worse),” Teixeira told MMA Fighting of the shoulder injury that forced him out of the card. “We’ll see if I need surgery or only physical therapy. I think I’ll need surgery because I wanted to have surgery before.”

Tom Taylor - August 15, 2018

UFC Hall of Famers Chuck Liddell and Tito Ortiz are going to fight for a third time. They will do so in a fight promoted by retired boxer Oscar De La Hoya as part of the new Golden Boy MMA venture. That’s been clear for awhile. Yet while this polarizing fight itself has been official for some time, the date and setting have remained a mystery. Speaking to Fight Hub TV this week, Oscar De La Hoya provided a bit of clarity on that front.

Tom Taylor - August 15, 2018

Kamaru Usman has been angling for a fight with Colby Covington for some time. Unfortunately for him, the fight has not yet come to fruition. Speaking on Monday’s edition of The MMA Hour, Usman explained that, with UFC welterweight champ Tyron Woodley occupied with a UFC 228 title fight with Darren Till, he was hoping he might finally get to fight Covington on November 30.

Tom Taylor - August 15, 2018

Retired boxer Paulie Malignaggi, who is one of Conor McGregor‘s chief doubters, unsurprisingly gives the Irishman little chance in his UFC 229 lightweight title fight with Khabib Nurmagomedov. Speaking on SiriusXM Boxing this week Malignaggi broke down McGregor’s fight with Nurmagomedov, using his 2016 loss to Nate Diaz as a key reference. “Here’s the thing about Conor, I’ve said that he has no balls and he has a problem with this fight,” Malignaggi said (transcript via MMA Fighting). “Khabib is not a guy that will put you out of your misery. Remember the Nate Diaz fight, when he shot in on Nate Diaz and got submitted? Nate Diaz is a guy you don’t want to wind up on the ground with because he’s a black belt in jiu-jitsu and he’ll submit you right away. If you’re gonna fight Nate Diaz, you have to keep the fight standing up. In that fight against Nate Diaz though, he’s getting pummelled in round two and he’s probably gonna get pummelled for the rest of the fight, so what does he do? He needs a way out of it because he doesn’t want to get beat up for four straight rounds. So what does he do? He goes, ‘If I take this fight to the ground, Nate will submit me and then it won’t look like I quit.’ Because if you’re fighting Nate Diaz, common sense tells you that you don’t want to wind up on the ground. Conor is the one that took that fight to the ground. He shot in looking to take that fight to the ground. Why did he do that? Because he’s trying to quit. If Nate puts him in a submission, he can quit and then it looks like ‘Oh well, I had to tap out.’ But really the decision was made when he shot in that he was quitting already.”

Tom Taylor - August 15, 2018

Earlier this month, TJ Dillashaw defended the UFC bantamweight title with a first-round knockout his rival Cody Garbrandt. On the same night, Olympic gold medalist Henry Cejudo did the unthinkable, capturing the UFC flyweight title from seemingly unstoppable flyweight champ Demetrious Johnson. Since then, Dillashaw and Cejudo have flirted with the notion of fighting each other. At first, the idea was that Cejudo would move up to bantamweight to challenge Dillashaw. More recently, however, Dillashaw and his coach Duane Ludwig have implied interest in dropping to flyweight to fight Cejudo.

Tom Taylor - August 15, 2018

Grappling star Dillon Danis wants to grapple with UFC lightweight contender Kevin Lee. And not just for fun. Instead, Danis hopes to meet Lee on the mats in a sub-only contest, and broadcast it on Instagram Live. He proposes they both put up $100,000 cash, and the winner takes it all.

Drake Riggs - August 14, 2018

Before we could really even get all too excited about it, UFC Sao Paulo in September has already lost its main event due to injury. It was recently announced that the headliner for the September 22nd event would be a light heavyweight scrap between Jimi Manuwa and Brazil’s Glover Teixeira.

Drake Riggs - August 14, 2018

Shortly after new UFC flyweight Andrea Lee made her debut in May, some controversy involving her husband came to light. Now even worse news has surfaced. The initial controversy involving Lee’s husband Donny Aaron surfaced after fans noticed Aaron’s swastika and Nazi-related tattoos that were visible in pictures they had taken recently. In 2009 Aaron also happened to be found guilty and convicted of negligent homicide with a firearm resulting in time behind bars.

Drake Riggs - August 14, 2018

Are you planning on going to see “the biggest fight in MMA history” live and in person on October 6th? Well then get ready to shell out some cash. Everyone in MMA wants to see Khabib Nurmagomedov and Conor McGregor finally settle the score. And the UFC is aware of this as they’re going to try and capitalize on it in all ways to make it a success.

Drake Riggs - August 14, 2018

Feeling good feels good. So when proper recognition is received, especially in a solo sport such as fighting, it feels even better.

Tom Taylor - August 14, 2018

UFC welterweight champion Tyron Woodley will attempt his next title defense in the main event of UFC 228 on September 8, when he takes on undefeated British striker Darren Till. Originally, of course, it was expected that Woodley’s next title defense would pit him against current interim welterweight champion Colby Covington. Yet the UFC wanted to book the fight for UFC 228, and when Covington wasn’t able to accept that date, the promotion gave the shot to Till. Colby Covington believes that was a serious error on the UFC’s part. By his estimation, UFC 228 is doomed to be a pay-per-view disaster.

Tom Taylor - August 14, 2018

On August 4, the UFC took over the Staples Center in Los Angeles, California with UFC 227. The card featured two title fights: a bantamweight title rematch between champion TJ Dillashaw and challenger Cody Garbrandt, and a flyweight title rematch between long-time champion Demetrious “Mighty Mouse” Johnson and Olympic gold medalist Henry Cejudo. Despite the fact that this card featured two title fights, it was not expected to be much of a pay-per-view hit. Bantamweight and flyweight title fights are not typically big business for the UFC, and the rest of the card was not particularly stacked either.

Tom Taylor - August 14, 2018

Surging UFC lightweight contender Kevin Lee is hoping for a spot on the stacked UFC 229 lineup. Yet with Khabib Nurmagomedov, Conor McGregor, Dustin Poirier and Nate Diaz all booked up, his options in terms of opponents are fairly slim. Luckily for Kevin Lee former UFC lightweight champion Anthony Pettis is currently enjoying a career resurgence. Lee thinks that a fight with the former champ might be just what the doctor ordered. A big win over Pettis might even be enough to convince Georges St-Pierre, who he called out previously, that he’s a worthy opponent.

Tom Taylor - August 14, 2018

Extreme weight-cutting is one of the biggest problems in MMA at present. Not only is it incredibly dangerous, but it also frequently derails fight cards, as fighters often miss their marks and can’t compete at their contracted weights. Former UFC welterweight and middleweight champion Georges St-Pierre thinks he knows how to fix this problem. His ideal solution? What Chael Sonnen said.

Tom Taylor - August 14, 2018

Former UFC heavyweight Brendan Schaub is not impressed by the UFC’s affiliation with former NFL star Greg Hardy, who has recently been competing on Dana White’s Tuesday Night Contender Series as part of a developmental deal. In Schaub’s eyes, the efforts the UFC has put forth to promote Hardy would have been far better applied to World Series of Fighting veteran Nick Newell. “I just don’t understand. I don’t understand why he’s in that bulls**t Contender Series,” Schaub said of Hardy on his Below the Belt podcast (transcript via MMA Fighting). “They’re just doing it for views. They’re riding and dying on Greg Hardy which is hilarious. It just shows you the nature of the business and what you’re dealing with with Dana White being a promoter.

Drake Riggs - August 13, 2018

https://twitter.com/TonyFergusonXT/status/1029173733720616960 It was the saddest April’s Fools joke that wasn’t. No one wanted to believe it, but it was true. Tony Ferguson had gotten injured out of UFC 223’s main event.