MMA News

Justin Golightly - December 27, 2017

We are just a few days away from the biggest women’s MMA fight since Holly Holm first took the bantamweight title away from Ronda Rousey back in 2015. Holm will take on Cris Cyborg in a huge main event with the featherweight title on the line. The comparisons to the approaching moment has not been lost on the Jackson Wink fighter or her coaches. A win here not only would make Holly Holm a two-division UFC champion, but also the best female fighter in the world. Even if there was no belt on the line, that’s what means more to her. “I want to do things in this world and in my life that haven’t been done before. If there’s no female that’s done it before, guess what? I want to do it. That’s something that’s always driven me. I’m a driven person. That’s something that really drives me. On the flip side of that coin, I would still want to beat [Cris Cyborg] just as badly even if it wasn’t for the belt. Yes, to be a champion in two divisions is huge but just to win against one of the most highly respected fighters, that’s where the real pride is.”

Tom Taylor - December 27, 2017

Former UFC strawweight title challenger Claudia Gadelha has not been seen in the cage since she came up short against fellow Brazilian Jessica Andrade in September. Apparently that will soon change. In a Christmas Eve post to Instagram, the top strawweight explained that she’s been taking a bit of time off to deal with a “broken” body, and that she plans to get a fight “very soon.” See Claudia Gadelha’s post below:

Tom Taylor - December 27, 2017

There is quite a bit of mystery surrounding the next fight of UFC lightweight champion Conor McGregor. In the opinion of lightweight contender Kevin Lee, however, McGregor will probably return to the Octagon to battle interim champion Tony Ferguson in the new year. “I think he comes back, he fights Tony,” Lee said on a recent episode of MMA Junkie Radio. “He don’t want to, but I feel like at some point they’re going to force him to. Either that, or something crazy is going to happen there. But at least I think everything that I’ve seen and all the little whispers that I’ve heard, he comes back, he fights Tony.”

Tom Taylor - December 27, 2017

We can now add another item to former UFC strawweight champion Joanna Jedrzejczyk’s long list of accolades, achievements and awards. The striking specialist will carry the Olympic torch for her home country of Poland in the lead up to the 2018 Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang, South Korea. Jedrzejczyk announced this news on a recent radio appearance, as reported by sportowefakty.wp.pl.

Tom Taylor - December 27, 2017

This Saturday, in the main event of UFC 219, UFC women’s featherweight champion Cris Cyborg will attempt to defend her title against former UFC women’s bantamweight champion Holly Holm. Though the ever-destructive Cyborg is generally regarded as a sure-thing against most of her opponents, this is not the case leading up to this fight Holm. In fact, Holm is being given a very real chance by many members of the MMA community. Holm’s coach Mike Winkeljohn even believes his student will finish Cyborg.

Justin Golightly - December 27, 2017

We all have some form of PTSD regarding Khabib Nurmagomedov’s weight cuts. It’s not a dig on him, it’s just a simple fact of the matter which Nurmagomedov seems to realize himself. He’s dealt with endless Tweets about tiramisu and trolling memes since March when he was forced to pull-out of his highly anticipated fight with Tony Ferguson. This is where UFC’s nutritionist Tyler ‘Melee’ Minton comes in. We’ve never gotten this close of a look inside Khabib’s cut and it seems like he’s never been in better hands. If the photo that was dropped yesterday doesn’t convince you, just read how Minton breaks it all down. “The UFC wants fighters no higher than 10 percent of their weight class on arrival. Two meals and a lot of water later, Khabib Nurmagomedov weighs in more than a pound under [which puts him at about 170 pounds]. Sorry haters. That’s an extremely easy weight cut considering he’s been drinking two gallons daily and eating a good bit. Muscle holds water. Fat doesn’t. He’s drinking two gallons of water a day and still eating more carbohydrates [250 grams daily] this week than many fighters eat a month out. One gram of glycogen stored in the muscles holds two-three grams of water. Khabib will drink two gallons of water every day this week except Thursday, when he will cut that in half. Then begin drinking again Friday morning. He will never go without water. He’s also normally much heavier than this.” — Tyler Melee Minton via multiple updates on Twitter.

Tom Taylor - December 27, 2017

Over the last few years, the UFC has hosted several major, multi-fighter press conferences is an effort to promote its upcoming shows. These press conferences, which have included names like Conor McGregor, Ronda Rousey, and Jon Jones, have produced some truly memorable promotional material, and even a few skirmishes. From the sounds of it, we’ll get another one of these massive press conferences to hype the promotion’s early 2018 shows, and we won’t have to wait long for it. According to Ariel Helwani, this star-studded event will go down this Friday in Las Vegas, ahead of Saturday’s end of the year card.

Tom Taylor - December 27, 2017

Originally, streaking bantamweight contender Jimmie Rivera was expected to take on former champ Dominick Cruz at UFC 219 on December 30. Regrettably, though, Cruz was forced out of this fight with an injury. From there, Cruz was replaced my the ever-dangerous John Lineker. Yet once again, bad luck struck, as Lineker was forced out of the fight just days ahead of time. With Lineker out, Rivera began a frantic search for a replacement opponent, having trained through Thanksgiving and flown to Las Vegas over Christmas. And while it looked like he might meet fellow bantamweight contender Marlon Moraes at a TBD catchweight, that option is now off the table.

Drake Riggs - December 26, 2017

Gilbert “El Nino” Melendez knows a thing or two about fighting. He has been one of the Lightweight division’s very best for the better half of the last ten years. Primarily known as the king of Strikeforce, Melendez defended a Strikeforce title six times overall and was a three-time champion. He also was the very first ever WEC champion. Nowadays, Melendez has been trying his hand as an analyst and has been doing a great job. Since it’s the week of UFC 219 which is headlined by the big Featherweight title fight that pits Cris Cyborg against Holly Holm, Melendez took the time to share his thoughts with ESPN on how Holm can defeat the seemingly unbeatable, Cyborg.

Drake Riggs - December 26, 2017

The last time we saw Tonya Evinger in action it was in the biggest fight of her career. She was making her long-awaited UFC debut at UFC 214 where she took on the unstoppable, Cris Cyborg for the vacant UFC Featherweight championship. Evinger was leaving behind her Invicta FC Bantamweight title in an attempt to capture UFC gold against a woman she was interested in fighting since the time they were both Invicta champions. The UFC title fight was Evinger’s first fight at 145 lbs as she is regularly a Bantamweight and one of the world’s best to boot. As Invicta FC champion, Evinger defended her title twice and went undefeated with the organization at 7-0 and finished her opponents in five of them.

Drake Riggs - December 26, 2017

The current Light Heavyweight king has gone by one name since May of 2015 and that name is Daniel Cormier. Since he defeated Anthony “Rumble” Johnson at UFC 187 to become the champion, Cormier has won three fights accompanied by one no contest. That no contest coming in his last outing when he took on bitter rival Jon Jones in a highly anticipated rematch that headlined UFC 214. The fight’s initial result was a third-round knockout loss for the champion, Cormier. But not too soon after the night of the event, Jones was busted for steroids and the result was overturned. After a recent interview with FloCombat, Cormier opened up a bit more about his feelings on the fight among other things.

Drake Riggs - December 26, 2017

The UFC’s biggest star from Switzerland, Volkan Oezdemir burst onto the scene at 205 lbs this year when he quickly defeated the likes of Ovince Saint Preux, Misha Cirkunov, and Jimi Manuwa to earn himself a title shot next month. Unfortunately for Oezdemir, he’s in a bit of some trouble as of late in regards to a battery charge that he was arrested for on November 19. According to  Oezdemir’s attorney, Bruce A. Zimet, the Coconut Creek, Florida resident, Oezdemir was not the incident’s aggressor and therefore his actions were justifiable. Oezdemir, a Switzerland native, surrendered his passport to the court temporarily and he plead not guilty on November 29. The details of the incident are that of such: Oezdemir inflicted injury/harm or disability, which is a second-degree felony. Since then this has been reduced down to felony battery inflicting great injury/harm, a third-degree felony. Accusations towards Oezdemir are that of him striking and knocking out a Fort Lauderdale bargoer(male) outside the bar in August.

Russell Ess - December 26, 2017

It has been over one year since we have seen Khabib Nurmagomedov compete in the Octagon. The current number 2 UFC ranked lightweight last fought at UFC 205 against Michael Johnson winning with a kimura submission in the third round. Nurmagomedov was scheduled to fight Tony Ferguson for the interim UFC lightweight title at UFC 209 in March. However, Nurmagomedov was taken to the hospital “due to weight management medical issues” just before the weigh-ins took place and the fight had to be canceled.

Justin Golightly - December 26, 2017

At one point and time, Anthony ‘Rumble’ Johnson had some of the most feared hands in MMA. We haven’t seen Rumble since he lost to Daniel Cormier for the second time at UFC 210 back in April. It was the fight where he announced his retirement from MMA. He hasn’t returned yet, although a big heavyweight match-up could lure him back, but instead he still enjoys the sport from the outside. As the year closes, Johnson sat down and talked about his top three favorite UFC fights of all time. “The most recent one was Cub Swanson and the little Korean guy [Dooho Choi]. I think they call him ‘Superboy’ or something like that. I was right there front row and those guys were just banging. I was surprised that Cub made it out okay and the little Korean guy made it out okay because they were throwing bombs and hitting each other hard. Just being there and witnessing it up close and personal, that was just amazing to me. Right now, that’s one of my favorite fights. They showed a tremendous amount of heart and both of those guys have my respect.”

Christine Allen - December 26, 2017

“I don’t really fit the profile of a UFC Champion, but they have to do (business) with me, even though they’re never going to promote me to a level like they did Ronda Rousey or Holly Holm.” Current female bantamweight champion Amanda Nunes ruffled feathers earlier this year when she declared to FloCombat.com that the UFC machine had failed to push her like it has other more aesthetically pleasing female fighters.

Justin Golightly - December 26, 2017

Leading up to the suspenseful weigh-ins approaching quickly on Friday, we already had a roller coaster of emotions kicking into UFC 219 fight week just after Christmas. Jimmie Rivera has been going back-and-forth with Marlon Moraes about being his replacement this Saturday, but despite multiple attempts to agree on increasingly higher catchweights, it never worked out. It all started when his former opponent John Lineker had to pull out of their fight with a serious tooth infection. Speaking recently to Guilherme Cruz of MMA Fighting, Lineker opened up about the situation. “I noticed this when I came to Las Vegas earlier. I didn’t know how bad it was a week ago. I started to feel the pain, but I thought it was something related to the root canal treatment I did three weeks ago. When I talked to a second doctor — the first one didn’t have an answer for the pain — they found this infection. I kept training hard despite the pain, but the pain kept getting worse a week before fight week. I decided to go to Vegas early so the UFC doctor could see how I was because I wanted to fight no matter what, but he saw that I wasn’t fit to fight and would have to do something about it.”

Justin Golightly - December 26, 2017

Donald ‘Cowboy’ Cerrone has been frustrated recently. Allegedly, he had a fight already lined up with Mairbek Taisumov but that ended up falling through. After those winter storms cleared up though, those silver linings have showed up via a potential fight scheduled for UFC  First reported by Damon Martin and Jim Edwards of MMA NYTT, it looks like Cerrone will be taking on Yancy Medeiros. WHAT A FIGHT! Yancy Medeiros with the TKO win over Alex Oliveira in a fight of the year caliber match! #UFC218 https://t.co/8jeOSmU60n

Tom Taylor - December 26, 2017

Earlier this month, in the co-main event of the stacked UFC on Fox 26, Team Alpha Male prospect Josh Emmett made good on a short-notice opportunity, levelling long-time featherweight contender Ricardo Lamas with a first-round punch. Having earned this career-changing win, Emmett is now ready to run the final stretch to a UFC featherweight title shot. And while he knows the next shot at reigning champion Max Holloway is likely to go to Frankie Edgar, Emmett feels he’s at least earned a number-one-contender fight with Brian Ortega, who recently burst into the title picture with a submission win over Cub Swanson.