MMA News

Tom Taylor - September 23, 2016

UFC 205, which is scheduled for November 12 in New York City, is drawing closer by the day. As it does, its lineup continues to grow. At this point, the highlight of the card is a long-discussed welterweight title fight between Champion Tyron Woodley and challenger Stephen “Wonderboy” Thompson. Woodley won the divisional crown by shutting the power off on Robbie Lawler in July. Thompson, meanwhile, earned his number-one-contender status in June, when he extended his win-streak to seven with a decision win over recent Bellator signee Rory MacDonald.

Tom Taylor - September 23, 2016

UFC lightweight champion Eddie Alvarez has been the subject of many headlines over the last few days—and very few of them have painted a positive picture of him. Our news feeds have been flooded with reports that the champ’s hardball negotiation tactics are the reason his long-rumored fight with Irish superstar Conor McGregor fell through. We’ve seen countless call-outs from streaking lightweight contender Khabib Nurmagomedov, who has claimed repeatedly that Alvarez has refused to sign a contract to fight him. We’ve seen headline after headline suggesting that the reigning lightweight champion, for one reason or another, is simply not interested in signing on to fight McGregor or Nurmagomedov.

bjpenndotcom - September 23, 2016

Think you have the perfect game plan to beat "Cyborg" Justino? You're apparently one of the few. pic.twitter.com/hoFftQ8h5H — MMAjunkie (@MMAjunkie) September 23, 2016

bjpenndotcom - September 23, 2016

In addition to Tyron Woodley going into his UFC 205 title fight with Stephen Thompson, in the UFC’s historic inaugural event at the Madison Square Garden, with the UFC welterweight championship, he’s also going into the fight as an underdog. After the fight was announced earlier this month, current betting odds on Bovada have Woodley as a +150 underdog ahead of the fight, with Stephen ‘Wonderboy’ Thompson coming in as a -185 favorite.

bjpenndotcom - September 23, 2016

This week, unfortunate news surfaced that #15 ranked UFC flyweight Sergio Pettis had been forced to withdraw from his ‘UFC Fight Night: Portland’ scrap with #9 ranked flyweight Louis Smolka. Pettis’ head coach, Duke Roufus, broke the news via Instagram, revealing that ‘The Phenom’ had suffered a minor injury in training that would prevent him from fighting on Saturday. In addition, Roufus went on to call the injury a “speed bump”, claiming the injury wouldn’t take long to heal.

Tom Taylor - September 23, 2016

UFC 205, which will go down from New York’s Madison Square Garden on November 12, appears to have grown by one massive fight: a strawweight title bout between reigning champion Joanna Jedrzejczyk (12-0) and streaking challenger Karolina Kowalkiewicz (10-0), both of whom hail from Poland. This news comes from Dizz (@TalkMMA) and James Lynch (@LynchOnSports) on Twitter. It lines up perfectly with Jedrzejczyk’s recent announcement that she has signed the agreement for her next bout.

bjpenndotcom - September 23, 2016

Lately, talks of former UFC women’s bantamweight champion Ronda Rousey making her return to the Octagon have begun to pick up more and more steamSe. These reports have gone as far as to reveal that Rousey will be returning to the Octagon before the end of the year. The last report that surfaced revealed that Rousey had been offered a title fight with newly crowned champion Amanda Nunes. Nunes, who won the belt back in July at UFC 200, picked up a spectacular 1st round KO win over Miesha Tate in her last Octagon outing. Since then there has been no word yet on when Nunes will return to the Octagon, however a fight with Rousey could very well make for a massive fight for her first title defense.

Tom Taylor - September 23, 2016

UFC strawweight champion Joanna Jedrzejczyk, who is quickly emerging as one of the most dominant champions in the UFC, has apparently signed the bout agreement for her next title defense. The undefeated Polish champ took to Twitter to make this announcement early on Friday morning. Kontrakt na kolejną walkę podpisany! Czekajcie na oficjalne info👊 | Just signed the aggrem… https://t.co/2GRSUJEhEB pic.twitter.com/6cD4esJjQk

Tom Taylor - September 23, 2016

Early this morning, reigning Invicta featherweight champion Cris “Cyborg” Justino took to the scale to weigh in for her for sophomore UFC effort, a 140-lb. catchweight bout with Swedish striker Lina Lansberg. Despite plenty of doubt to the contrary, the Brazilian made weight, taking full advantage of the bout’s 1-lb. allowance and tipping the scale at 141. This, of course, is a major relief, as Lansberg suggested she would not take the fight if Cyborg failed to make the contracted weight. Cris Cyborg just weighed in at 141 pounds. Her #UFCBrasilia main event vs. Lina Lansberg is official.

bjpenndotcom - September 23, 2016

Despite Julianna “The Venezuelan Vixen’ Peña’s insistence on Ronda Rousey ‘getting in line’ after a definitive loss, it appears the UFC has different ideas for her , and it’s not a title shot. Fellow woman’s bantamweight Valentina Shevchenko tweeted on Thursday that she had signed a fight agreement with ‘The Venezuelan Vixen’, thus ruling out a potential shot at Amanda Nunes belt for Peña.

Russell Ess - September 22, 2016

[ooyala code=”9oMGIyNjE6mFj9pFDkXr37e9wYTx02kn” player_id=”bd214e34cfad476984102de4bf5e8da2″ auto=”true” width=”1280″ height=”1600″] With just a little over a week out from UFC Fight Night 96, which takes place in Portland Oregon, it was announced that UFC flyweight Sergio Pettis pulled out of his scheduled fight against Louis Smolka.

bjpenndotcom - September 22, 2016

Throughout the course of the week leading up to ‘UFC Fight Night: Brasilia’ there has been much speculation as to whether or not Invicta FC featherweight champion Cris Cyborg would be able to make her contracted weight of 140 pounds. Cyborg has been very transparent about the fact that she has been struggling to make the weight-cut. Throughout the course of the week, Cyborg has released several fight week vlogs in which she has given fans an inside look at her troubles cutting weight. As the week has progressed, there has been more and more updates regarding Cyborg’s weight-cut leading up to her fight with Lisa Lansberg this Saturday.

bjpenndotcom - September 22, 2016

UFC lightweight champion Eddie Alvarez has missed out on a ‘red panty night’ after asking for more money to fight Conor McGregor. Brendan Schaub revealed on the Fighter and the Kid podcast that Alvarez apparently complained to the executives at the UFC and was met with an indignant Joe Silva before the match-maker parted ways with the promotion: “So from what I hear, Eddie Alvarez was complaining to the UFC brass that he wanted more money to fight Conor McGregor. He wanted pay-per-view points, he wanted a certain amount of money. And the UFC, you know Joe Silva’s going out, he goes, ‘You wanna do what? Oh one of the biggest fight card of all time at Madison Square Garden. First time the UFC’s ever been to New York and we’re allowing you to fight Conor McGregor as the main event but you want more money? Nah, I’ll tell you what we’re gonna do. We’re going to pull Conor off, give him a bigger fight. Then, here’s Khabib Nurmagomedov.

bjpenndotcom - September 22, 2016

Thursday afternoon, news broke that the NSAC had scheduled disciplinary hearings for Jon Jones, Conor McGregor and Nate Diaz. ESPN’s Brett Okamoto broke the news, which revealed that the trio would be having a hearing on October 10th. Per Bob Bennett of NSAC, McGregor/Diaz (water bottles) and Jones (failed test) hearings are all scheduled for its meeting on Oct. 10.

bjpenndotcom - September 22, 2016

Cris ‘Cyborg’ Justino has arrived in Brazil for Saturday night’s main event fight with Lina Lansberg. Just a day before weigh-ins, ‘Cyborg’ had a photo taken of her with bantamweight champion Dominick Cruz, who was in town to serve as color commentator for UFC Fight Night 95. Take a look at the picture for yourself to see how ‘Cyborg’ stacks up size-wise when standing next to a male UFC fighter!

bjpenndotcom - September 22, 2016

With just over a week to go until the UFC hits Portland, Oregon, top ranked UFC flyweight Sergio Pettis has been forced to withdraw from the card. Pettis, who currently sits at #15 on the UFC’s official flyweight rankings, was slated to face #9 ranked flyweight Louis Smolka on the main card of the event. Unfortunately however, he was forced to withdraw from the fight due to a “minor injury” according to his coach, Duke Roufus.

bjpenndotcom - September 22, 2016

With just over 24 hours to go until Cris Cyborg has to hit the scales for her UFC Brazil main event scrap with Lisa Lansberg on Saturday, things aren’t going too well for the Invicta FC champ.

Russell Ess - September 22, 2016

With UFC Fight Club presale tickets for UFC 205 going on sale in less than a week with general tickets to the public going on sale to follow, it might seem tough for fans to decide on whether or not they will be putting their hard-earned cash down for a fight card that has not fully been announced yet. With big names like Conor McGregor, Eddie Alvarez, and Chris Weidman not officially announced for bouts at the first UFC event since MMA was legalized in the Big Apple in 2016, there is a lot to consider for fans.