Martial Arts News

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Ultimate Fighting Championship CEO Dana White was in attendance as the Las Vegas Sphere debuted this weekend with concerts by Irish rock band U2. White was so impressed with everything about the Sphere that he’s now admittedly “obsessed” with putting on a UFC event at the venue. The UFC head honcho has been in regular contact with concerned parties as he plots the “greatest live combat sports event anybody has ever seen.”

Interestingly, White wants the card to go down on Mexican Independence Day in September 2024, which according to him should also be the first live sports event at the venue. The 54-year-old is confident in his ability to put on a show that will set the precedent for live events at the Sphere.

Moreover, White vehemently dismissed the possibility of any boxing promotion securing the bid before him as he believes none of the promoters have the money required.

“I will put on the greatest live combat sports event anybody has…

🚨 Breaking 🚨

Cameron Smotherman (@Lilcampster) and Mando Gutierrez (@MandoGoes4Gold) will throw down in the main event of Fury FC Challenge Series 10 which takes place November 12th. pic.twitter.com/jXzfsSmuuq

— Alex Behunin (@AlexBehunin) October 10, 2023

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Cameron Smotherman and Mando Gutierrez will trade leather in the main event at Fury Fighting Championship Challenger Series 9 on Nov. 12. The booking was first reported by Alex Behunin of MMA Mania on Wednesday.

Smotherman (8-4) will look to defend his Fury FC bantamweight title against Gutierrez in a five-round affair that will go down in Houston. “The Baby-Faced Killer” dethroned former champ Peter Caballero with a stunning Round 2 knockout to top off a four-fight win streak back in February.

Smotherman subsequently made an appearance on Dana White’s Contender Series Season 7, Week 2 in a bid to earn an Ultimate Fighting Championship contract, where he wa…

Ultimate Fighting Championship heavyweight contender Curtis Blaydes (17-4) recently pulled out of his scheduled clash against Jailton Almeida (19-2).

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Blaydes was slated to clash against Almeida on Nov. 4 in the UFC Sao Paulo main event, which will mark the Las Vegas-based promotion’s return to the Brazilian city after four long years. However, the booking recently fell through with “Razor” being replaced by knockout artist Derrick Lewis (27-11), although the reason for Blaydes’ withdrawal hasn’t been disclosed.

Blaydes has now released a statement on Facebook addressing his withdrawal while offering an apology to his fans. The perennial heavyweight contender is seemingly dealing with several injuries suffered during camp, all of which will require a considerable amount of rehabilitation.

While it took him a while to realize the same, Blaydes now plans to take time off from training and solely focus on recovery.

“Injuries from camp we…

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The main event of the Ultimate Fighting Championship’s upcoming card in Abu Dhabi has suffered a massive blow with just 10 days to go before fight night.

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Former lightweight champion Charles Oliveira (34-9) has withdrawn from his UFC 294 title rematch against Islam Makhachev (24-1) due to a cut suffered in training. Featherweight champ Alexander Volkanovski (26-2) will step up on short notice to take on Makhachev in his second bid for lightweight gold. The news was first reported by OverDogs Podcast on Instagram and subsequently confirmed by Carlos Contreras Legaspi of ESPN Deportes.

UFC President Dana White officially confirmed the news on Tuesday at the post-fight press conference for DWCS 2023, Week 10. White revealed that “do Bronx” was forced to pull out after having his eyebrow split open during sparring the night before he was supposed to fly down to Abu Dhabi. The UFC president also expressed his displeasure with Olivei…

One of the world’s top grappling events is on the calendar for next year, and fittingly, the world’s top grappler will be the main attraction.

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The 2024 Abu Dhabi Combat Club World Championships have a fixed date and venue as trials have started for the Europe, Middle East, Africa and East Coast regions. The event will go down at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas on Aug. 17-18 and will premier exclusively for fans on FloGrappling.com with a subscription. Tickets for the mega grappling show will go on sale on Black Friday, Nov. 24. The promotion also plans to host the ADCC youth in the same week.

The biggest star in the sport, Gordon Ryan, will defend his Super Fight title in the main event of the night against reigning ADCC absolute champion Yuri Simoes. Ryan dethroned four-time ADCC Super Fight champ Andre Galvao in 2022 along with winning the 99kg division. Ryan now has two unique proposals for ADCC to further cement his legacy, which already in…

Aljamain Sterling believes he isn’t getting an immediate rematch against Sean O'Malley, but he thinks O'Malley may not hold the title for long anyway.

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The former Ultimate Fighting Championship bantamweight king lost his strap to O’Malley by second-round TKO in an upset at UFC 292 in August. Since then, Sterling has since been calling for either an immediate rematch or for his close friend and teammate Merab Dvalishvili to get his own his long overdue title shot. However, O’Malley is plotting his first title defense against Marlon Vera, who handed “Sugar” his lone professional loss back in 2020 and rumors have recently surfaced of a potential booking between O’Malley and “Chito” for UFC 297 on Jan. 20 in Toronto.

In a live stream on his YouTube page on Monday, Sterling revealed that he is almost sure of a rematch snub against O’Malley. The 34-year-old “Funkmaster” also believes Vera will pull off an upset against O’Malley, whose knockout power he c…

Ramon Taveras stood toe to toe and fought fire with fire when the stakes were highest.

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The Bulldog Boxing export was one of five hopefuls to nail down an Ultimate Fighting Championship contract during Week 10 of Dana White’s Contender Series, as he buried Cortavious Romious with first-round punches on Tuesday at the UFC Apex in Las Vegas. Taveras (9-2, 1-1 DWCS) sank the St. Charles MMA rep 29 seconds into Round 1.

Romious (5-2, 0-1 DWCS) went out on his shield. He cut loose with power punches and body kicks, but left too many defensive holes for his opponent to exploit. Taveras dropped him twice in the middle of violent exchanges, then connected with a devastating left hook that sent him crashing to the canvas in a dazed and confused state. More punches followed, prompting referee Herb Dean to call for the stoppage.

Flyweight Andre Lima, featherweight Connor Matthews, lightweight Marquel Mederos and bantamweight Lucas Rocha are set to join…

Sherdog’s coverage of DWCS 2023, Week 10 will begin Tuesday at 8 p.m. ET. Round 1 The 2023 season closer opens up with a bantamweight clash between Bittencourt and Rocha, whose five-pound weight miss last week forced the postponement and weight class change here. The referee is Mike Beltran. Bittencourt launches himself across the cage immediately with a flying front kick that comes up short. Bittencourt chases down Rocha, who circles out and tags him with a hard jab. Bittencourt shoots a takedown from far outside and Rocha sprawls well, but Bittencourt turns the corner and takes his back. Rocha gets up and Bittencourt launches him with a belly-to-back slam. Rocha makes his way back up and Bittencourt repeats the high-amplitude slam. Two minutes down and Bittencourt is still stuck to Rocha’s back. Rocha finally spins away and disengages, and Bittencourt catches him with a spinning back kick. Bittencourt changes levels and drives Rocha into the fence. Rocha does a good job of…

Nobody so far has managed to defeat Islam Makhachev, but one former opponent believes he now knows the key.

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Ultimate Fighting Championship lightweight Drew Dober faced the current champ at UFC 259 in March of 2021. Makhachev put on a dominant showing, notching over nine minutes of control time before submitting Dober with an arm triangle in the third round. Dober, who got back in the win column by knocking out Ricky Glenn this past weekend at UFC Fight Night 229, learned from the loss and, despite being best known himself as kickboxer with knockout power, believes he made a mistake in approaching their fight as a striker-versus-grappler affair.

According to Dober, several elite grapplers in the 155-pound division have the required skills to beat Makhachev—if they are willing to grapple with him. Dober believes Makhachev’s opponents need to stop focusing on staying on the feet and start wrestling the undefeated Dagestani. The 34-year-old recently t…

Several fighters from the recently concluded Bellator 300 may be forced out of action for a while due to long medical suspensions.

Former Bellator MMA flyweight champion Ilima-Lei Macfarlane (13-3) took on her longtime friend former training partner, current champ Liz Carmouche (20-7) on Saturday’s main card a Pechanga Arena in San Diego. Macfarlane suffered a possible fracture to her left knee en route a fifth-round TKO loss, resulting in a 180-day medical suspension, unless cleared by a physician earlier.

In addition to Macfarlane, six others from the prelims card also faced medical suspensions of six months or until cleared by a doctor: Jesse Roberts (left knee and left jaw), Davion Franklin (left knee), Dovletdzhan Yagshimuradov (right knee), Herman Terrado (rib), Romero Cotton (right orbital), and Miguel Peimbert (right foot, left hand, right ankle) Other medical suspensions from Bellator’s marquee event included Cat Zingano, who received a 45-day suspensi…

RandyBrown will fight MuslimSalikhov at #UFC296 on December 16th. (per Brown's Discord & @Full_Violence) #UFC #MMA #UFCESPN #UFC2023 pic.twitter.com/XO63nbtKDI

— Marcel Dorff 🇳🇱🇮🇩 (@BigMarcel24) October 9, 2023

The final Ultimate Fighting Championship pay-per-view event of 2023 has picked up a potential banger of a welterweight matchup.

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Randy Brown (17-5) and Muslim Salikhov (19-4) are reportedly booked to meet at UFC 296 in December. Brown broke the news of the booking on his Discord along with @Full_Violence on Twitter. “Rude Boy” had a four-fight win streak snapped at UFC 284 in February, thanks to a first-round submission by Jack Della Maddalena. “Rude Boy” has since regained some momentum with a decision victory over Wellington Turman in June.

Salikhov went on a five-fight win streak starting with his sophomore UFC outing which included wins over the likes of Elizeu Zaleski dos Santos and Francisco Trinal…

How strong are u? U never really know until you get tested by fire 🔥 of life.I did surgery 3 weeks ago , 10 seams size . But I know how tough I’m and continues improving and overcoming myself. It doesn’t stop me, still doing my things sparrings and everything. I’m so blessing… pic.twitter.com/gbClA66K7l

— Paulo Costa ( Borrachinha ) (@BorrachinhaMMA) October 9, 2023 Recent unplanned surgery will not keep Paulo Costa from his fight in November.

Renzo Gracie recently informed Sherdog that Costa had arrived to his apartment in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates. Additionally, he mentioned that Costa had received surgery on his elbow in a procedure that would not put his UFC 294 appearance in jeopardy. On Monday, Costa posted publicly about his operation, with photographs showing his condition before and his training after.

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“How strong are [you],” Costa asked. “[You] never really know until you get tested by fire of life. I …