Martial Arts News

Manchester Top Team export Abraham Bably landed a Professional Fighters League contract during Week 3 of the PFL Challenger Series, as he brutalized, embarrassed and ultimately put away Hassan Graham with punches in the first round of their heavyweight showcase on Friday at Universal Studios in Orlando. Graham (1-1, 0-1 PFL) succumbed to blows 3:56 into Round 1.

The unbeaten Bably (3-0, 2-0 PFL) seized the reins at the start and never let go. He delivered a takedown with an inside trip, progressed to the back and eventually climbed to full mount. From there, Bably cut loose with punches, increasing the ferocity and frequency of his shots with each passing moment. Graham turned away from contact and surrendered his back in one final defensive move but found no refuge there.

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Meanwhile, Louie Sutherland cut down Dana White’s Contender Series alum Alton Meeks with a knee strike and follow-up punches in the second round of their heavyweight affair. …

[embedded content] The Ultimate Fighting Championship heads down under with two title fights atop UFC 284.

First on the scale was UFC featherweight titleholder Alexander Volkanovski, who is moving up in weight to take on Islam Makhachev for the lightweight championship. Both champs made weight, as well as interim featherweight challengers Yair Rodriguez and Josh Emmett, who will look to become the next fight for "Alexander the Great."

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Elsewhere on the card, two prelim fighters missed weight. Kleydson Rodrigues came in one pound overweight at 127 pounds for his flyweight bout against Shannon Ross, and has been fined 20 percent of his purse. Additionally, Zubaira Tukhugov hit the scales at 157.5 pounds ahead of his lightweight contest against Elves Brener Oliveira, and has been fined a percentage of his purse.

Having defeated Charles Oliveira via arm-triangle choke in his last outing to claim UFC gold, Makhachev (23-1) is on a roll. The Dagestani fi…

Sherdog's live PFL Challenger Series 3 coverage kicks off Friday at 9 p.m. ET. The action will be broadcast live and free on fuboTV. Round 1 Sherdog Scores Lev Pisarsky scores the round:Brian Knapp scores the round:Mike Fridley scores the round:

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Round 2 Sherdog Scores Lev Pisarsky scores the round:Brian Knapp scores the round:Mike Fridley scores the round:Round 3 Sherdog Scores Lev Pisarsky scores the round:Brian Knapp scores the round:Mike Fridley scores the round: The Official Result Round 1 Sherdog Scores Lev Pisarsky scores the round:Brian Knapp scores the round:Mike Fridley scores the round:Round 2 Sherdog Scores Lev Pisarsky scores the round:Brian Knapp scores the round:Mike Fridley scores the round:Round 3 Sherdog Scores Lev Pisarsky scores the round:Brian Knapp scores the round:Mike Fridley scores the round:The Official Result Round 1 Sherdog Scores Lev Pisarsky scores the round:Brian Knapp scores the round:Mike Fridley scores the round:Round 2…

It's 𝗚𝗢 𝗧𝗜𝗠𝗘. WIN and 𝗜𝗡😤

Week 3⃣Heavyweights are ready to throw down inside the SmartCage for a PFL Contract ✍️

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Fights are 𝗟𝗜𝗩𝗘 & 𝗙𝗥𝗘𝗘 on @fuboSports

[ #PFLonFubo | Heavyweights | Fri, Feb 10th | 9pm ET] pic.twitter.com/HtGjh8cr99

— PFL (@PFLMMA) February 9, 2023 The latest Professional Fighters League Challenger Series show will feature eight fighters in the heavyweight division.

As expected, no fighters missed weight, as all eight came in under the 265-pound limit. The main event will see two veteran heavyweights go at it as Danilo Marques takes on Ras Hylton.

Marques (12-4) will be the lighter man at 247 pounds, while "The Jamaican Shamrock" came in at 255.2 pounds. Hylton (9-6) is riding a three-fight win streak that all came via knockout. Meanwhile, the Brazilian UFC castoff recently rebounded from a two-fight skid with a submission in the Gladiator Challenge promotion.

PFL Challenger Ser…

The Ultimate Fighting Championship is putting together a potential title eliminator and tossing it on the prelims of a Fight Night card.

On Wednesday, Sports Illustrated broke the news that Brandon Royval (14-6) would be taking on Matheus Nicolau (19-2-1) on the preliminary portion of the UFC Fight Night event on April 15. The unnumbered fight card is going down at the T-Mobile Center in Kansas City, Missouri. Royval has since confirmed this flyweight contest on his Instagram page.

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The UFC tenure of Royval has been streaky thus far after six appearances, earning wins in his first two outings, then dropping the next two, and bouncing back to rattle off two more victories. In 2022, “Raw Dawg” claimed a split decision – his second career win on the scorecards – over Rogerio Bontorin, and he followed that by landing a guillotine choke on Matt Schnell less than four months later. The Factory X fighter was linked to fights with Askar Askarov and Amir Alba…

Ultimate Fighting Championship mainstay Jim Miller still has a chance to go for his 25th win in the Octagon next week.

Per a UFC press release on Thursday, Miller (35-16, 1 NC) has received a replacement opponent for UFC Fight Night 219. The longtime vet will now meet Alexander Hernandez (13-6) at lightweight, with the latter coming back up from a one-off appearance at featherweight in December. The two will square off on the main card that will be held inside of the UFC Apex in Las Vegas on Feb. 18.

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The 39-year-old Miller is currently riding a three-fight finish streak, knocking out Erick Gonzalez and Nikolas Motta before tapping Donald Cerrone with a guillotine choke in his last outing. The win streak is his longest since getting his hand raised three fights in a row in 2016. The roster staple that has been part of the organization since 2009 holds the most appearances (40), most wins (24) and is tied with Cerrone for the second-most finishes (16) …

Ultimate Fighting Championship middleweight great Robert Whittaker needs someone to fight.

At UFC 284 in Perth, Australia, Whittaker was linked to a fight against Paulo Costa. Negotiations fell apart, with the promotion announcing the fight before the two agreed. Costa publicly chided the UFC for putting forth the news of the bout before it came together, and it was ultimately scrapped from the lineup. As the former champion sits on the shelf waiting for a call, one such fighter has offered to take him on: Khamzat Chimaev. Whitaker’s head coach, Alex Prates, spoke to Sherdog about that fight and UFC 284 as a whole, but was quick to remark that, “Whittaker is not a good matchup [for] Chimaev.”

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“That’s the fight UFC wants,” Prates stated. “We have nothing official from UFC, but I think it will be so big as it would be a title fight.”

A disciple of Mario Sperry, coach Prates has been away from his home country of Brazil for the last 23 years. Training …

Former Ultimate Fighting Championship lightweight king Charles Oliveira is ready to get back in the game.

Four months after losing his 155-pound title to Islam Makhachev, Oliveira is expecting to return to the Octagon within a few months. Having trekked to Perth, Australia, to corner teammate Elves Brener Oliveira in his UFC debut opposite Zubaira Tukhugov, the ex-champ spoke with Sherdog about his plans. A recent interview with The Schmo brought to light a possible pairing with Beneil Dariush, and Oliveira confirmed that fight is in the works.

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“It’s true that we are negotiating to face Dariush, who is coming from a gigantic sequence of wins,” Oliveira admitted. “My managers Jorge Patino and Diego Lima are taking care of that. As I said in other interviews, that’s a moment where we have to think with reason not emotion. I must fight the one who will take me to the title shot. My plan is [to] fight April or May, and fight again for the belt by the end …

[embedded content] Kleydson Rodrigues does not yet have his feet fully underneath him in the Ultimate Fighting Championship flyweight division—a situation he hopes to remedy in his latest assignment.

The former Jungle Fight champion will do battle with Shannon Ross as part of the UFC 284 undercard on Saturday at the RAC Arena in Perth, Australia, where he aims to nail down his first victory inside the Octagon. Rodrigues made his promotional debut on May 7, when he wound up on the wrong side of contentious split decision against C.J. Vergara at UFC 274.

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“The fight against Vergara was very close,” he told Sherdog.com. “A lot of folks didn’t agree with the results.”

Rodrigues outlanded the onetime Fury Fighting Championship titleholder 81-71 in terms of significant strikes and accounted for the only two completed takedowns in the bout. However, Vergara was credited with more control time and connected with more total strikes. All three judges struck …

The Association of Boxing Comissions and Combative Sports (ABC) has launched an “athlete’s voice committee” to give fighters a better opportunity to connect with regulators.

According to a release, the committee will help fighters “who wish to better understand vital issues such as how scoring works, appeal rights, contractual literacy workshops, regulatory rights regarding managers and any other educational opportunities that can advance fighter interests in the sport.”

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“The ABC hopes this committee will allow all fighters to understand the sport from a regulatory standpoint.” said ABC president Mike Mazzulli. “At every weigh-in I ask fighters questions relating to rules and regulations and it is apparent to me a majority of combative participants do not have clear knowledge of the Rules and Scoring Criteria. This committee will also allow fighters a voice at the table.”

The committee will be chaired by New York State Athletic Commission Executive…

The UFC Fight Night card featuring Max Holloway vs. Arnold Allen in the evening’s headliner has a location and venue.

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The promotion announced on Wednesday that the event will take place at the T-Mobile Center in Kansas City, Mo., on April 15. The venue is located in downtown Kansas City in 2007 and has a capacity of nearly 19,000. Other bouts scheduled for UFC Fight Night include Edson Barboza vs. Billy Quarantillo at featherweight and Chris Gutierrez vs. Pedro Munhoz at bantamweight.

The Las Vegas-based organization’s first — and only trip to Kansas City occured at UFC on Fox 24 on April 15, 2017. That event saw Demetrious Johnson retain his flyweight crown with a third-round submission of Wilson Reis in the headliner at the Sprint Center.

Holloway is coming off an unsuccessful bid to regain featherweight gold, as he dropped a five-round verdict to Alexander Volkanovski at UFC 276 this past July. The Hawaiian known as “Blessed” is now 0-3 ag…

Nathaniel Wood has been forced to withdraw from a proposed featherweight clash against Lerone Murphy at UFC 286.

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“The Prospect” revealed on social media that a “freak accident” in training resulted in him having to get stitches on his knee.

“It is with a heavy heart to announce I will no longer be fighting in London. It seems I just can’t get a break in this game with constant set backs. A freak accident landing on wooden trim in wrestling practice,” Wood wrote. “Sorry for all those who were coming to see me. Going to have a sit down and think about some things. The highest of the highs and the lowest of the lows.”

“Unfortunately I cannot bend my knee until these stitches are out.”

It is unclear if Murphy will remain on the card against a replacement opponent. UFC 286 takes place at the O2 Arena in London on March 18 and is headlined by a welterweight title rematch between Leon Edwards and Kamaru Usman.

A former Cage Warriors bant…