Seoul, South Korea, is no longer on the slate for the Ultimate Fighting Championship in early
2023.
Per
MMA Fighting on Thursday, the promotion is moving on from a
slated event in Seoul on Feb. 4. After Chan Sung
Jung succumbed to a shoulder injury, the organization has
decided to change this event’s location to the UFC Apex in Las
Vegas. Headlining this
UFC Fight Night event will be a rescheduled heavyweight battle
as Derrick
Lewis (26-10, 1 NC) takes on Sergey
Spivak (15-3). Spivak has since confirmed this news on his
Instagram Stories. Lewis and Spivak were initially set to throw
down in the main event of
UFC Fight Night 215 on Nov. 19, but Lewis suffered a medical
issue on fight day that ejected him from the billing.
Lewis will be looking to rebound from a pair of knockout losses to
Tai
Tuivasa and Sergei
Pavlovich in 2022, putting him on the first multiple-fight skid
since 2019. The UFC’s all-time leader in knockouts, “The Black
Beast” set that record in December 2021 by pulverizing Chris
Daukaus. Over the years, Lewis has topped names including
Francis
Ngannou, Curtis
Blaydes, Alexander
Volkov and many more as he has remained a perennial top
contender for quite some time.
Since coming up short against then-surging contender Tom
Aspinall in late 2021, Spivak has not looked back. In March,
Spivak put a beating on Greg Hardy
in just over two minutes to spell Hardy’s removal from the UFC
roster. A subsequent outing against Augusto
Sakai in August also went his way, as he overwhelmed the
Brazilian en route to a second-round knockout. As a professional,
“The Polar Bear” celebrates a finish rate of 87%, with a nearly
equal number of knockouts and submissions to his credit.
On Feb. 4, the UFC Apex will now play host to this Fight Night
event, with Las Vegas claiming the date that Seoul expected to
hold. Several fights involving combatants from East Asia, including
Doo Ho
Choi vs. Kyle Nelson
at featherweight and Da Un
Jung–Devin Clark
in the 205-pound division, are already booked for this date. It is
unclear if these matches will remain on the lineup or if they will
get pushed to another fight card.