Ultimate Fighting Championship heavyweight contender Curtis
Blaydes (17-4) recently pulled out of his scheduled clash
against Jailton
Almeida (19-2).
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 weren’t healing at a fast enough pace for me to
compete at the level required to be the best version of myself Nov.
4,” the 32-year-old wrote. “There’s a difference between being hurt
and injured took me almost 3 months to see the difference. I’m
going to take some time off from training and focus on rehabbing so
I can come back fully confident in my athletic abilities. Apologies
to everyone who was hyped up for this fight. I promise this
decision wasn’t made in haste.”