Anthony
Birchak will make his first Octagon appearance since 2016 when
he steps in on short notice to face Gustavo
Lopez at
UFC on ESPN 17.
Birchak is a replacement for Felipe Colares, who recently tested
positive for COVID-19. Fansided
was first to report the new bantamweight bout. UFC on ESPN 17 takes
place on Saturday at the UFC Apex in Las Vegas and is headlined by
a light heavyweight clash pitting Thiago
Santos against Glover
Teixeira.
Birchak enters the matchup with Lopez on a three-fight winning
streak, with each of those victories coming inside of a round. In
his last outing, the 34-year-old Arizonan scored a first-round
submission of Erik
Radleim at Combate Americas “Tucson” in October 2019. Birchak
went 2-2 during a brief UFC stint from 2014 to 2016 before
transitioning to Rizin, where he went 0-3 in the Japanese
organization in three 2017 appearances.
A nine-time Combate Americas veteran, Lopez had a three-fight
winning streak snapped in his debut with the Las Vegas-based
promotion at UFC on ESPN 10, where he dropped a unanimous verdict
to Merab
Dvalishvili on June 13.