On the second episode of UFC 305 Embedded, defending champ Dricus du Plessis does a meet and greet with fans in Australia; the City Kickboxing team — including former two-time UFC middleweight champion Israel Adesanya, Dan Hooker, and Kai Kara-France — fly into Perth; Mateusz Gamrot goes for a walk in the woods; Carlos Prates hits the gym; Steve Erceg spends time with his family; Tai Tuivasa puts in work, plus more.
Dana White’s vision for UFC 306 is starting to come to light.
The UFC CEO on Tuesday revealed the first details of his production plan for the Sept. 14 event at Las Vegas’ famed Sphere venue, which White has repeatedly called “a love letter” to Mexican combat sports.
“So what we’ve done, really what we’re going to do on September 14 takes over a year to do. We’re doing it in four months,” White said Tuesday on The Pat McAfee Show. “So, when the show starts, we’re going to have the prelims, and then we’re going to tell — throughout the rest of the night — the history of combat in Mexico, from the beginning of time and into the future. So the first fight of the night will start at the beginning of time, the main event will be the future of Mexico. That’s the first time I’ve ever talked about this.”
UFC 306 features a 10-fight card headlined by two title bouts, as UFC bantamweight champion Sean O’Malley faces Merab Dvalishvili in the main event and UFC women’s flyweight champion Alexa Grasso puts her belt on the line in a trilogy bout against Valentina Shevchenko. Grasso is the first Mexican UFC women’s champion and her most recent bout against Shevchenko headlined UFC’s inaugural Noche UFC event in September 2023.
The Sphere is a $ 2.3 billion venue that features a 160,000 square-foot 16K-resolution wraparound screen inside and generally seats between 18,000 to 20,000 people. White has touted the pay-per-view show as a one-off, due to it being the most expensive production in promotional history, with more than $ 17 million already spent. However, with the cheapest tickets priced in the thousands, TKO Group Holdings chief financial officer Andrew Schleimer said the event could end up producing the largest live gate in company history.
“Look, we’re bullish,” Schleimer said on an investor call in early August. “We’ve talked obviously about this being a cultural event and Dana has publicly stated how much more [invested UFC is] in this event, and obviously this is going to be a massive spectacle for those in the arena and for those at home.
“On the top side, this will be one of the largest gates if not meaningfully the largest gate that we’ve ever done, and on the cost side, it’s going to be the single largest investment that we’re making in an event. It’s even more expensive than we originally anticipated.”
With a month to go until the big day, White is excited to show off what UFC put together, but also knows he must deliver on the spectacle he’s promised for more than a year.
“Listen, we have to execute, but this thing is going to be — if you are even this much Mexican, you are going to love this event on Mexican Independence Day at the Sphere,” White said. “I guarantee you. It’s so badass.”
UFC 306’s full card lineup can be seen here.
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At least for now, Dana White is done entertaining the idea of Alex Pereira to heavyweight.
The UFC CEO delivered a vehement “no” when asked Tuesday on The Pat McAfee Show whether Pereira will get his chance to challenge UFC heavyweight champion Jon Jones.
Pereira, 37, is the current UFC light heavyweight champion and former middleweight champion. Also a former two-division champion in GLORY Kickboxing, Pereira has twice stepped in on short notice to save the UFC in 2024, headlining UFC 300 in April with a first-round knockout of Jamahal Hill and then headlining UFC 303 in June with a second-round knockout of Jiri Prochazka.
Following the Prochazka knockout, UFC color commentator Joe Rogan led a voracious charge to allow Pereira to move up to heavyweight and attempt to become the first three-division champion in UFC history. Both Pereira and Jones have expressed an openness to the matchup, and Pereira’s longtime coach Plinio Cruz recently endorsed the idea to MMA Fighting, calling Jones vs. Pereira “the biggest fight this sport has ever seen.”
“I think it’d be a mega-fight. I think [it’d be] the biggest fight this sport has ever seen,” Cruz said in July. “We all respect Jon Jones a lot. And I think it’s going to be just a great fight. I’m not going to say [who] wins, they lose, [who] wins, they lose. Fight is a fight, but I think it’s going to be the best fight between two great champions.”
“I like the idea. I think that’s a [move] that’s going to happen eventually,” Cruz added. “I don’t think right now it’s the move, because let’s just be honest, the heavyweight division is clogged, it’s stopped right now. First Jones has to fight, first [Tom] Aspinall has to fight, so for us to be chasing something that’s not even moving yet, I don’t think is the point.”
Jones, 37, is the current UFC heavyweight champion and widely considered the greatest light heavyweight to ever compete. Jones is expected to face Stipe Miocic in a long-awaited matchup — most likely in November at New York’s Madison Square Garden — after spending most of 2024 rehabilitating from a shoulder injury that derailed the bout in 2023. Jones has not competed since defeating Ciryl Gane to claim the vacant title in March 2023, which marked Jones’ first and only bout at heavyweight in his 15-year MMA career.
White has been an ardent supporter of both the Jones vs. Miocic matchup and Jones’ claim to being the No. 1 pound-for-pound fighter in the sport, and that continued on Tuesday.
“Well, everybody on the internet is stupid,” White said when asked about criticism of his positions. “Anybody who thinks Jon Jones isn’t the pound-for-pound best fighter in the world should never be discussing fighting ever. Period, end of story.”
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Joilton Lutterbach admitted to taking performance-enhancing drugs prior to getting a short notice opportunity with the UFC, and now, he is dealing with the repercussions.
On Tuesday, Combat Sports Anti-Doping (CSAD) announced that Lutterbach accepted a 24-month sanction for violating the UFC’s anti-doping policy. The test was administered June 8, two weeks before Lutterbach was set to face Shara Magomedov at UFC Saudi Arabia.
Lutterbach tested positive “for the presence of 3a-Hydroxy-2a-methyl-5a-androstan-17-one, a metabolite of drostanolone,” which is an anabolic steroid. The 31-year-old was made aware of the positive test on June 20 while at the host hotel two days before the event. According to the release, he admitted to “extensive use” of the prohibited substance prior to his signing, and because he didn’t declare the use ahead of time, Lutterbach received the stronger penalty.
Additionally, Lutterbach’s UFC contract was terminated based on the failed test, and Lutterbach admitting to it — which he also did on social media after he was pulled from the card.
“I actually used juice three months ago and had no idea that I would sign with the UFC,” Lutterbach wrote at the time. “I could have hidden in the mountains or gone to Thailand to hide as many do and are not tested, but I preferred to take the risk and believe I was clean and fit to fight.”
Lutterbach will be eligible to return on June 23, 2026.
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A pivotal lightweight clash is expected for the PFL’s return to pay-per-view
Multiple people with knowledge of the promotion’s plans confirmed to MMA Fighting that a matchup between former Bellator featherweight champion A.J. McKee and former Cage Warriors star Paul Hughes is targeted for the PFL’s superfight pay-per-view event on Oct. 19. MagicM MMA first reported the booking on Twitter.
Since losing his title to Patricio Pitbull in April 2022, McKee has had a successful shift to lightweight, winning all four of his 155-pound appearances. In his most recent outing, the 29-year-old submitted Clay Collard in 70 seconds at February’s PFL vs. Bellator event. The No. 13 ranked lightweight in MMA Fighting’s Global Rankings has won 22 of his 23 pro fights.
Hughes signed with PFL earlier this year as one of the sport’s highly-touted free agents following a nine-fight run with Cage Warriors. In his first promotional appearance, the 27-year-old stopped Bobby King via second-round TKO at Bellator Dublin in June.
The event will be headlined by the MMA return of Francis Ngannou as he faces fellow knockout artist Renan Ferreira.
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It’s been almost a year since Israel Adesanya last competed in the UFC, and he has plenty to prove in his comeback.
Adesanya would likely rather forget his September 2023 bout that served as a shocking upset loss to Sean Strickland and cost him the UFC middleweight title. That setback came after a pair of intense showdowns against longtime rival Alex Pereira, which ended with Adesanya scoring a vicious knockout over the Brazilian to reclaim the belt.
But Adesanya’s reign ended just a few months later with the Strickland loss, which was then followed by an extended break from action. As Adesanya prepares to make his return on Saturday at UFC 305, Daniel Cormier, who is set to call the fights as part of the broadcast team, believes Adesanya actually made the right move to sit out rather than rushing back.
“I honestly don’t hate that he took some time off,” Cormier said on the latest episode of The Fighter vs. The Writer. “They were riding this dude so hard. He was riding so hot, for so long.
“I remember right after he lost to Sean Strickland, I posted a picture of the amount of fights he had headlined. I thought to myself, this dude needs a break. It’s not bad that he took some time off. He was fighting a lot. Like, a lot. He was fighting a lot. I don’t know if anyone’s been as active.”
Adesanya was definitely one of the more active champions on the UFC roster, racking up five fights between 2022 and 2023 culminating with his loss to Strickland.
After Adesanya lost the belt, UFC CEO Dana White declared the former champ would compete for a title when he returned, which now comes to fruition with his fight against new UFC middleweight champion Dricus du Plessis in the UFC 305 main event.
Adesanya was actually supposed to defend his title against du Plessis this past September instead of Strickland, but the South African contender wasn’t able to make a quick turnaround following a win over ex-UFC champion Robert Whittaker in July.
The UFC 305 showdown finally brings Adesanya and du Plessis together after the middleweights exchanged plenty of nasty words over the past couple of years. Whatever professional rivalry existed between them eventually turned personal ahead of the title fight in Perth.
Because Adesanya is coming back from a loss and a year off, Cormier knows there’s a lot riding on the former champ’s performance, but that pressure only gets amplified facing a heated rival like du Plessis.
“He don’t want to lose to that dude,” Cormier said of Adesanya. “He don’t want to lose to Dricus. I love how intense it gets between these guys.
“I like bad blood fights. That’s my thing. I’m not going to lie to you, I love when it’s a bad blood fight, and this one has all the shit that I love. Those guys hate each other.”
Despite coming into the fight as the challenger rather than the champion, Adesanya certainly has a lot riding on the results.
At 35, Adesanya is moving towards the latter stage of his career and it’s impossible not to wonder where he would go next if he suffers a second straight loss in a title fight.
Cormier knows du Plessis is actually counting on that after hearing the UFC middleweight champion address the matchup in the days leading up to the fight.
“I think Dricus is almost betting on him not being [the same guy he was before],” Cormier said. “He said it on Countdown. He said, ‘He’s a tremendous fighter but his light is dimming … his light is dimming if it isn’t completely out [already].’ F*cking Dricus du Plessis said that about Izzy.”
“It’s on Izzy to show that’s not the case. It’s [up to him to say], ‘I’m still here and I’m still the man.”
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PFL heavyweight Bruno Cappelozza won’t fight again until 2025 after being suspended for one year by the United States Anti-Doping Agency.
This is actually the second suspension the Brazilian has faced for using banned substances after he was hit with a nine-month sanction by the Nevada Athletic Commission in 2023. In that incident, Cappelozza was busted for using drostanolone — an anabolic steroid — and his win over Matheus Scheffel was overturned to a no contest.
On Monday, USADA officials announced that Cappelozza has now been suspended for one year after an out-of-competition drug test conducted on April 17 came back positive for clomiphene and its metabolite desethyl-clomifene. Clomiphene is banned at all times for athletes and listed in the class of hormone and metabolic modulators.
The one-year suspension is the maximum sentence allowable based on the substance used.
Cappelozza remains suspended until April 17, 2025.
USADA oversees the PFL anti-doping policy, which was instituted after a rash of positive drug tests plagued the promotion’s 2023 season.
It’s been a rough couple of years for the 35-year-old veteran after winning the PFL heavyweight tournament in 2021 but then losing to Scheffel in 2022. He recorded a knockout in the rematch, which was swiftly overturned due to 2023’s positive drug test.
In his return to action at the start of 2024, Cappelozza fell to ex-Bellator champion Vadim Nemkov by second-round submission.
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MMA Fighting has DWCS results for all the action from season eight, week one of UFC’s Contender Series on Tuesday night at the UFC APEX in Las Vegas, Nev.
In the main event, undefeated 26-year-old Mansur Abdul-Malik and 28-year-old up-and-comer Wes Schultz square off in a middleweight contest.
Check out the DWCS results below for Contender Series season eight, week one.
Fight Card
Mansur Abdul-Malik vs. Wes Schultz
Ding Meng vs. Rami Hamed
Mikhail Sazhiniani vs. Bruno Lopes
Jose Delgado vs. Ernie Juarez
Lone’er Kavanagh vs. An Tuan Ho
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UFC Vegas 95 is in the books and … no one cares. Serghei Spivac got his revenge against Marcin Tybura and the world kept right on spinning. But we are now locked into UFC 305, which has one of my most anticipated fights of the year: Dricus du Plessis vs. Israel Adesanya for the middleweight title.
We’ve already discussed that fight and the event specifically this week, so let’s instead delve into some broader questions about UFC 305, the promotion in general, and how this year is going.
For a fight that once had so much heat and anticipation after Izzy beat Pereira back at 287, why do you think DDP vs. Izzy seems to be lacking any sort of buzz less than a week out from 305?
— Ari Gilberg (@arigilberg) August 12, 2024
For a fight that once had so much heat and anticipation after Izzy beat Pereira back at 287, why do you think DDP vs. Izzy seems to be lacking any sort of buzz less than a week out from 305?
This is a great question because it is absolutely spot on and I think there are two reasons for it.
The first is that this is just the world we live in now. With very, very few exceptions, UFC is a weekly content business. The build for fights lasts only as long as fight week itself and then it’s on to the next one, week after week, all year round. Because of this, the fandom just gets caught up in the monotony of repetitive scheduling until it’s, “Oh, I didn’t realize UFC 305 was this weekend. OK.” Unless it’s something like UFC 300, the promotion straight up doesn’t promote events anymore for longer than a week. And so you can forget about them until they are at hand.
There is of course an easy solve for this, but UFC will never do it: Have a gap week before every pay-per-view event. At this point PPVs are the only events UFC tries on (because you have to try to get people to pay $ 80) and so they could pretty easily leave the weekend before every PPV open. That would then afford them two weeks of promotion for the big event, letting it build the excitement up. But that’s not going to happen.
The other reason this particular fight feels underwhelming is because UFC screwed up. After Adesanya beat Pereira, this was the fight. There was serious animosity between these two, a real story to tell, and nothing standing in the way. Except some people thought du Plessis needed another win (they were dumb, it would have been fine, next man up is fine) and UFC had a schedule to keep so instead du Plessis fought Robert Whittaker.
That was a risky choice as Whittaker could have beaten DDP and derailed all of this, but instead he won, and suddenly this fight was undeniable. There was no fight I wanted to see more in MMA. But UFC again had a schedule to keep, and so when DDP couldn’t turn around on a few weeks to fight for the belt, in came Sean Strickland. Had Adesanya beaten Strickland, this fight would have been massive, but that’s not what happened. Strickland won, throwing everything into the shuffler for a bit.
Eventually we got here and the fight remains great. But it’s past it’s ideal time and a lot of stuff has happened since to take the sheen off of it, including both du Plessis and Adesanya seemingly less interested in diving into the fraught waters of the “true African” debate, at least for now. I suspect much of that will change this week as the fight builds and they try to sell more PPVs, but I guess we’ll see.
Jed, longtime fan here. What was your FART score for Vegas 95, and what is the Meshewlin Star Rating for 305?
— Mike Heck (@MikeHeck_JR) August 12, 2024
Jed, longtime fan here. What was your FART score for Vegas 95, and what is the Meshewlin Star Rating for 305?
For those new here, I have two scoring systems in place for judging MMA cards. The first is the F.A.R.T. System — Fights Above Replacement Tussles — and the second is the Meshewlin Stars. APEX cards get the latter, PPVs get the former, and Fight Nights get one or the other depending on quality. Both are fairly simple.
The F.A.R.T. System scores each event based on how many high-quality fights are on the card, designed like WAR in baseball. Any ranked fighter on the card is worth .5 (either in the UFC rankings or MMA Fighting Global Rankings) plus other fights or fighters I may find especially compelling, above and beyond any random replacement matchup that fills APEX events.
Meshewlin Stars are handed out in a similar fashion to how Michelin Stars are: Each star basically represents how willing someone should be to travel to the event. One star is a very good card, worthy of attending if you live in the host city. Two stars is an excellent card, worthy of taking a short trip to attend (think a couple hour drive). Three is the maximum awarded and is reserved for exceptional cards that are worth a special trip just to attend. For reference, UFC 300 was three stars but UFC 301 received none.
Now, to the question: this will be controversial, but UFC Vegas 95 was better (on paper) than people wanted to acknowledge. Yes, the card was a brutal watch, but the system is not retroactive. You get the score you get based on the fights as they were booked. And while none of these got people excited, six ranked fighters competed this past Saturday, meaning the event gets 3 F.A.R.T.s. It’s not the lowest of the year, and sadly, it’s not that far off the average for APEX events these days.
As for UFC 305, it’s a One Star event. Were I in Perth, I’d definitely go. The main event is enough to merit that. But if — knock on wood — something were to happen to the main event, this card is sorely lacking. Kai Kara-France and Steve Erceg is a good fight but it’s a bit of a weak co-main event, and the rest of the main card is similarly good-but-not-great. Add in that the undercard is, shall we say mid, and the main is doing a lot of heavy lifting here. Sorry, but I’m not recommending anyone from Adelaide take a four-hour plane flight to get to Perth for this event.
Can you imagine a scenario where the next broadcast deal with the UFC reduces the number of contractually obligated events like #UFCVegas95? Or do you think we’re stuck with ~42/year going forward?
— Jay Pettry (@jaypettry) August 11, 2024
Can you imagine a scenario where the next broadcast deal with the UFC reduces the number of contractually obligated events like UFC Vegas 95? Or do you think we’re stuck with ~42/year going forward?
If I had to guess, I’d say it’s more likely we end up with more events in the future than just the now standard 42.
I’ve been thinking about this a lot and I’ve settled on two possible outcomes moving forward as UFC’s broadcast rights deal comes up for auction soon. The first (and I think the most likely) is that UFC does not re-sign a single broadcast deal, but instead inks multiple. Televised sports rights is a massive business and from all the reporting, UFC is a hot commodity. In the end, I think we’re looking a split of events between multiple parties, because that’s likely how UFC can maximize its profit.
Now, could that mean ESPN keeps 20 events and say, Netflix (who I strongly suspect will be involved) gets 20? Sure. But I think the more likely outcome is UFC commits to offering more events split among multiple partners, probably upping it to 50 or so fight cards a year, perhaps with fewer fights on each card.
The other outcome (and this is more wish-casting than honest belief) is that one broadcast partner comes over the top with a massive offer for the next several years, which includes accepting fewer events.
Because here’s the thing about the APEX, I cannot imagine those shows are profitable on their own. They barely sell tickets after all. Instead, APEX events are profitable in the aggregate, as part of the bundle UFC owes ESPN for it’s massive payout each year. APEX events are two-way contractual obligations, giving ESPN what they have to and keeping up their end with the huge number of fighters they have to sign as part of having a big enough roster for all their events. That’s why every APEX card is dirt — it’s just a mishmash of people they owe fights, and by stocking the event with people making minimum contracts, UFC can depress its overhead because that’s just basic business.
But if you go to Dana White and offer him more money for less events, well, that’s a deal anyone would take. UFC could then reduce overhead even more, take a culling scythe to the roster, and continue to rake in money hand over fist, while also restoring product integrity with the fan base.
But again, this probably won’t happen. It’s like the NFL’s inexorable march toward a 20-game season that no one but the owners seems to want: Unfettered greed always wins.
We’ve had the highs of UFC 300 and the lows of Tybura v Spivac 2, what are we grading the year 2024 so far for the UFC?
— Chase Colaw (@coca_colaw) August 12, 2024
We’ve had the highs of UFC 300 and the lows of Tybura v Spivac 2, what are we grading the year 2024 so far for the UFC?
Another good question with a boring answer: 2024 in the UFC has been good.
It is undeniably true that week in and week out, UFC is putting out the worst product it has in several years. As White famously likes to say about Conor McGregor, he doesn’t need to fight, so why would he? UFC doesn’t need to try anymore, so why would it? They won the sport, so now they can simply fulfill their obligations and rake in money, at the cost of the consumer quality. This is literally why monopolies are bad, unless you’re the monopoly.
That being said, it doesn’t matter in the slightest this year. Have there been more weekends with bad to meh cards than good ones? Probably. But are we going to remember those in a few years? Not a chance. Nostalgia is a powerful thing and people are uniquely bad at remembering the boring and underwhelming. People mostly remember all the highs and only the absolute worst moments, and this year has already given us a number of memorable highs.
UFC 300 was billed as the best event ever assembled and it lived up to the hype. UFC 299 was also exceptional. UFC 303 was super weird and awesome and gave birth to the Alex Pereira to heavyweight conversation. UFC 306 (or UFC Noche 2, whatever) is very likely going to be cool as (Mike) Heck. UFC 308 is Ilia Topuria vs. Max Holloway. And there’s still the chance of a Conor McGregor return (however remote).
When we look back on this year, we won’t remember week after week at the APEX with middling heavyweight main events, we will remember the high-water marks. And this year, the tide has been pretty damn high (when it’s not so devastatingly low).
Thanks for reading, and thank you for everyone who sent in tweets (Xs?)! Do you have any burning questions about things at least somewhat related to combat sports? Then you’re in luck, because you can send your tweets to me, @JedKMeshew, and I will answer my favorite ones! Doesn’t matter if they’re topical or insane, just so long as they are good. Thanks again, and see y’all next week.
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On the first episode of UFC 305 Embedded, two-time former UFC middleweight champion Israel Adesanya shows off an old relic from a past life, defending champ Dricus du Plessis previews his first title defense, flyweights Steve Erceg and Kai Kara-France ready themselves for Saturday’s top contender bout, plus more.
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