UFC middleweight champion Dricus du Plessis has all the respect in the world for light heavyweight champ Alex Pereira, but if the UFC were to book a matchup between the two titleholders, du Plessis can see a real world where he stops Pereira with strikes.
“If I’m talking about just the standup exchanges—I’m not fighting a kickboxing fight, I’m fighting an MMA fight,” du Plessis told Submission Radio. “And in a kickboxing fight, You need to be able to land combos, you need to land massive punches the whole time, get a guy rocked, you get an eight count, you have all those variables. Where in MMA, I don’t care who you are. If I catch you clean with those small gloves, you’re going to go down and I am going to catch you eventually.”
Du Plessis captured the middleweight title with a decision win over Sean Strickland at UFC 297 this past January, and then stopped Israel Adesanya in his first title defense at UFC 305 the following August. At light heavyweight, Pereira has put together a Fighter of the Year campaign with knockout wins over Jamahal Hill, Jiri Prochazka, and Khalil Rountree.
The South African champion understands he has his work cut out for him, but after watching Pereira’s win over Rountree, du Plessis saw some things he could capitalize on.
“Now, I said it with with Izzy—he said, I’m too slow, I wouldn’t be able to catch him. Well, yeah,” du Plessis said. “I made a post recently saying maybe it’s not pretty, but damn, it’s effective because I will catch you eventually. And then it’s then it’s a whole different story because I’m not engaging in a kickboxing fight. I’m punching and I’m kicking, but it’s not a kickboxing fight. It’s an MMA fight, and when I put those together, it’s a different fight.
“So I honestly believe that with a guy like Alex Pereira, he has power. I have a lot of power too. The man is… yeah [he has] crisp striking. His striking is incredible. That’s why he has the kickboxing résumé. … But we saw with [the] Khalil Rountree fight, we saw a lot of things that [Rountree had] a lot of success [with] in those first two rounds. He really did.”
Watch du Plessis’ interview with Submission Radio below.
If Jon Jones sticks around beyond his upcoming matchup against Stipe Miocic at UFC 309, then he’s got designs on a potential fight against a reigning champion but not the one you might think.
With rumors of retirement swirling around his return on Nov. 16, the now 37-year-old heavyweight champion doesn’t have anything left to prove when it comes to his accomplishments in the sport. That’s why Jones isn’t interested in just fighting anybody at this stage of his career but there is a certain Brazilian knockout artist who’s captured his attention lately.
“If there were to be a fight of a guy that’s still on our UFC roster that would be not only financially worth it but legacy worth it, it would be Alex Pereira,” Jones told Kevin Iole ahead of UFC 309. “Alex Pereira and I, we’re both 37 years old. Right now I weigh about 235 [pounds]. I’m an incredibly light heavyweight. I think Pereira walks around at 240.
“I think that fight would go much farther on my legacy than a young man who’s cool today and maybe gone tomorrow.”
In his short time since joining the UFC roster, Pereira already claimed titles across two different weight classes and he’s scored wins over five former UFC champions. He’s currently riding a five-fight win streak with four knockouts along the way while becoming arguably one of the biggest stars in teh sport.
Meanwhile, the “young man” in question is UFC interim heavyweight champion Tom Aspinall, who is expected to be in attendance at Madison Square Garden in New York when Jones defends his belt against Miocic in the main event.
Aspinall has asked numerous times for the chance to face Jones since defeating Sergei Pavlovich to claim the interim title but his calls have largely fallen on deaf ears.
While he’s said recently that he hopes that the winner in the UFC 309 main event sticks around long enough to unify the titles, Aspinall probably won’t be thrilled to hear what Jones had to say about that potential matchup.
“More than likely not [fighting Tom Aspinall],” Jones revealed. “I feel like Tom Aspinall is, I don’t want to say nobody, but he just hasn’t proven anything. He hasn’t done anything. I understand that he won his belt against Sergei [Pavlovich]. Sergei just got slaughtered by [Alexander Volkov]. I’m not here to gamble someone else making a name off of me.
“I’m here to compete against the guys when we look back 10 years from now like ‘Jon Jones fought this guy and that guy and this legend and this champion and this champion.’”
As impressive as Aspinall has been during his UFC campaign with an 8-1 record overall and all of his wins coming by knockout or submission inside the first two rounds, Jones just doesn’t see a big enough body of work to make it worth his time to seek out that fight.
Throughout his 16-year UFC career, Jones has witnessed plenty of highly touted prospects come and go and he’s just not interested in sticking around to face the next big thing.
“I remember a time when the whole world thought Johnny Walker was going to be the guy to beat me,” Jones said. “No disrespect for Johnny Walker but we’ve all see the way his career has played out.
“I’ve just been here too long to get all excited about someone who’s hot today. I’m here for legacy. I’ve been gambling for too long to just take random fights.”
Marcus Buchecha finally re-enters the ONE Championship ring on Friday to face Amir Aliakbari in Bangkok in what could be his last walk to the ring in Asia
Speaking with MMA Fighting ahead of ONE 169, the jiu-jitsu legend said the winner of his clash with Aliakbari could determine who’s next in line for the heavyweight belt—on the line later that night between Anatoly Malykhin and “Reug Reug” Oumar Kane. However, as it is the final bout of Buchecha’s contract with the organization, he might not stick around to find out.
“This fight will give me leverage,” Buchecha said, “So I’ll focus 100 percent on this fight and then discuss better terms. This is the goal.”
Buchecha publicly complained about a lack of fights in early September, saying “I’ve been out waiting for a fight for almost one year.” The Brazilian heavyweight has been inactive since August of 2023, when he suffered his first loss in the sport against “Reug Reug.” ONE booked him versus Aliakbari shortly after his post.
Asked if his long layoff will be taken into consideration when he has to decide whether or not re-sign with ONE, Buchecha said “you can’t cry over spilled milk,” noting he is fully focused on the task ahead of him.
“I hope to talk to you again on Saturday and definitely talk about the future, but my goal right now is Friday,” Buchecha said. “It obviously wasn’t my decision [to stay out for over a year] but I was in the gym, training and evolving in every aspect as an athlete on the feet, in wrestling, in jiu-jitsu. I feel a much better fighter now than I was last time I entered the ring.
“The actual fight [with Kane] was a great experience. I won’t be a hypocrite and say it was the result I wanted, of course not, but it turned out to be great experience. After that fight, plus the 15 months [of training], it added a lot to my career as a MMA athlete. I learned a lot about a Buchecha I didn’t know. It was good to learn to control my emotions in bad and good situations.”
For now, all Buchecha wants is to stop Aliakbari’s four-fight winning streak and enter free agency on a high note.
“He has a good background in Greco-Roman wrestling and he’s one of the two heavyweights I haven’t fought yet, him and Anatoly,” Buchecha said. “I think it’s going to be a very interesting fight to watch, a clash of grapplers.
“He has heavy hands, but his background is in wrestling. If the fight goes to the ground, I’m ready. If it stays on the feet, I’m ready. I don’t care what he wants to do, I’m focused on my goal and my plan.”
Kamaru Usman and Shavkat Rakhmonov have shared a gym, but that doesn’t mean they can’t share the octagon on fight night.
UFC 310 is still in flux with welterweight champion Belal Muhammad having withdrawn from the scheduled main event after suffering a foot infection. Muhammad was to defend his title against Rakhmonov and it is not yet known if their fight will be rescheduled or if a new opponent will be found for Rakhmonov to stay on the Dec. 7 card.
Should the matchmakers need an elite name to step into Muhammad’s spot, Usman is ready for the call, even if it means squaring off with a fighter he’s often seen in the same training space.
“First of all, let me clarify something: We’re not teammates,” Usman said on his Pound-4-Pound podcast. “He comes in and trains in my gym where I was for most of my career until the last four or five years, which I’m still in that gym. That’s [Henry Hooft’s] gym, Kill Cliff now is the name, but he’s not my teammate per se.
“But if the UFC’s going to call who they think is going to be legit tough enough and man enough to step in there, is crazy enough to step in there on short notice and go out there and possibly shock the world, definitely the UFC know who to call when that situation happens. And if they do give me a call, I’m going to answer the call, we’ll get a couple of things straight and if we’ve got to do it, we’ve got to do it. I don’t shy away from any of that. I’ve done it on six days’ notice. I’ve done it on eight days’ notice and hey, this is only a couple of weeks’ notice.”
Usman is currently on a three-fight skid and has been patient with searching out his next opponent. Most recently, he lost a majority decision to Khamzat Chimaev at UFC 294 in a middleweight bout that he accepted on short notice. Prior to that, he lost back-to-back title fights against rival Leon Edwards and is now winless since November 2021.
There has been no love lost between Usman and Muhammad and while that’s a matchup he’s also targeted, he hopes Muhammad is given proper time to recover and suffers no longterm negative effects from his toe infection.
“That’s my personal belief, I do sometimes think he does act like a dork, but Belal, he’s a man,” Usman said. “He’s a man at the same time. He’s a competitor, he’s a fighter, and I would never want to see that happen to anyone. I’ve dealt with series of series of injuries and it’s never fun, especially when this is our livelihood. This is how he feeds his family, so I would never, ever want something like that to happen. So hope for a speedy recovery for Mr. Belal Muhammad.”
Tom Aspinall | Photo by Richard Sellers/PA Images via Getty Images
Dana White might just be practicing the art of positive affirmation because he’s certain no matter who walks out with the heavyweight title at UFC 309, the winner will move on to face interim champion Tom Aspinall next.
The showdown between Jon Jones and Stipe Miocic has been anticipated for over a year after they were booked to meet in November 2023 until a torn pectoral muscle suffered by Jones delayed the fight. In Jones’ absence, Aspinall become interim champion but White and the UFC were adamant about Jones still facing Miocic in a battle between two all-time greats.
There has been plenty of talk of Jones, Miocic or both of them possibly retiring after their fight concludes on Nov. 16, but White continues to believe that the winner won’t walk away without giving Aspinall his chance to unify the titles.
“I truly believe that whoever wins this fight, just competitively the way that these guys are wired and the reason that they’re both massive legends in the sport, they’re not going to just ride off into the sunset without settling the dispute with Tom Aspinall,” White told TNT Sports.
Aspinall has repeatedly called out Jones, who claimed a vacant heavyweight title with a quick submission of Ciryl Gane back in March 2023. In response, Jones largely scoffed at Aspinall’s demands while staying steadfast that he’s always wanted to face Miocic, who holds the record for most successful title defenses (4) at heavyweight in UFC history.
While Miocic won’t make any commitment about his future until after he fights at UFC 309, Jones has publicly hinted at his own retirement numerous times. Despite that, White believes that Jones and Miocic respect the sport enough to give Aspinall his opportunity to become an undisputed champion before hanging up the gloves.
“When you think about Jon Jones becoming the youngest champion in [UFC] history and all the things that Stipe accomplished, they were given opportunities when they were young,” White said. “I think that they will reciprocate.”
Aspinall plans on sitting cageside for the event and he’s also weighing in as the backup, although it remains to be seen if Jones or Miocic would actually agree to face him on short notice if disaster struck during fight week.
For his part, White knows that either fighter eventually taking on Aspinall would do huge business for the UFC and he’s not giving up hope on making it happen.
“People will lose their f*cking minds if either one of those fights happen,” White said. “Stipe or Jon Jones [against Tom Aspinall].”
The broadcast team calling the fights for the upcoming Jake Paul vs. Mike Tyson card has finally been revealed ahead of the event airing on Netflix on Nov. 15 from AT&T Stadium just outside Dallas.
Leading the commentary and handling play-by-play duties is veteran broadcaster Mauro Ranallo, who has called dozens of championship fights during his career dating back to his days working with PRIDE Fighting Championships.
Ranallo is joined in the broadcast booth by former multi-division boxing champion and former Tyson opponent Roy Jones Jr. The third person in the broadcast booth is actually actress Rosie Perez, who has often talked about her passion for boxing and now she’ll get to call one of the most talked about fights of the year.
Kate Scott, a veteran broadcaster from CBS, is set to host the event during the broadcast with retired boxing champion Andre Ward providing analysis from the booth before and after fights.
Sean Wheelock joins the broadcast as the rules and scoring expert with Sibley Scoles and Ariel Helwani reporting from inside the arena. Tyson’s son Amir Tyson is actually serving as the in-arena reporter alongside Scoles during the preliminary fights on the card.
Kody Mommaerts, who currently serves as the announcer for BOXXER and BYB Extreme Fighting, is handling the in-ring announcer duties for the card.
The broadcast team lineup was first revealed by Variety.
The main card airs exclusively on Netflix for no additional cost to subscribers with the broadcast starting at 8 p.m. ET on Friday, Nov. 15. The preliminary card kicks off at 5:30 p.m. ET
Colby Covington | Photo by Chris Unger/Zuffa LLC via Getty Images
Colby Covington sees plenty of big fights ahead when he returns to action.
December will mark a year since Covington’s most recent fight, a loss to then-welterweight champion Leon Edwards in the main event of UFC 296. Since then, Covington has been relatively quiet, though he has spent much of 2024 campaigning for President Donald Trump. With Trump once again having been elected to office, Covington is free to focus on his own career.
And he already has a few names in mind, including top welterweight contender Jack Della Maddalena.
“We’ve been talking about this fight with Jack Della Maddalena,” Covington told Submission Radio (transcription via Denis Shkuratov). “I think it makes a lot of sense. He got a big win in my hometown in Miami last time he was out here so he has a little bit of a name out here. He’s undefeated. He’s hungry. He’s fearless. He’s an exciting fighter.
“I think that’s a fight that the fans would be intrigued with. I think it’s a high-level fight. It’s a top contender fight that establishes who’s the next contender for the belt.”
Della Maddalena is one of the hottest names at 170 pounds, with seven straight wins to kick off his UFC career. Overall, he has won 17 straight fights after beginning his pro career 0-2. This past March, the Australian slugger defeated one-time UFC title challenger defeated one-time UFC title challenger Gilbert Burns by third-round knockout and he currently stands at No. 4 in the MMA Fighting Global Rankings.
While Covington is eager to climb back up the charts, he’s also entertaining grudge matches. One fighter who Covington has gone back and forth with in the media is lightweight contender Paddy Pimblett. If Pimblett wants to jump up in weight, Covington is eager to slap him back down.
“He’d never fight again,” Covington said. “It’d be the last fight that he’d ever have in the Octagon. I would beat him silly from pillar to post. I’d beat him so bad it’d be one of the worst beatings in UFC history. I don’t think the athletic commission would be able to sanction a fight for him ever again after the damage I would do to Paddy f*cking Pimblett. The guy’s an absolute joke and it’s just hilarious because last time I saw him on Fight Week, he’s walking down, literally walked by me, like, three times. Every time he puts his head straight down, doesn’t make any eye contact, but now he wants to talk a big game. So Paddy, if you’re really about that life, come see me. Come see the ‘King of Miami.’
“Call [UFC executive] Hunter [Campbell]. You know what? You probably don’t even have the boss’s number. You probably have to go through, like, the matchmakers or something. Don’t worry, I’ll put in a call to the boss. We can get this fight going if you’re really about that. And you know what? More importantly, you don’t got to cut weight. I know you’re a big guy. You’re bigger than me anyways. So come up to welterweight, eat as much food as you want, and bring your A-game and pack a lunch because it’s going to be the last time you ever fight again.”
Long term, Covington still believes he can fight for UFC gold. Though Covington’s performance against Edwards was forgettable, he was previously part of two entertaining title fights with Kamaru Usman, and the urge to prove himself against the best remains.
He’s eager to fight undefeated welterweight Shavkat Rakhmonov, who is looking for a dance partner now after UFC champion Belal Muhammad was forced to withdraw from their UFC 310 main event meeting due to a toe infection. If Rakhmonov finds a new opponent for the Dec. 7 card, regardless of the result, Covington wants a piece of him.
“I think I can walk him down and pressure him and he’s not going to like my pressure,” Covington said of the Rakhmonov matchup. “He doesn’t do very well with southpaws. We saw how he did with the busboy, Geoff Neal, that was a very competitive fight. He hasn’t really fought a top, top contender yet. He’s fought some gatekeepers in the division, some some guys right on the cusp of the top 10, but he’s never fought a champion like me and a guy who’s just going to come at him for for five straight rounds and just walk him down.
“So I think I match up well with him. He stands very tall. I don’t know, I don’t see anything special with him. You know, he has some good submissions, he’s slick, but that’s when he can control the wrestling. He’s not going to control the wrestling on me. I think I can beat him pretty easily and I think it’s a favorable fight. It’s a fight that I want in the future whether he wins or loses in December.”
Watch Covington’s interview with Submission Radio below.
BKFC champion Kai Stewart wasn’t necessarily looking for a fight against fellow Montana native Sean O’Malley, but now he actually likes that idea.
As he prepares to defend his title on home soil against UFC veteran Jimmie Rivera on Saturday, Stewart addressed his beef with O’Malley, which dates back to UFC 292, the night that the flamboyant Contender Series veteran first captured the bantamweight championship. It was an odd interaction when O’Malley was asked about the rise of combat sports in Montana and when Stewart’s name was mentioned, he responded by saying “that kid sucks … he’s in my DMs talking shit, I don’t even know this kid.”
It turns out the direct message was from four years ago but apparently O’Malley never forgot.
“So the DM in question was from 2020, this was 2023 when he beat [Aljamain Sterling],” Stewart told MMA Fighting. “It’s from 2020, he posted something about wrestlers and one of my really good friends is Myles Mazurkiewicz, if you type that name versus Sean O’Malley on YouTube, you’ll see what happens.
“My only negative DM to him was, ‘What about Myles Mazurkiewicz, the only wrestler you’ve ever faced?’ Apparently that stuck because three years down the road he hit me with that.”
The fight in question came when O’Malley was still an amateur and he suffered a loss to Mazurkiewicz, was a standout wrestler at the University of Providence in Montana. Stewart says that was the only private message he ever sent to O’Malley and that seemingly innocuous interaction led to some ill feelings between them.
In addition to that incident, Stewart revealed he also received an opportunity from O’Malley’s team to face off with one of his training partners with the now-former UFC champion offering up a bonus to make the fight happen. While Stewart does have a pro MMA bout on his résumé, he’s now a reigning and defending BKFC champion and he has no plans to burn the promotion by trying to pursue a grudge match against one of O’Malley’s boys.
“They said, ‘Sean O’Malley will give you $ 20,000 if you can sign up and fight against our guy and win,’” Stewart said. “I was like obviously I’m not giving up my world title to fight a 1-0 pro fighter in MMA. Absolutely not. It’s just little things like that. They’re just trying real hard to see a downfall in me because I think they’re just scared that I’m coming, especially after that Merab [Dvalishvili] fight.”
Despite the simmering bad blood between them, Stewart says he still openly roots for O’Malley whenever he competes because he always wants to show support to his fellow fighters from Montana.
“I’ve rooted for him every single fight,” Stewart said. “People said Merab was just going to do what he did to O’Malley and I thought it was possible but also I saw how chinny Merab is. If I was going to put my money down on the fight, I would probably put my money on Sean. That’s what I was telling people. Sean is a sniper. Then Merab went out and did that.
“I still supported him through everything because Montana to the moon. But eventually the forces are going to clash and it’s going to be good. If there’s any beef, it’s the Montana way, let’s just take care of it.”
It might seem impossible to imagine a fight between Stewart and O’Malley considering they don’t compete in the same promotion much less the same sport. That said, Stewart knows new BKFC owner Conor McGregor has already pitched the idea of doing crossover fights with the UFC and he doesn’t rule out the possibility that a showdown against O’Malley could actually happen one day.
“Conor posted recently about doing crossovers with Dana [White], Conor is still super marketed through the UFC, he’s in every commercial that they have so that holds weight,” Stewart said. “I definitely slid up and hopefully we can get that fight set up one day no matter where we do it.
“I’m leaving the door open. I’m in the position where I’m willing to go to 135. I’m willing to go to MMA. I’m willing to do it in bare-knuckle. I’m willing to do it at 145. I’m willing to do it at a catchweight. The ball is entirely and literally in O’Malley’s court. That’s what I wanted. As long as I remain king of BKFC, it’s way more likely we can get a fatter payday over here than we could over there.”
Stewart maintains he really doesn’t have anything against O’Malley but he also loves the idea of two top fighters from Montana squaring off to settle whatever beef exists between them.
“If there’s any beef, it’s the Montana way, let’s just take care of it,” Stewart said. “I will fight O’Malley in MMA, bare knuckle, we can do whatever he wants. I’m going to take it home.”
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We’re back for another day of the SB Nation UFC in-5 daily trivia game, and we’re switching to a system of a new article each day for the game.
We tried using a single article for the game, updated with the latest game each day, but it was creating a bit of an unwieldy experience in the comments. So, we’ll have the current day’s game plus the previous three days in each new article. That way, you can catch up if you miss a day.
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The goal of the game is to guess the correct random UFC fighter player with the help of up to five clues. We’ll mix in BOTH ACTIVE AND RETIRED FIGHTERS. It won’t be easy to figure it out in one or two guesses, but some of you might be able to nail it. It will be a mix of well-known players and some “that guys” that we haven’t thought of in some time. The game will appear in slot #3 of the MMA Fighting layout each morning, with occasional movement later in the day.
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Lucas Almeida | Photo by Chris Unger/Zuffa LLC via Getty Images
David Onama needs a new opponent for next week’s UFC 309 after Lucas Almeida was forced off the card due to undisclosed reasons, multiple people with knowledge of the situation told MMA Fighting.
UFC 309 will take place at New York City’s Madison Square Garden on Nov. 16, and the promotion is currently seeking a replacement to fight the Ugandan featherweight on just over a week’s notice.
Onama (12-2) hopes to keep the momentum going after back-to-back wins over Gabriel Santos — a bonus-winning second-round knockout in Jacksonville, Fla. — and Jonathan Pearce, a bout he missed weight for.
Almeida (15-3) was looking to compete for the first time since signing a new UFC contract following a decision victory over Timmy Cuamba this past June, rebounding from stoppage defeats to Pat Sabatini and Andre Fili.
UFC 309 will air live on pay-per-view and feature Jon Jones’ first defense of the heavyweight belt against former champion Stipe Miocic in the main event.
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