Sean O’Malley and Dana White | @danawhite, Twitter
UFC CEO Dana White and Sean O’Malley tested out their acting chops in a trailer to the upcoming movie in the Venom series.
White and O’Malley are featured in the latest promotional material for Venom: The Last Dance, which hits theaters on Oct. 25. The film stars Tom Hardy, who plays character Eddie Brock, along with the body host of Venom.
Check out the trailer below.
#Venom: The Last Dance in theaters ONLY October 25th @SugaSeanMMA pic.twitter.com/rFTwPogf6u
— danawhite (@danawhite) September 14, 2024
White is shown on the phone, when Brock comes into his office saying he’s on the run and needs money — offering his services to fight for the UFC. When White threatens him, Brock leaves, but runs into O’Malley, before putting him in a rear-naked choke, forcing White to throw a wad of cash to the Brock-Venom combo character.
The film will be the third of the series, which includes the original that dropped in 2018, along with the sequel, Venom: Let There Be Carnage that dropped in 2021.
Alex Pereira | Photo by Jeff Bottari/Zuffa LLC via Getty Images
Alex Pereira looks to keep the magic going at UFC 307, capping off one of the deepest cards of the year.
During Saturday’s UFC 306 event, the promotion revealed the full lineup for its upcoming pay-per-view show, slated for Oct. 5 in Salt Lake City.
The show is topped by two championship bouts, with “Poatan” closing the show in an attempt to defend his 205-pound title for the second time in less than four months as he faces Khalil Rountree. In the co-main event, Raquel Pennington puts her bantamweight title on the line for the first time when she welcomes back Julianna Peña to the octagon.
The main card is complete with a key featherweight contest between Movsar Evloev and Aljamain Sterling, Kayla Harrison looks to earn a shot at UFC gold when she takes on Ketlen Vieira, and Roman Dolidze faces Kevin Holland.
The prelims include former champions Jose Aldo and Carla Esparza, and the top spot goes to former welterweight title contender Stephen Thompson’s battle with Joaquin Buckley.
Below is the full fight card and bout lineup for UFC 307
Main card, 10 p.m. ET, ESPN+ PPV
Alex Pereira vs. Khalil Rountree Jr. — for light heavyweight title
Raquel Pennington vs. Julianna Peña – for women’s bantamweight title
Jon Jones and Alex Pereira | Photo by Jeff Bottari/Zuffa LLC
UFC light heavyweight champion Alex Pereira is open to training with heavyweight champion Jon Jones.
Up next for “Poatan” is a defense of his title against Khalil Rountree at UFC 307 on Oct. 5. After that, he’s ready to help Jones prepare for his upcoming heavyweight title clash with Stipe Miocic on Nov. 16.
Pereira attended UFC 306 this past Saturday in Las Vegas and said in an interview with Full Send that he’s been texting “Bones” for a while about possibly training together, and that it could happen before Jones fights Miocic at UFC 309 in New York.
“I think there’s some good time [between our fights], his fight is only in November,” Pereira said. “There’s always something coming off a fight, a small injury, so we can get some rest and then train together.”
Pereira and Jones posed for pictures inside Sphere on Saturday and the Brazilian said he felt Jones appeared to be “more athletic and leaner” compared to when he last fought at UFC 285, where he scored a quick submission victory over Cyril Gane in March 2023 to earn a vacant heavyweight title. Training together could prevent the two champions facing off one day in the octagon, and Pereira said he’s not focused on chasing that fight at the moment.
“A lot of people talk about this superfight but I think I have to make the most of this guy’s experience,” Pereira said. “He has a ton of experience, but people are talking about him maybe doing only one or two fights more, and I’m not even at heavyweight yet. I don’t know if that’s possible, but I want to at least be training with him.”
Asked who he would choose for a champion vs. champion clash next if middleweight Dricus du Plessis and heavyweights Jones are on the table, Poatan tripled down on his intention to regain his 185-pound belt.
“Dricus du Plessis is the easier fight,” Pereira said. “It’s harder to cut the weight, but as I’ve said when I moved up in weight that I needed two or three fights without this weight cut for my body to recover, and then I could do the cut again. I’ve said that after the [Jiri Prochazka rematch] and I’m still waiting for an answer. He never gives a straight answer. Everybody knows he’s scared.
“Dricus du Plessis always jokes in his answer. We can see he doesn’t want this. He has to say, ‘UFC, make this fight happen. Alex wants it, I want it, so let’s make it happen.’ It’s easier to work if he says that, but we can see from his answer that he’s scared. Assh*le [laughs].”
Irene Aldana spent three rounds in the octagon with Norma Dumont at UFC 306 but it looked like she was tangling with Jason Voorhees just one day after Friday the 13th.
A clash of heads opened a horrific cut on Aldana’s head that had blood running down into her eyes as she kept wiping at her face while trying to mount a comeback against Dumont. Despite a valiant effort, Aldana just couldn’t get the job done with Dumont ultimately winning a unanimous decision.
While the loss probably stung enough, Aldana then had to go backstage to get treatment on her cut with UFC CEO Dana White showing off a photo of the gruesome gash before she got medical attention.
Dr. Greg Hsu — the UFC’s on-staff physician and surgeon — then took it one step further by posting a video that showed him moving the cut around Aldana’s head before eventually stitching her up.
The video definitely isn’t for the faint of heart as Hsu shows just how deep the cut went on Aldana’s head.
View this post on Instagram
A post shared by Dr. Greg Hsu (@the_ufc_doctor)
The next slide over shows the aftermath with Hsu literally sewing Aldana’s forehead back together again following the damage done from the fight.
It’s safe to assume that Aldana is going to need some plastic surgery in the not too distant future to ensure that machete-like wound doesn’t leave her with a permanent scar across her forehead.
Sean O’Malley has a lot to reflect on after a lackluster outing cost him the bantamweight title at UFC 306.
Despite promises of a first-round knockout and going into the fight as the incumbent champion, O’Malley struggled to deal with Merab Dvalishvili’s pace and pressure, which led to six takedowns and over 10 minutes of control time from the Georgian bantamweight.
In the end, O’Malley lost a unanimous decision on the scorecards with Dvalishvili crowned as the new champion.
“He looked flat,” UFC CEO Dana White said about O’Malley’s performance at the UFC 306 post-fight press conference. “He didn’t look sharp.”
As much as O’Malley struggled throughout the fight, he almost made a stunning comeback after snapping off a front kick to the body that hurt Dvalishvili badly in the final round. Realizing his opponent was hurt, O’Malley rushed forward to try and inflict more damage but Dvalishvili was able to circle away and stay out of trouble until the final horn sounded.
Outside of that moment, O’Malley never had Dvalishvili in any real trouble during the entire fire.
In fact, White believes O’Malley’s inactivity is really what cost him after he looked at the statistics from the fight and realized that the always colorful bantamweight just wasn’t throwing many punches during the five-round fight.
“He didn’t look crisp until the last round,” White said. “He hurt him with that body shot and he knew he hurt him with the body shot, and he kept going in trying to finish. But I looked at the punch stats, it was like six in a couple of the rounds.”
According to the official UFC stats, O’Malley landed just 5 out 10 significant strikes in round two and then 6 out of 9 significant strikes in round four. For the entire fight, O’Malley connected with 47 significant strikes compared to 82 for Dvalishvili.
Obviously nobody was more upset about the loss than O’Malley but White didn’t have any easy answers about why he performed the way he did on Saturday.
Perhaps the most credit goes to Dvalishvili, who just never allowed O’Malley to settle into any kind of rhythm during the fight. With Dvalishvili in constant pursuit, O’Malley was forced to react off his backfoot and he just couldn’t find the timing for his punches before he was stuck fending off takedowns round after round.
Ultimately, O’Malley lost the decision and his UFC title so now he’ll have to get back to the drawing board to see if he can earn another shot at the belt in the future.
Esteban Ribovics and Daniel Zellhuber | Photo by Chris Unger/Zuffa LLC
Esteban Ribovics and Daniel Zellhuber were handsomely rewarded for their Fight of the Year contender.
On Saturday night, Ribovics and Zellhuber met in a lightweight contest on the main card of UFC 306 at Sphere in Las Vegas, and for 15 minutes the two prospects went to war in one of the very best fights of the year. The third round was particularly thrilling as both men got badly hurt at points, and nonetheless battled through in a wild brawl until the final bell. Ultimately, Ribovics took home a split decision victory but both men were well-compensated, earning $ 50,000 Fight of the Night bonuses.
Ignacio Bahamondes and Ketlen Souza also walk away from UFC 306 $ 50,000 richer, picking up Performance of the Night bonuses for their stoppage wins on the prelims, the only two finishes of the evening. Bahamondes scored a nasty first-round knockout of Manuel Torres in their lightweight bout, and Souza pulled off a technical rear-naked choke over Yazmin Jauregui.
Merab Dvalishvili and Valentina Shevchenko left UFC 306 Sphere in Las Vegas as UFC champions following their dominant decision wins over Sean O’Malley and Valentina Shevchenko. Despite the championship bouts not being the most thrilling affairs, was the UFC’s big swing a success?
Following Saturday’s pay-per-view event, MMA Fighting’s Mike Heck and Jed Meshew react to Dvalishvili and Shevchenko’s title wins, what the losses mean for the now former champions, Diego Lopes continuing his incredible surge with a win over Brian Ortega, the Fight of the Year contender between Esteban Ribovics and Daniel Zellhuber, and more.
Additionally, José Youngs gives his experience of being inside Sphere live for the card, talks how it looked and felt being there, and his biggest takeaways.
Watch the UFC 305 post-fight show above, or an audio-only version of the show can also be streamed below and on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever else you get your pods.
Sean O’Malley was understandably disappointed with his result at UFC 306.
After vowing to end Merab Dvalishvili inside the first round, O’Malley ended up losing a unanimous decision, which cost him the bantamweight title in his second attempted defense. O’Malley struggled to deal with Dvalishvili’s relentless pressure and takedowns before he was ultimately dethroned as champion.
While he didn’t make an appearance at the post-fight press conference, O’Malley posted a brief message on social media to address his loss.
“Over promised, under delivered,” O’Malley wrote on Twitter. “Sorry. Love you guys.”
Over promised under delivered. Sorry. Love you guys.
— Sean O’Malley (@SugaSeanMMA) September 15, 2024
Best known for his sniper-like striking, O’Malley just couldn’t put the trigger much on Saturday with Dvalishvili constantly walking him down and then scoring on several takedowns. The wrestling from Dvalishvili definitely altered O’Malley’s ability to use his kicks, although he did connect with a nasty shot to the body late in the fifth round.
Unfortunately for O’Malley it was too little, too late with Dvalishvili surviving the only serious damage he suffered in the fight before he was crowned the new UFC bantamweight champion.
It’s only the second time O’Malley has tasted defeat in his career, although he’ll likely say it’s the first after an injury led to a ground and pound finish when he fell to Marlon “Chito” Vera back in 2020.
Considering the way the fight against Dvalishvili played out, O’Malley posted a short video on Instagram wearing a wrestling singlet as he showcased his sprawl to defend a takedown along with a caption that said “back to work.”
View this post on Instagram
A post shared by Suga Sean O’Malley (@sugasean)
Because he lost after predicting a knockout victory, O’Malley had to know he was going to hear it from his biggest critics, which included boxer Devin Haney.
“O’Malley b*tch ass lost,” Haney wrote on Twitter.
O’Malley bitch ass lost..
— Devin Haney (@Realdevinhaney) September 15, 2024
While he probably wasn’t in the mood to hear it, O’Malley still took time to fire back at Haney with a reminder about what would happen if they ever actually fought.
“Still kill you,” O’Malley wrote in response.
Still kill you
— Sean O’Malley (@SugaSeanMMA) September 15, 2024
O’Malley leaves Las Vegas without his title but he remains one of the biggest stars on the UFC roster so it probably won’t take long for him to get back into contention with another win or two.
For now he’s going to regroup and figure out where it all went wrong after losing on Saturday night.
Sean O’Malley and Merab Dvalishvili face off ahead of UFC 306 | Photo by Chris Unger/Zuffa LLC
This Saturday, the UFC goes where it’s never gone before: the Sphere in Las Vegas.
Hailed as a revolutionary new venue for fan experience, the UFC brought a special card that Dana White has promised will be “the greatest live sporting event of all-time,” and in the UFC 306 main event, bantamweight champion Sean O’Malley puts his title on the line against No. 1 contender Merab Dvalishvili.
Pulling off the upset over Dvalishvili’s friend and teammate Aljamain Sterling to claim the bantamweight title at UFC 292, “Suga” made his first successful title defense earlier this year, avenging a previous loss to Chito Vera with a one-sided shellacking in the main event of UFC 299. Now he looks to cement himself as the best 135-pound fighter on Earth with a similar performance against Dvalishvili.
Viewed by some as the uncrowned king at 135 pounds, Dvalishvili is currently on an impressive 10-fight win streak, dating back to 2018. A win over former champion Henry Cejudo at UFC 298 earlier this year cemented Dvalishvili’s place atop the bantamweight contenders, and now he looks to avenge his teammate and create his own legacy at 35 pounds.
Check out the UFC 306 main event live blog below.
Prefight:
Main event time. What more can they do in the Sphere for the main event?
Jon Jones vs. Stipe Miocic gets made official before we get the walkouts. Hopefully, the next two months fly by.
So, this last graphic thing on the Sphere is kind of weird. Very CGI movie-ish. At least the start of it was. I will say, I’m glad the pacing hasn’t felt impacted at all by this spectacle. That might be just me though.
The background takes a night city theme as Dvalishvili makes his way to the octagon.
Superstar by Lupe Fiasco plays on the speakers for O’Malley and they have definitely made him feel like one with this entrance.
Round 1:
Reluctant touch of the gloves from O’Malley. Here we are. Main event.
O’Malley instantly presses Dvalishvili. Very bizarre instant stop in the action from Herb Dean. No idea what happened there. No explanation.
Good inside leg kick from Dvalishvili. Spinning wheel kick misses from O’Malley. Body punch lands for O’Malley. It sounds like Tim Welch might be saying things to Merab or something. This is weird. Warning from Dean to Welch.
Nice head kick from Dvalishvili gets blocked but was heavy. Jab from O’Malley. One-two just misses for O’Malley. Good straight left from O’Malley. First takedown from Dvalishvili lands O’Malley gets up relatively quick but takes some punches in the process. Dvalishvili doing his thing and drags O’Mallet back down and knees the thigh. Big punch on the break from Dvalishvili.
Right hand for O’Malley leads to a single-leg takedown from Dvalishvili. They scramble, Dvalishvili goes in on a guillotine but they roll and he loses it. They stand against the cage and break. Horn sounds.
MMA Fighting scores the round 10-9 Dvalishvili.
Round 2:
Apparently, Welch was getting warned for “excessive coaching.”
The fighters feel out the first minute of this round. O’Malley connects with a long straight right to the body. Merab tries to jab his way in. O’Malley can’t seem to find his usual comfort on the feet as he gets taken down again. They work from full guard.
O’Malley teases with an omaplata attempt but doesn’t commit. He switches to a triangle then grabs Dvalishvili’s glove and gets yelled at by Dean like a father to his son. Silly time in the officiating department in this one. Right back to guard they go.
O’Malley rolls to his stomach to give up his back and take some punches as he gets pushed to the cage wall. More knees to the thigh land for Dvalishvili. Another guillotine tease from Dvalishvili closes the round before he let go and claimed O’Malley kissed him? I think? This got weird. O’Malley tries to land some punches late. Horn sounds.
MMA Fighting scores the fight 10-9 Dvalishvili.
Round 3:
A slow start to the round bleeds the first minute. O’Malley keeps connecting with shots to the body when he has found success at this low volume. Body kicks and punches. He throws a right hook but can’t land.
Dvalishvili attacks with a speedy shot and slams O’Malley into the cage before a takedown attempt. Dvalishvili lands some nice knees to the head while he holds a guillotine grip but O’Malley shakes it off and breaks away.
O’Malley just barely misses with a knee up the middle that probably gave Chito Vera flashbacks. Leg kicks inside land for Dvalishvili. Flurry of leg kicks for Dvalishvili land. Left straight seems to graze through on Dvalishvili but he eats it well. Good right straight and knee connect on Dvalishvili before the horn sounds. Much closer effort from “Sugar.”
MMA Fighting scores the round 10-9 Dvalishvili.
Round 4:
Good pair of body punches land for O’Malley. He’s trying to find a way to tire Dvalishvili but it truly may not be possible.
Dvalishvili tries to punch his way into a takedown but eats some smalls shots for his trouble. Big, well-timed takedown lands for Dvalishvili in the inner-area of the octagon. Dvalishvili works from half-guard.
Dean warns Dvalishvili to work when he clearly is landing punches and elbows. Big breath taken from O’Malley while on bottom. O’Malley manages to roll to his knees as Dvalishvili holds a grip around his waist and they move toward the cage. Knees to the thigh, punches to the ears. Clockwork for “The Machine.”
30 seconds, another guillotine position for Dvalishvili. Stats show he’s outstruck O’Malley 61-6 before a big flurry at the end of the round.
MMA Fighting scores the round 10-9 Dvalishvili.
Round 5:
O’Malley needs the hail mary but he looked spent between rounds.
Dean instantly claps for work 30 seconds into the round. Rough night for him.
Big overhand right followed by the blast double land for Dvalishvili. Backs him to the cage, more knees to the thigh from Dvalishvili. Overwhelming as always from Georgia’s finest.
Brian Ortega and Diego Lopes face off ahead of UFC 306 | Photo by Chris Unger/Zuffa LLC
This is the UFC 306 live blog for Brian Ortega vs. Diego Lopes, the featured fight on the pay-per-view main card this Saturday in Las Vegas.
Ortega and Lopes were originally scheduled to fight in at UFC 303 in June, until a series of unfortunate events led Ortega to withdraw from the bout just a few hours before they were set to compete. While that would normally be a catastrophic end, instead Lopes and the UFC found an unprecedented solution: Dan Ige came to the arena and stepped in as a replacement on just a few hours notice.
Lopes ended up winning a decision over Ige, but perhaps more importantly won the hearts and minds of fans for his willingness to fight anyone, at any time, which also made him a darling of the UFC, who promptly granted his wish to re-book this fight for UFC 306.
Check out the UFC 306 featured fight live blog below.
Prefight:
Before this one they reveal the UFC 307 lineup in full and Jose Aldo on the prelims is a sight. Fourth to last, too.
Very excited for this featherweight fight we missed out on in July.
The Sphere shows the Independence Day bell celebration. Super cool.
Here comes Diego Lopes and the crowd is rightfully hyped. How do you not love the guy?
Ortega enters. I would say the same about him but we know that Jed Meshew exists.
Round 1:
Fighters touch gloves and it’s on.
A massive right-left hook combo smashes Ortega early and hurts him bad. Lopes swarms to pursue the finish. Lopes punches away with ground and pound. Ortega looks for any grip to find a submission. Lopes jumps in and gets half-mount and the back of Ortega as they scramble briefly. Lopes stands while Ortega looks for up kicks. Hammerfists from the bottom by Ortega.
Lopes steps away to let Ortega up. Nice jab from Ortega. Uppercut sneaks through for Ortega as he gets back to jabbing. Lopes looks a bit slower after the flurry but lands a nice shovel hook. Overhand right lands for Lopes. Nice calf kick for Lopes. Ortega fires one back. Body hook followed by the left hook lands for Lopes.
30 seconds. Jab from Ortega. Another two-punch combo for Lopes misses, body kick for Ortega. Horn sounds.
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