CombatSports.org

Paige VanZant didn’t get the result she wanted in her second appearance in Power Slap after the UFC and BKFC veteran was penalized for an illegal blow in the second round in her match against Chelsea Dodson.

The 30-year-old combat sports star, who made her slap fighting debut back in June with a unanimous decision win, ended up going to a draw with Dodson — wife to former UFC title contender John Dodson — after she was deducted a point for “clubbing,” which is defined as “any strike other than a permitted slap to the permitted target area.”

In this case, VanZant delivered a shot where more of her arm connected with Dodson’s face than her hand, which resulted in a penalty being assessed.

The one-point deduction put VanZant in a tough position to either deliver a knockdown or a knockout in order to win the bout in the third round. Neither of those things happened, although VanZant did win both the first and third rounds on the scorecards.

Unfortunately the point deduction in the second round cost VanZant the match after both she and Dodson stayed standing following each blow delivered during the match. The final tally was 28-28 across all three scorecards with the bout declared a draw.

VanZant didn’t speak directly after the match, although she said after her Power Slap debut in June that she definitely planned on competing there again in the future.

“Kind of going into it was like, ‘I only have to do this one time, a bucket list thing, I want to go do Power Slap, prove that I can,’” VanZant told MMA Fighting in July after her debut. “But then afterward it was like, ‘Shoot, that was really fun.’”

It remains to be seen if Thursday’s match could lead to another VanZant appearance in Power Slap.

MMA Fighting – All Posts

submitted by /u/OverStatement500 [link] [comments]

MMA: Mixed Martial Arts

Usman Nurmagomedov is a man with a plan.

Younger brother of UFC bantamweight contender Umar Nurmagomedov and cousin to lightweight GOAT Khabib Nurmagomedov, the undefeated Usman is currently the Bellator 155-pound champion. Recently, Usman Nurmagomedov successfully defended his title against Alexander Shabliy at in September, cementing himself as one of the best lightweights on Earth. But his ambition doesn’t stop there.

Speaking recently about his future plans, Nurmagomedov revealed he hopes to follow in his cousin’s footsteps by making the move to the octagon once training partner and UFC lightweight champion Islam Makhachev is done.

“I’m waiting for Islam to finish his career and then I will [go after the UFC title],” Nurmagomedov said on Gorilla Fighting’s YouTube. “I think if we get it right, we’ll be fighting in the UFC at 28. I’m 26 years old right now. Two years, I’ll get stronger and that’s it. Go into the UFC at 28 and compete until I’m 32.”

Undefeated for nearly a decade, Makhachev is currently the No. 1 pound-for-pound fighter in MMA, with three successful lightweight title defenses to his name. Before winning the belt, Makhachev found himself in a similar situation to Usman, serving as “the next man up” to Khabib Nurmagomedov. That played out exactly to the plan of the legendary coach Abdulmanap Nurmagomedov, who developed all of these fighters, and according to Khabib, that plan also extended to Usman.

“This is what Abdulmanap envisioned,” Khabib said. “He strongly believed in Usman and always said that he would be the future champion. I didn’t see the potential when he was 16 years old. I saw the prospects and I believed, and from the very beginning, my father believed in it all, believed in Usman’s future.”

Of course, Nurmagomedov’s intention to go to the UFC is not exactly great news for the Bellator or its owner, the PFL. However, speaking with MMA Fighting on Wednesday, PFL co-founder Donn Davis dismissed this as a concern for the promotion.

“How many of you have said you’re going to move to Florida and retire in four years, and how many of you do it?” Davis said. “One in 10? One in five? … People say things all the time, and then they don’t do it.

“So might he go? Might not he go? Might he go in two years? Might he go in five years? Might he be the champion? Might not he be the champion? My goal is to make my man Usman happy. My goal is to make my man Usman successful, financially rich, and a champion, so that in two years he forgets he said this today.”

Whatever happens in two years, for the time being, Nurmagomedov remains signed with Bellator, where his next fight is likely a title defense against Paul Hughes, following the Irishman’s win over A.J. McKee at PFL Battle of the Giants this past Saturday.

MMA Fighting – All Posts

Fighter picks
| BJPenn.com

UFC

Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) held its official pre-fight press conference on Thursday for the upcoming UFC 308 pay-per-view (PPV) event, locked and loaded for this Sat. (Oct. 26, 2024) at Etihad Arena in Abu Dhabi, UAE. All 10 main card combatants were on hand this morning and came face-to-face at the conclusion of the UFC 308 press conference festivities.

That includes event headliners Ilia Topuria and Max Holloway. “El Matador” makes this first defense of his 145-pound title against “Blessed,” who is certainly no stranger to championship titles. In addition, ex-middleweight kingpin Robert Whittaker returns to battle local hero Khamzat Chimaev, not long after Magomed Ankalaev and Aleksandar Rakic hook ‘em up at 205 pounds.

MMAmania.com will deliver LIVE round-by-round, blow-by-blow coverage of the entire UFC 308 fight card RIGHT HERE, starting with the early ESPN+ “Prelims” matches at 10 a.m. ET, followed by the UFC 308 PPV main card start time at 2 p.m. ET on ESPN+.

To check out the latest and greatest UFC 308: “Topuria vs. Holloway” news and notes be sure to hit up our comprehensive event archive right here. For the complete UFC 308 fight card and PPV lineup click here.

MMAmania.com – All Posts

submitted by /u/InflationPrudent1388 [link] [comments]

MMA: Mixed Martial Arts

UFC welterweight champion Belal Muhammad never backs down from a challenge but he’s not going to seriously entertain a potential fight against somebody competing two weight classes below him.

Just recently, Muhammad got drawn into a war of words with Ilia Topuria after he warned the UFC featherweight champion to watch what he says when addressing Islam Makhachev after declaring plans to eventually challenge for the 155-pound title. The comment led to a back-and-forth exchange over social media with Topuria taking one additional step when he said he wants to eventually become the UFC’s first ever three-division champion, which would then require him to go for Muhammad’s belt.

While Muhammad admits he had some fun trading verbal jabs with Topuria, he’s not even remotely concerned that this challenge actually deserves his attention.

“I think that dude’s got Napoleon syndrome or something,” Muhammad told MMA Fighting. “Short guys always act like they’re tough. Literally I think he started coming at me because somebody asked me about why is he coming at Islam [Makhachev]. I said bro, he needs to focus on [Max] Holloway, who’s in front of him and you don’t want to disrespect the guys from Dagestan because they see you in person, they’re going to slap you. They don’t take that stuff. They don’t play the trash talk game. It’s real life to them.

“I think he took offense to it. He’s at that mode where I think he’s trying to find himself and he’s trying to show fans that he’s trash talker and he’s this bad guy. He’s not really good at trash talking. When he comes at me, it’s laughable because he’s basically copying words off memes.”

As far as his aspirations about winning titles across multiple divisions, Topuria first has to get through his upcoming fight against Max Holloway at UFC 308 as he defends his featherweight belt for the first time.

Regardless if he wins, Muhammad says it’s still a far cry from actually jumping up one division and challenging a dominant champion like Islam Makhachev before packing on at least 25 pounds to attempt the move to welterweight.

In other words, Muhammad isn’t taking that challenge seriously.

“At the end of the day, we’re not going to fight in the cage so why are you even giving me those words, you’re trying to talk tough because you know nothing’s really going to come of it,” Muhammad said. “He can say ‘I want to go up to 170 and be a triple champ after this’ but you know you’re not.

“I don’t even think he’s going to get past Holloway. I think he’s going to lose this fight and then we don’t even have to hear his freaking mouse voice.”

When it comes to Topuria’s fight on Saturday, Muhammad absolutely plans on rooting for Holloway to win but that’s not even a situation where he’s just hoping to see the featherweight title change hands.

Muhammad absolutely expects it to happen.

“I’m rooting for Max but I think skill wise, Max will beat him,” Muhammad said. “I think [Topuria] goes out there and pushes these guys forward and a lot of the guys he fought were shorter. Max is a taller boxer. He hasn’t fought somebody like him. We know how good Max’s chin is. I think that he’s going to realize when it gets to the third, fourth and fifth round that Max is still there, still in front of him.

“We saw him get a little bit tired in the [Josh] Emmett fight. I think it’s going to get worse in this fight because Max is high volume. He showed last fight, he’s working on his power. I think Max will put his lights out.”

MMA Fighting – All Posts

During a recent Q&A session hosted by MMA Fighting’s Mike Heck, PFL founder Donn Davis took questions from the fans in the live chat. One question asked whether Davis and the promotion would be releasing an official statement regarding Daiane Silva.

The Brazilian fighter was set to make her debut for the promotion at the Bellator Champions Series event in London back in September. Following a failed attempt to hit the featherweight limit, having previously competed at lightweight in her career, Silva was admitted to the Intensive Care Unit at Northwick Park Hospital in London.

After suffering from kidney failure, she was placed into an induced coma with MMA Fighting reporting that she is still currently sedated. Nacao Cyborg, an MMA promotion belonging to Cris Cyborg, posted about the current situation this past weekend which alerted a lot of people to what was going on after there was no statement or update from the PFL.

Davis explained why that was the case by speaking publicly on Silva’s health concerns for the first time.

“Yes, I’ll tell you it’s specifically not been addressed for the fighter privacy. Everything you just said fully explains the situation. She was a first time fighter for us, she experienced a very difficult weight loss which resulted in a medical emergency which was dealt with seriously and appropriately and she’s been in long-term hospitalization and we’ve done everything possible to support her recovery. To say anything other than that is not our place. This is her business and her privacy but everything I just said is the news and that’s the news that is well known and that’s the news that, we wouldn’t want to say anything other than that news.”

Davis was also asked why there was no response from the promotion when they were asked for updates by the media.

“Yeah look, I understand why a lot of times, people in the media want to know stuff. I totally understand that but I would hope people appreciate over the last five or six years, given how we’ve handled our business partners, our fighters, our relationships with everybody associated with the company, we always try to do the right thing, which doesn’t always mean the easy thing. In this case, I think respecting her privacy at a very sensitive time instead of giving constant updates to anyone who wants to know is the right thing. It might not appear to be the easy thing.”

Continue Reading PFL’s Donn Davis Explains Silence On Fighter Put In Coma After Botched Weight Cut: ‘Not Our Place’ at MMA News.

MMA News

submitted by /u/StoryOfTheFight [link] [comments]

MMA: Mixed Martial Arts