Daniel Pineda came up short against Darren Elkins at UFC Vegas 99, but hung up his gloves in style Saturday night.
A veteran of 43 professional bouts, Pineda entered the cage looking to snap a two-fight losing skid to Alex Caceres and Nathaniel Wood, and put on an absolute war against Darren Elkins in the main card opener at the UFC APEX.
Elkins left victorious with an unanimous 29-28 score to put his first winning streak together in over three years, 12 months after his second-round finish over TJ Brown, while Pineda drops his final three inside the octagon.
“That was my last one, man,” Pineda said after the featherweight clash. “You know, we’re some dogs in here and this is my third [loss] straight. F*ck it, dude, I’m done. I’m done guys. Thank you Elkins for this badass fight.”
Pineda retires with a record of 28-17 and three no-contests, and wins over the likes of Leonard Garcia, Johnny Bedford and Herbert Burns.
Umar vs. Song is not a lock for UFC’s Tampa show in December, according to Yadong’s coach Urijah Faber.
We’re less than two months out from the UFC’s return to Tampa Bay and the card still does not have a locked in main event.
MMAMania.com confirmed reports earlier this week that the promotion had moved on from trying to coax Colby Covington into a home state main event against Ian Garry. Instead, they were looking to lock in Umar Nurmagomedov vs. Song Yadong — a surprising matchup considering Umar was already promised a title shot against new champ Merab Dvalishvili.
Nurmagomedov recently accused Dvalishvili of trying to duck him by making himself unavailable until Ramadan, the Islamic month of fasting. Rather than wait for Merab until spring or summer, Umar said he was willing to fight again in December. That would help fill the hole at the top of Tampa’s ESPN broadcast card, but according to Song Yadong’s coach Urijah Faber, nothing has been signed and the date they like is January for UFC 311 in Los Angeles.
“We don’t have a date for that yet, I don’t think December 14th is the date we’ve talked about,” Faber told Helen Yee in a new interview. “I think January is what we’re looking at. But we like that fight. I think Umar and Song are both guys that people don’t want to fight, so they’re both willing to step up.”
“We’d fight [Sean] O’Malley, we’d fight [Deiveson] Figueiredo, we’d fight any of these guys. We’ve been seing all sorts of stuff being posted about that fight but nothing’s been signed. A date has not been agreed upon. If that fight does happen, it’d most likely happen in January [at UFC 311 in Los Angeles].”
That leaves UFC on ESPN 63 in a bit of a lurch, but it’s not like the UFC is above just promoting a Mackenzie Dern vs. Amanda Ribas rematch to the main event slot. We’ll keep you updated as the Tampa Bay card coalesces, and who ends up headlining.
Johnny Eblen is the latest fighter to criticize the “Cowboy” comeback.
Longtime UFC veteran Donald Cerrone recently announced he plans to come out of retirement in pursuit of being the first fighter to log 50 in-cage appearances across the UFC and WEC. His return has been met with criticism from several of his peers, especially given that Cerrone has admitted to using performance-enhancing drugs while out of competition.
Eblen was asked about an existing issue with Cerrone and he explained that he doesn’t approve of Cerrone fighting again.
“I just don’t think it’s a good idea to retire, take a bunch of steroids and then come back and fight again,” Eblen said, speaking to the media at the PFL Battle of the Giants on Saturday in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. “It’s not a good look. I think Conor [McGregor] paved the way, I think he’s influencing a lot of other people to do it, and I think people are trying to fight past their prime and use all these substances and it’s just not natural, it’s not good.
“Your brain doesn’t heal from steroids. So all that CTE just adds up. I’m very against steroids, I’m very against people fighting past their prime.”
Cerrone turned 41 this past March. It is not yet known if the UFC will accept his request to step into the octagon again, but UFC CEO Dana White shared his opinion on the matter saying, “Love him, hate that.”
As far as Conor McGregor goes, while the former two-division champion has noticeably bulked up at various points during his break from competition dating back to July 2021, he has never officially failed a drug test. After injuring his leg against Dustin Poirier at UFC 264, McGregor was subsequently removed from the drug-testing pool until he began being tested again in October 2023.
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Raquel Pennington isn’t stunned in the least about Amanda Nunes teasing a potential return to the octagon.
Following Pennington dropping the bantamweight title via a controversial split decision to Julianna Peña at UFC 307, the now two-time titleholder ignored fellow event winner Kayla Harrison, and went right for a trilogy fight with Nunes. The third meeting was booked for UFC 289 in June 2023, but a Peña injury led to Nunes defending the belt against Irene Aldana in the main event — which Nunes successfully did via lopsided decision before announcing her retirement.
Nunes since released a comment on social media, tagging UFC CEO Dana White, asking him to call her. If “The Lioness” returns to the fold, Pennington will be cheering her on.
“Obviously Amanda and I have fought but we’ve known each other since Invicta,” Pennington told MMA Fighting. “I’ve always supported her career, she’s supported mine, my family supports her and stuff, and then her and Nina [Nunes] are two of Tecia [Pennington’s] closest friends. So every time we go to Florida, we’re down at their house. I mean, we stay with them half of the time and the kids get to play together, and whatnot.
“They’re competitors — both of them — and so it’s not just even Amanda. I feel like it’s something that everybody’s known for a long time, and as an athlete, like, when do you know the right time to walk away? This is a conversation that I actually have with other athletes and they’re like, ‘I don’t know, I guess we’ll figure it out,’ and you see a lot of these athletes, they’re like, ‘OK, like we’re good.’ And they’re in that phase in their life and then all of a sudden, it’s like, they’re natural born competitors.
“I’ve had conversations with both Amanda and Nina, and they’re just like, ‘Yeah, we’re done for now’ type thing, and ‘we might be coming back,’ and of course, Amanda, she’s been very successful with everything. She’s known as the GOAT and she’s done amazing things, and she loves to shut everybody’s mouth. And so you had Kayla come in and she’s made the comment about the fact that she would love to just shut Kayla up, [and] we all know how she feels about Julianna, and she said that if Julianna ever got the belt back, she was gonna come back and beat the brakes off of her. I feel like I can’t speak for Amanda, but I’m not surprised with her video at all just knowing her as a person, knowing her as a competitor and I’m sure the world would absolutely love to see her back.”
Nunes would be a welcome addition to the current bantamweight slate, which is certainly more above the radar following Nunes’ retirement. With Pennington finding her stride, along with Peña, Harrison, Vieira, and more in the mix, one of the promotion’s most shallow divisions in terms of numbers has gotten a shot of depth and excitement.
Pennington sees it too, but believes recognition has been deserving for some time. Now the dominoes are falling in the right place for the division to shine.
“It’s kind of like when Ronda left, you [had’ Amanda who [had] started a very successful run for herself, but the world was just absolutely hating on her,” Pennington sait. “It was just like, ‘Oh, Ronda left, like, this division sucks.’ And then all of a sudden, Amanda just completely took over and it’s like, ‘OK, Amanda left, this division sucks.’ The world has a hard time when it comes to change initially, but the women’s bantamweight division actually has a lot of talent.
“That’s why even with the matchup between Ketlen and Kayla, like, I thought it was extremely disrespectful to not give Ketlen any credit. She’s a very talented fighter. She packs a punch. It’s a different ball game. Women are in this division for a reason, and so it’s really interesting to see. It was really cool that they put some of the top fights on the card, so that way the world can actually see a lot more talent that’s there.
“There’s talent here and I feel like the division definitely needs a lot more credit.”
Ilia Topuria | Photo By Oscar J. Barroso/Europa Press via Getty Images
Ilia Topuria will wear custom shorts in his first defense of the UFC featherweight championship at next weekend’s UFC 308 in Abu Dhabi, Spanish news outlet Marca revealed Saturday.
The red-and-yellow shorts, with bulls on the side, will be worn by Topuria when he enters the cage to face former champion and current “BMF” champion Max Holloway in the main event. UFC 308 takes place at Etihad Arena in Abu Dhabi and airs live on ESPN+ pay-per-view.
Check out the shorts below.
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Topuria (15-0) has won seven in a row since joining the UFC in October of 2020, including a vicious second-round knockout of Alexander Volkanovski to claim the 145-pound championship at UFC 298.
Holloway (26-7) has beaten some of the all-time best in the UFC, from Jose Aldo to Anthony Pettis to Frankie Edgar, and once again entered the title picture at 145 pounds by capturing the BMF belt from Justin Gaethje in epic fashion in a lightweight bout at UFC 300 this past April.
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