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The Heavyweight division took a big step forward earlier on Thursday (May 16, 2024) when interim champion Tom Aspinall booked the first defense of his title opposite wrestling ace Curtis Blaydes. The two are booked as the co-main event of UFC 304, scheduled for July 27 from Manchester, England.

Official kingpin Jon Jones isn’t worried.

Despite resistance from the fan base, Jones and UFC CEO Dana White have made it abundantly clear that the next match up for the undisputed belt — which, again, is currently disputed by Aspinall — will be Jones vs. Stipe Miocic, despite Miocic’s extremely long layoff since his knockout loss to Francis Ngannou.

In a series of Tweets, Jones reacted to the interim title booking and labeled it the “official number one contender spot,” dismissing any bit of the bout’s credibility as a championship fight.

In addition, Jones revealed November 9th as his planned return date, which hasn’t yet been announced by UFC. Jones rebuked the online critics and laughed off the Blaydes vs. Aspinall match up again, pointing out that the duo are the co-main event to a Welterweight title fight, which would never happen with an undisputed Heavyweight title fight.

Jones’ tweets actually offer a lot of clarity as to how the Heavyweight division will move forward. If both bouts go through as planned, the victor of Jones vs. Miocic and Aspinall vs. Blaydes could seek to unify the titles in the first half of 2025. It’s not ideal to have both champions fighting other contenders just a couple months apart, but at least there’s a game plan moving forward.

… Unless Jones retires with a victory.

Insomnia

Joaquin Buckley wasn’t interested in a quick turnaround opposite Ian Garry.

Boxing payouts are so far beyond UFC salaries.

I hope to be alive for UFC 1000 but I pray I’m not covering it!

Terrance McKinney reacts to his knockout loss last weekend:

Belal Muhammad has more than earned his shot, but also … why are UFC fighters the last to hear that they’re fighting?!?

Sean Strickland’s reply in the comments: “Man its out of respect!! You’re crushing it bkb lol! I just wanna see how good you are!!!!!”

The build up to Sean O’Malley vs. Ryan Garcia is getting weird!

Slips, rips, and KO clips

This is quite the dramatic fall at the end.

Getting booted like a heavy bag is a worst-case scenario.

Incredible spinning elbow set up by falling forward after throwing the teep kick:

Random Land

What could possibly be in those plastic bags that is worth getting gored by a bull?

Midnight Music: Rock, 1971

Sleep well Maniacs! More martial arts madness is always on the way.

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Jon Jones wasted no time firing back at Tom Aspinall over his claims that the reigning UFC heavyweight champion was holding up the division.

On Thursday, UFC CEO Dana White announced Aspinall would face Curtis Blaydes in the co-main event at UFC 304 on July 27 with the interim heavyweight title going up for grabs. Afterwards, Aspinall posted a reaction video where he took a shot at Jones, who has been out ever since he suffered a torn pectoral muscle that prevented him from facing Stipe Miocic this past November.

“Usually, when the champ is coming back, the interim [champion] would obviously fight the champ,” Aspinall said. “Jon Jones is holding shit up, let’s be honest. He’s playing games.”

Jones responded with a message of his own on Twitter with a reminder that Aspinall is defending his belt in a co-headlining slot underneath Leon Edwards vs. Belal Muhammad in a welterweight title fight at the top of the bill in Manchester, England. Of course, an undisputed title always trumps an interim belt, which is the same reason Aspinall fought in the co-main event against Sergei Pavlovich at UFC 295 as well.

“Trolls telling me I’m slowing down the division by getting injured,” Jones wrote. “Meanwhile, the next two heavyweights aren’t even a main event? interesting. I’m on the right path, I got until November to remind the world. Again.”

In a now deleted tweet, Jones initially proclaimed he was returning Nov. 9 at Madison Square Garden in New York City, which is a yearly landing spot for the UFC.

There’s no official word if Jones vs. Miocic is expected to headline the UFC’s return to New York in November. It’s clear that’s the target on Jones’ mind.

As far as Aspinall and Blaydes go, Jones basically told them to fight for the chance to face the real champion after he’s done with Miocic later this year.

“Curtis versus Tom for the official No. 1 contender spot!” Jones said.

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Many are looking forward to UFC 306 at the Las Vegas Sphere, and Dana White has ensured fans that it will be the best live combat sports event of all time.

The UFC continues to break boundaries by venturing into new markets and setting records whilst doing so. The company has big plans to debut in Africa, Spain, and have hopes of showcasing the UFC at a football stadium, but at this point, all eyes are firmly on September 14 at the Sphere.

While discussing the significance of UFC 306, Dana White insisted that he and his team are going to pull something off that will never be done again.

“I’m telling you guys right now, we literally just went through the storyboard two days ago on this thing,” White said whilst attending the UFC St. Louis post-fight press conference. “This is going to be the sickest live event in combat sports that anybody has ever seen.”

“It will never be done again. This will be a one-and-done just because I wanted to do it.”

Dana White later addressed the doubters and revealed that a lot of money has been pumped into making the event the very best it can be.

“Everybody, when I said I wanted to do this, said, ‘How? How are you going to do a fight in there? It’s too hard, it’s too this, it’s too that.’ That’s the kind of stuff I love.”

Related: Conor McGregor’s UFC 303 return breaks record, becomes highest gate in company history

“We’ve already spent a sh*tload of money on this thing. No one will ever be able to pull this off again because nobody would spend the money to do it. Nobody is going to spend the money to do what I’m doing over there right now.”

The UFC’s historic event at the Las Vegas Sphere will take place on September 14. Though nothing has been made official, several notable fighters have been pushing to book a fight on the card.

Check out what Dana White had to say about the Las Vegas Sphere event below.

UFC St. Louis Post-Fight Press Conferencehttps://t.co/FtMizAtVrN

— MMAWeekly (@MMAWeeklycom) May 12, 2024

MMAWeekly.com | UFC and MMA News, Results, Rumors, and Videos

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MMA: Mixed Martial Arts

When Aspen Ladd signed with the PFL as a free agent, she was excited compete in the promotion’s season-long format where the winner earns a $ 1 million grand prize.

She came up short in her first bid to become a PFL champion during the 2023 season, but the 29-year-old UFC veteran was excited to try again in 2024, especially after learning that a whole new roster of fighters would be jumping into the fray at 145 pounds. This past November, the PFL closed a deal to acquire Bellator MMA along with all of the fighters, which included a slew of women’s featherweights and champion Cris Cyborg.

But rather than put the top eight fighters in another season long format, PFL dropped the women’s featherweights in favor of introducing a women’s flyweight season instead.

“I was definitely disappointed,” Ladd told MMA Fighting in reaction to the PFL’s decision. “Because I did my first season with them so going into the next one, we’re like we know how everything works, we know how this is, I’m used to this format. Then bam! It changes again.

“So this is more back to the one-off fights like when I was in the UFC basically. But it’s still different because I don’t know what next year’s going to hold. I don’t know what we’re building towards. I don’t know if they’re combining. So I’m taking it one fight at a time. That’s my full, complete focus and we’ll see where it goes from there.”

At Bellator Paris on Friday, Ladd faces Ekaterina Shakalova, an 8-1 prospect who made her Bellator debut this past August. Ladd can’t control what happens past that date, although she wishes there was a little more clarification about what happens afterward.

All signs have pointed towards a “champion vs. champion” fight between PFL’s Larissa Pacheco and Bellator’s Cris Cyborg but no deal has been struck just yet. That fight started gaining steam after Kayla Harrison bolted from the PFL and signed with the UFC.

Beyond that, Ladd doesn’t know if there’s a plan in place for a PFL champion at 145 pounds and a Bellator champion at 145 pounds or if the entire division is just being combined into one group.

She’s excited about all the different matchups now that the featherweight division is much, much deeper but where that goes beyond 2024 is anybody’s guess.

“Bellator had a giant division and now we have this one, giant division,” Ladd said. “The opportunity to compete and with more competition, that’s thrilling. It’s just the format we’re fighting in. It’s like OK. Season last year, back to one-off fights this year but I’m curious to see what they’re going to do.

“Will it be one unified belt for both organizations? Or are they going to keep it Bellator has one and PFL has one? I don’t know and I’m curious about that.”

Ideally, Ladd hopes the PFL considers returning to the season format for the featherweights because that guaranteed her the chance to potentially fight four times in a year with a chance to win a $ 1 million prize at the end.

She was convinced that was already happening after PFL bought Bellator but then plans changed and Ladd can only roll with the punches being thrown at her.

“I think that would be very neat and that’s where my mind went at the beginning of the year,” Ladd said about a future featherweight season. “That’s almost what they did last year. Because they had the European season, Dakota [Ditcheva] won it and then they acquired Bellator and they took the top 125’ers and that was the season.

“It almost feels like if that’s the plan, we’re going to have the 145’ers all fight it out and then take the best of them and throw them into the season next year. We’ll see.”

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MMA Fighting has Bellator Paris results and more from the Accor Arena in Paris, France, on Friday afternoon.

In the main event, Bellator bantamweight champion Patchy Mix will put his title on the line against Magomed Magomedov.

Top prospect Cedric Doumbe will try to bounce back from his first career loss when he faces Jaleel Willis in the co-main event in a welterweight contest.

Check out Bellator Paris results below.

Main card (MAX at 12 p.m. ET)

Patchy Mix vs. Magomed Magomedov

Cedric Doumbe vs. Jaleel Willis

Gregory Babene vs. Costello van Steenis

Yves Landu vs. Jonas Bilharinho

Thibault Gouti vs. Archie Colgan

Slim Trabelsi vs. Louie Sutherland

Mansour Barnaoui vs. Yusuke Yachi

Steven Hill vs. Mike Shipman

Aspen Ladd vs. Ekaterina Shakalova

Asael Adjoudj vs. Bruno Fontes

MMA Fighting – All Posts

Welterweight champion Leon Edwards will put his title on the line against second-ranked Belal Muhammad in the UFC 304 main event at Co-op Live in Manchester, England on July 27.  UFC CEO Dana White made the announcement on Thursday.  

“UFC 304 from the Co-op Live in Manchester, England, the main event, Leon Edwards facing Belal Muhammad,” White said in a video posted to social media.  “Leon is on a 13-fight unbeaten streak facing Belal Muhammad who is on a 10-fight unbeaten streak.”

Muhammad (23-3, 1 NC) defeated Gilbert Burns in his last fight at UFC 288 in May 2023.  The first time Muhammad and Edwards faced off at UFC Fight Night 187 in March 2021, the fight ended in a no contest after Muhammad was accidentally poked in the eye and unable to continue.  

Edwards (22-3, 1 NC) successfully defended his title for the second time in his last outing at UFC 297 last December, defeating Colby Covington via unanimous decision. 

“There you have it ladies and gentlemen.  We are coming back to Manchester, England.  And let me tell you what, if you have never been to a fight in Manchester, England, the crowd is incredible,” White said.  “Band new arena.  See you soon.  If you don’t know, now you know.”  

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