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Aspen Ladd returns to action as part of the Bellator roster for a featherweight fight against Ekaterina Shakalova on May 17 in Paris.

The UFC veteran last fought under the PFL banner this past November, losing a unanimous decision to Kayla Harrison in a featured bout on the season-end card. That fight came after Ladd failed to advance to the PFL playoffs, with a 1-1 record in the regular season format.

Since arriving in PFL, Ladd has posted an overall 2-2 record, which also includes a win over ex-Bellator featherweight champion Julia Budd.

PFL previously promoted a women’s lightweight tournament and women’s featherweight tournament in past seasons, however both divisions were dropped from the season-long format for 2024. Instead, women’s flyweight was added for the current season, with a group of Bellator fighters joining the PFL roster that includes champion Liz Carmouche.

Now the reverse happens for Ladd, as she moves from PFL to Bellator as part of the ongoing champions series for the card streaming on Max in May.

As for Shakalova, she makes her second Bellator appearance after falling to Dayana Silva in a split decision this past August.

Ladd vs. Shakalova is the latest addition to the growing Bellator Paris card, which is headlined by a lightweight title fight between champ Usman Nurmagomedov and Alexander Shabliy.

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DC’s take
| BJPenn.com

Tom Aspinall is onto Jon Jones.

The Heavyweight title fight the world is waiting for, unfortunately, doesn’t look like it will happen anytime soon, if ever. Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) currently has two titleholders between the undisputed and interim straps, held by Jones and Aspinall.

Typically, the two would fight next under normal circumstances. However, the promotion has maintained the stance that Jones will defend against former champion, Stipe Miocic, once Jones is fully healed from his recent injuries. Aspinall has been vocal about wanting to do the logical thing and face Jones to unify the titles. Coincidentally, the pair of Heavyweights had an impromptu meeting while doing meet-and-greets in Birmingham, England.

“I wanted to face off,” Aspinall said on The MMA Hour. “Jon’s smart, you know? … Jon will not say anywhere — you can’t find it, it’s not out there — that he will fight me. He won’t say it anywhere publicly. He won’t say it. You can’t find a clip, a quote, nothing, anywhere, of Jon Jones saying, ‘One day I’m going to fight Tom Aspinall, and I’m going to freaking beat the brakes off him. That’s what I’m going to do.’ That doesn’t exist. He doesn’t want any evidence, anywhere, of him agreeing to any kind of fight with me, because he doesn’t want to go back on that.

“He doesn’t want to do a faceoff because that promotes a potential fight,” he continued. “When I ask him, ‘Jon are we going to do this?’ He doesn’t say, ‘Absolutely. Let me get Stipe out of the way and we’ll do it.’ He’ll instead say, ‘Oh, maybe one day.’ Because he doesn’t want that quote of, ‘We’re going to fight one day.’ It’s super smart.”

Jones, 36, has expressed more openness to fighting Aspinall in recent months. Ultimately, the Brit doesn’t want to and won’t wait around forever, as he’s recently turned his attention towards a Curtis Blaydes rematch while Jones and Miocic handle their (potential) business.

“Honestly, I don’t spend my days thinking about Jon Jones,” Aspinall said. “On the contrary to what people think, I’m not desperate for it. That fight doesn’t define my career. It would be great, it would be nice, but I’ve got other ways to prove myself. I’m going to be around this sport for at least another five years. At least. Minimum. So it would be great. If I get the fight, fantastic. But I’m not like, ‘Oh, look at what Jon’s done again! It’s never going to happen! Oh my God!’ That’s Jon’s business. Jon can do his thing. If we fight, great. If we don’t, great as well. All respect to Jon Jones, one of the GOATs of the sport.”

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One-time UFC middleweight title challenger Paulo Costa said Sean Strickland was one of two fights proposed to him – and the former champ made an unexpected move.

In an interview with The Coach and The Casual, Costa said he was recently offered a fight with fellow one-time title challenger Jared Cannonier. He liked the idea of the matchup, but his promoter came calling with another opponent: Strickland.

“I love the idea of fighting Cannonier, and [the UFC] suggested I fight in June,” Costa said. “But then, the UFC came back and said, ‘Paulo, you fight Sean Strickland on June 1. It’s a great fight. It’s a fun fight, even more fun that Cannonier, I think.

“Unfortunately, I don’t know what happened – Strickland said no. Strickland refused to fight me. That’s what the UFC told me. I just have this information from the UFC. I think the fight would be great. I would love to fight him.”

UFC 302 takes place June 1 at Prudential Center in Newark, N.J.

A rep for Strickland didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment from MMA Fighting, but the ex-champ posted on Instagram, “I never say no…I say how much.”

Strickland campaigned for a rematch with Dricus du Plessis, who outpointed him at UFC 297 to deny him a first title defense. The previous man to beat Strickland was Cannonier, who won a hotly contested decision over the brash fighter at UFC Vegas 66.

Du Plessis recently polled his fans on whether a rematch with Strickland or a fight with rival and ex-champ Israel Adesanya would be best for his first title defense. Du Plessis and Adesanya have circled each other for several months and were once booked to fight at UFC 293 before a du Plessis injury scrapped the date. Strickland went on to replace du Plessis and capture the title with a massive upset over Adesanya.

With du Plessis at the top of the division, Costa’s title prospects improved measurably. But if Strickland indeed won’t fight him, he may have to take another path back to the title.

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After another fight card with eye pokes aplenty, is the Ultimate Fighting Championship ready to make a change?

As pointed out by John Morgan on X, the promotion is scheduled to deliver a “New UFC Equipment Announcement and Presentation” on Friday at noon PDT. Fans immediately flocked to the comments, hoping that this meant the Las Vegas-based company would unveil a new glove design to help address the UFC’s eye-poke epidemic.

Amy Kaplan of FanSided MMA also revealed on X that the announcement will be a “UFC Glove Launch” following the official weigh-ins for UFC 300, which goes down this Saturday night, April 13.

“There will be a “New UFC Glove Launch presentation” on Friday after the official weigh-ins,” Kaplan’s post reads. “It’s unclear if this will be special branded gloved for the event or actually a new design of the gloves.”

As Kaplan explains, this could be nothing more than the presentation of a glove featuring a unique logo to celebrate the promotion’s landmark event this weekend.

Two Fights end as the result of eye pokes in the UFC’s return to Atlantic City

Returning to the Octagon at UFC Atlantic City on March 30, former middleweight champion Chris Weidman climbed back into the win column for the first time since 2020. Unfortunately, the victory was mired in controversy after a slow-motion replay revealed that the ‘All American’ had poked his opponent, Bruno Silva, in the eye not once, but twice during the fight-ending sequence. Still, Weidman walked away with the win, first by TKO before being switched to a unanimous decision.

Moments before, Nursulton Ruziboev claimed his 10th-straight win with a TKO over Sedriques Dumas. However, Dumas appeared to get poked in the eye at one point and immediately protested. The referee allowed the fight to continue as he did not see the eye poke occur in real time. Moments later, Riziboev pummeled Dumas against the fence, forcing the stoppage and claiming what would be one of two incredibly controversial wins on the night.

LowKickMMA.com

Calvin Kattar gets excited about any fight, but the opponents rarely matter.

His return at UFC 300 might mean more than usual, but not because he welcomes former bantamweight champion Aljamain Sterling to 145 pounds. His elation this time comes from fighting for the first time since a torn ACL ended his October 2022 fight with Arnold Allen.

“I never put too much thoughts out there on what I’m expecting,” Kattar said on The MMA Hour. “I can’t control all the bulls***. I just try to stay as ready as possible. I knew the next one was going to be big, no matter who I was stepping across from. I feel like the last two fights were kind of tough for me, where last one was an injury, and the one prior I felt like I won. I feel like should be on at least a two-fight win streak, plus the injury. It’s just frustrating.

“It’s not the way it worked out, obviously. You can’t put energy into what you can’t control like that. All I can do is focus on come out and getting a strong rep on the next one and try to get me a ‘W’ here.”

The chance to fight on the historic UFC 300 card isn’t lost on Kattar. That opportunity was likely made possible by agreeing to be Sterling’s first featherweight opponent. For that, he is thankful. But really, he just wanted to wash out the bad taste from his previous outing.

“Not much, to be honest,” Kattar said of his reaction to Sterling as an opponent. “A little bit [surprised] in the fact that he’s a former champ, and that’s great, and you need tough opposition to get these big moment opportunities. Shout out to him for making this fight happen on such a historic card.

“I’m blessed [and] honored, but it would be the same if I was fighting anybody. The next fight’s always the biggest, no matter who it’s against. I didn’t put too much stock into who I was fighting.”

Sterling faces Kattar after his first loss in nearly six years when Sean O’Malley knocked him out at UFC 292 to claim the UFC bantamweight title. It was a somewhat shocking result given his run through the division, combined with O’Malley’s relative inexperience against top fighters in the division.

“I think Sean looked really good,” Kattar said about the fight. “I think he did a lot of small things really well in the little details. I was definitely a little surprised, but I knew that was a possibility, a high possibility, that could happen. Because Sean’s able to create that distance and make those shots land and those opportunities appear, and Aljo kind of walked right into those ones.

“I thought Aljo would have made it a little bit more of a dog fight. But hey, that’s the way it worked out.”

Because he’s returning from a serious knee injury that sidelined him for all of 2023, Kattar is primarily focused on himself rather than Sterling. That said, he knows his heavy hands combined with a potential size and power advantage could present Sterling the same kind of welcome to a new division as O’Malley did bouncing him out of his old one.

“You’ve got to be prepared for the best version,” Kattar said about Sterling. “A lot of people would say ‘oh a year and a half, you must have some ring rust.’ You put too much stock in that Aljo? Who gives a s***? People say a lot of s***. What’s going to matter is on fight night and it can go one of two ways.

“I’m going to do everything in my power to make it look like it did last August [for Sterling]. I’m prepared for a hell of a fight and I would love an early finish but I’m prepared for anything that presents itself on Saturday.”

As much as he’ll be asked about Sterling over the next few days leading into UFC 300, Kattar really didn’t care about the opponent or even landing on UFC 300.

His biggest concern was coming back healthy from the knee injury that sidedlined his career for over a year.

“Big opportunity obviously,” Kattar said. “But coming off a year and almost a half layoff, the next fight was big to me no matter who I was stepping across from and no matter what card I was on. Big moment for me to come back after a long layoff. Excited to put on a hell of a performance.”

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Refuting earlier statements that claimed otherwise, Jon Jones has spoken out and insisted he has not been arrested for his alleged acts against an anti-doping officer. 

‘Bones’ is considered by many to be the greatest fighter to ever compete in the sport of mixed martial arts but his career doesn’t come without problems. Despite maturing and staying out of trouble, he is still subject to the occasional controversy.

Just days ago, Jon Jones was accused of threatening to kill an anti-doping officer who came to his home to conduct a routine drug test. Now, Jones took to social media to deny those reports, stating that Crystal Martinez (the alleged victim) fabricated a story.

“Hello everyone, I wanted to address some misinformation that has been circulating this morning,” Jones said in his statement. “I woke up to false reports that I had been arrested.”

“I have not been arrested. In fact, I am currently in Texas with my daughters at a volleyball tournament.”

“I must admit, it’s disappointing to have to clarify these things again, but I understand that I may be an easy target given some of my past issues.”

“It’s important to set the record straight and make sure the truth is told.”

Jones continued, giving his side of the story from the anti-doping agency’s visit to his home.

“I was recently visited by testers while I was celebrating a birthday and taking a nap. Upon waking up, I was caught off guard by the unprofessionalism and protocol by one of the testers which caused frustration, leading me to use some profanity [that] I regret.”

“However, I want to emphasize that at no point did I threaten, get in anyone’s face, raise my voice to anyone, or engage in any form of assault.”

Related: Jon Jones releases video response to assault allegations

“It’s unfortunate that false news has been spread without proper fact-checking. I want to assure you that I will vigorously defend myself against these baseless accusations. The truth is, the incident simply did not occur.”

Hello everyone,
I wanted to address some misinformation that has been circulating this morning . I woke up to false reports that I had been arrested . I have not been arrested. In fact, I am currently in Texas with my daughters at a volleyball tournament.

I must admit, it's…

— BONY (@JonnyBones) April 7, 2024

Jon Jones earlier posted a clip from his home security camera which showed him high-fiving the apparent victim. Everything seemed to be on good terms between Jones and the tester, which likely helps his innocent claim even further.

pic.twitter.com/P1634ZFlcr

— BONY (@JonnyBones) April 6, 2024

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

Arman Tsarukyan plans to make it a quick night of work at UFC 300.

The lightweight contender meets Charles Oliveira on this Saturday’s pay-per-view main card in Las Vegas, and though he has great respect for the former UFC champion, he plans to score a fast finish to convince matchmakers that he’s the man to challenge for the title next.

“It’s going to be a crazy fight because [Oliveira] knows wrestling, he knows jiu-jitsu, he knows how to strike,” Tsarukyan said Monday on The MMA Hour. “I don’t even know what he wants to do during the fight; same as him, he doesn’t know what I’m going to do, wrestle him or strike him. If he’s going to miss punches, he’s going to wrestle. Me too, if I miss punches, I’m going to wrestle, so it’s going to be like a scramble fight.

“So [I’m] excited to fight and everyone who knows MMA is going to watch this fight. We are both complete MMA fighters. But my prediction is a finish in the first round, TKO.”

Tsarukyan has the track record to back up those words. The 27-year-old sports an impressive 8-2 UFC record, with four of his past five wins coming by way of knockout. This past December, he needed just 64 seconds to put away Beneil Dariush via strikes.

Oliveira is also coming off a first-round finish of Dariush, and his list of highlights rivals that of any fighter in UFC history. “Do Bronx” holds the record for most UFC finishes with 20, and he won the lightweight title amid an incredible 11-fight win streak that was stopped by current champion Islam Makhachev.

Both fighters eye a rematch with Makhachev — Makhachev defeated a debuting Tsarukyan by decision in April 2019 — so Tsarukyan wasn’t surprised when he was asked to go through Oliveira to get it.

“It’s like a dream fight,” Tsarukyan said. “[Oliveira] was the champion. For me, it’s like a fight for the belt because he was the champion, he defended his belt, and he’s No. 1, especially this fight, it’s [for] contender No. 1. I was super excited, super happy, and I couldn’t sleep a couple of days after that news.”

“I was expecting Gaethje or Oliveira because I was top five and I’m just one guy who is new in the top five,” Tsarukyan added. “They need new faces. So if I win, definitely I’m going to be contender No. 1. I think everybody wants to see the rematch, me and Islam, because it was so close. Not the Oliveira and Islam rematch, because Islam beat him easy, but he couldn’t beat me easy. It was a Fight of the Night and the next fight is going to be maybe the same, but I’m going to be the winner.”

Should Tsarukyan get another crack at Makhachev, he expects to become just the second fighter to defeat the indomitable champion, who currently sports a 25-1 MMA record. He believes he would be more successful than Oliveira, given how the Brazilian star was put away fairly decisively in the second round by Makhachev.

There are no guarantees in MMA, but Tsarukyan is trusting UFC CEO Dana White to make the right call if he takes Oliveira out.

“Arman Tsarukyan vs. Islam Makhachev, definitely,” Tsarukyan said. “When I beat Charles Oliveira, definitely I’m going to be the No. 1 contender.

“This fight, Dana White said, this is a contender fight. The winner is going to fight Islam, me or Oliveira is going to fight with Islam. Definitely.”

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