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UFC looking to book Justin Gaethje vs. Anthony Pettis.


It's not done and there's no date just yet, but that's the matchup currently in the works. Would be early next year.
 

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Smolka re-signed with the UFC. He will be competing at bantamweight, This is not a flyweight signing.


The 27-year-old has gone 3-0, finishing all of his opponents since he was released from the promotion last year.
 

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Nevada Athletic Commission is moving forward with approval of the updated Unified Rules of MMA, but it’s leaving behind the most debated of those new regulations.


At a meeting last month, the Nevada Athletic Commission (NAC) voted to approve a host of new provisions, including the adoption of the new Unified Rules of MMA. However, the commission — which regulates some of the biggest fights in the sport — will not adopt the updated definition of a grounded fighter.

Nevada’s new regulations still have to be finalized with the Legislative Control Bureau and come back to the commission one more time, but they are likely to pass and become part of state law.

The new definition of a grounded opponent has been a hot-button item since the Association of Boxing Commissions and Combative Sports (ABC) voted to approve a package of new Unified Rules in 2016. The rules were supposed to go into effect in January 2017, but many commissions did not adopt them, with states like New Jersey, Missouri and Ohio coming out against the grounded opponent definition primarily.

The new definition states that a fighter must have both hands — palms or fists — down on the ground in order to be grounded, unless a knee or anything other than the soles of the feet are also down. If a fighter is considered grounded, then a knee or kick to the head of that fighter is illegal.

The original Unified Rules going back to 2001 stated that anything but the soles of the feet being on the mat constituted a grounded fighter. In other words, a fighter could put a single hand or finger down and be considered grounded. In 2016, the ABC rules and regulations committee and later the entire ABC body passed the new rule via overwhelming vote, with the thought that fighters were gaming that provision too often and slowing down the flow of fights.

After consulting with other commission directors around the country, as well as referees and doctors, Bennett said he and the Nevada commission decided in favor of the old rule, with some slightly different language.

“We certainly didn’t agree with the both soles and both hands being down for a grounded opponent,” Bennett said. “We have one hand — weight-bearing — with two soles of the feet as the definition. We think that fighters are putting themselves in harms way when they have to put both hands down with both feet.”

So the Nevada rule will remain the original one — anything other than the soles of the feet touching the ground constitutes a grounded fighter.

Bennett and the commission were hesitant to change a rule that could potentially make MMA more dangerous for fighters. The same sentiment has been echoed by Larry Hazzard and Nick Lembo in New Jersey and Bernie Profato in Ohio.

The argument from the other side — commissions in places like California, New York, Mohegan Sun, Kansas and others — is that the new definition doesn’t make it more dangerous, because a fighter can just drop to a knee to become grounded while still protecting their head, rather than put both palms or fists down. The ABC medical committee approved the change. Association of Ringside Physicians (ARP) president Larry Lovelace has publicly given his approval of the new rules, but the ARP body does not endorse them.

Nevada did vote to adopt the other changes to the Unified Rules, including the elimination of fouls for heel strikes to the kidneys (from guard, mainly) and grabbing the clavicle. The heel strikes to the kidneys foul has been a hangup for places like New Jersey, Ohio and Missouri, but Bennett said NAC doctors don’t believe those blows generate enough power to do any real damage.

The new rule allowing referees to take points for fighters points their fingers out toward the opponent’s eyes and the altered language for judging will also be adopted in Nevada once the process is over.

The grounded fighter definition, though, has been the most polarizing and Nevada choosing not to adopt that part of the Unified Rules makes the word “unified” even more unfit. Now there will be at least three different sets of rules being used across North America — the old rules, the new rules and a mixed bag of the two, like Nevada will have.

Bennett said he dislikes the fact that the rules for MMA are so disjointed, but he and the NAC did not want to potentially compromise the health of fighters by just pushing through what other commissions have passed, he said.

“I don’t think it’s in the best interest of fighters for the rules to be different in different commissions,” Bennett said. “I think it would be a good thing for us to vote on or agree on what’s in the best interest of the fighter. It’s a tough enough sport as it is, let alone having different rule sets in different states.”
 

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TJ Killashaw will move down in weight to challenge Henry Cejudo for the flyweight title at UFC 233 on Jan. 26 in Anaheim


Dillashaw will try to become UFC’s sixth male two-weight champ.
 

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The UFC rankings are usually updated on the Wednesday after an event, unless someone is released and they feel the need to remove them from their respective division immediately. Today, three ranked fighters were removed from 125 - Brandon Moreno, Matheus Nicolau, and Hector Sandoval.

Moreno is the highest-profile of those three. He had been ranked as high as seven in the division, and headlined a card in Mexico City where he dropped a decision to Sergio Pettis. He is still only 24. The 25-year-old Nicolau went 3-1 in four UFC fights, while Sandoval was 2-2 in the promotion. Both Nicolau and Sandoval lost their last respective outings to Dustin Ortiz.

This caused the bottom of the rankings to change up a fair amount, with fighters like Alex Perez moving up spots despite just cracking the rankings in the last couple of weeks. In an amusing note, Neil Seery is now ranked as the 15th contender in the division. The problem with that? He retired in July 2017.
 

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UFC looking to book Justin Gaethje vs. Anthony Pettis.


It's not done and there's no date just yet, but that's the matchup currently in the works. Would be early next year.

I would advise someone to tell Anthony Pettis to not take this bout. It's a bad matchup all over for him.
 

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UFC officials announced Zak Cummings (21-6 MMA, 6-3 UFC) will face Trevor Smith (15-8 MMA, 5-5 UFC) at UFC on FOX 31, which takes place at Wisconsin Entertainment and Sports Center in Milwaukee.

Cummings returns to action for the first time since a split-decision loss to Michel Prazeres in May. Prior to the setback, Cummings had earned back-to-back submission wins over Nathan Coy and Alexander Yakovlev.

Meanwhile, Smith also looks to rebound from a recent May decision loss, albeit of the unanimous variety in a UFC Fight Night 130 meeting with Elias Theodorou. “Hot Sauce” fought just once in 2017, scoring a decision win over Chris Camozzi.

With the addition to the card, UFC on FOX 31 now includes ...

Kevin Lee vs. Al Iaquinta
Edson Barboza vs. Dan Hooker
Rob Font vs. Sergio Pettis
Jessica-Rose Clark vs. Andrea Lee
Jordan Griffin vs. Dan Ige
Bobby Green vs. Drakkar Klose
Jack Hermansson vs. Gerald Meerschaert
Dwight Grant vs. Erik Koch
Jared Gordon vs. Joaquim Silva
Juan Adams vs. Chris De La Rocha
Adam Milstead vs. Mike Rodriguez
Jim Miller vs. Charles Oliveira
Zak Cummings vs. Trevor Smith
 

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Not every former UFC champion is going to ONE Championship these days.

Benson Henderson, who possessed lightweight titles in both the WEC and UFC, is staying with Bellator.

Henderson has agreed to an “exclusive, long-term deal” with the promotion, having fought out his previous contract last month.

Henderson (26-8) is currently on a two-fight winning streak, submitting Roger Huerta in April before completing his old Bellator deal with a dominant unanimous decision win over the heavy-handed Saad Awad at Bellator 208 on Long Island. It’s Henderson’s first winning streak since submitting Brandon Thatch and edging out Jorge Masvidal in the final two fights of his UFC career back in 2015.

When Henderson signed with Bellator MMA as a free agent in 2016, he immediately challenged for the welterweight title, coming up well short against then-champion Andrey Koreshkov. He dropped back down to his more familiar lightweight division, getting a leg injury TKO win over featherweight champ Patricio Freire, setting up a title shot vs. then-champ Michael Chandler, who won a split decision. In September 2017, Henderson fought current lightweight contender Patricky Freire, and lost another split decision.
 

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Sean O'Malley has been suspended six months by the Nevada State Athletic Commission following an anti-doping violation flagged by the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency. He is eligible to return March 6th


The UFC bantamweight was also ordered to pay costs and fees of $472.42 associated with his case.

NSAC officials today issued their finding at the commission’s monthly meeting in Las Vegas.

An October pre-fight drug test showed the presence of ostarine, a Selective Androgen Receptor Modulator, in O’Malley’s system. While the UFC and USADA recently changed policy to keep potential failures private until after resolutions are made, O’Malley opted to announce the news, himself, and explain the situation.

O’Malley must still clear his case with USADA, as well. However, the NSAC and USADA have generally remain closely aligned in their decisions.
 

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Mike Perry, claimed Donald Cerrone, “broke his damn arm” during their 170-pound co-main event last weekend in Denver.

Not the case.

Perry revealed his post-fight X-ray on Tuesday, courtesy of his Instagram stories, showing no broken bones; however, “Platinum” still has to undergo an MRI to determine ligament, tendon, or muscle damage — or perhaps a combination of the three.
 

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Both McGregor and Khabib are currently serving their indefinite suspensions, as they await the Nevada Athletic Commission’s decision in a December 10th meeting. These sanctions are shared by members of their respective teams, namely Dillon Danis, Zubaira Tukhugov, and Abubakar Nurmagomedov, all of whom had a hand in the post-fight incident.

All three were also given temporary suspensions and were mandated to appear before the Commission in a meeting on Wednesday, but none of them showed up. This urged NAC members to extend their suspensions until the December 10th meeting.

Tukhugov is still signed with the UFC, despite Dana White’s threats that he would be released from the company for his involvement in the brawl. Abubakar and Danis, on the other hand, are fighting under PFL and Bellator, respectively.
 

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The UFC is close to finalizing Nick Diaz's return to the Octagon


The fight is Jorge Masvidal at UFC 235 on March 2 in Vegas
 

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DC has talked about being on UFC 235 as his final fight.

Having a co-main of Nick Diaz should help line DC's pockets one last time.
 

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MIrsad Bektic is OUT of his featherweight fight against Renato Moicano at UFC 231 in Toronto.
 

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Who knows what's going on.

As of last week Jones said he has no interest in a 3rd fight with DC.

Lesnar was at first going to leave WWE after Roman Reigns fulfilled his multi-year quest of beating Lesnar this past April. But when Saudi Arabia flashed a checkbook of more than $40 million per show in Vince McMahon’s direction, suddenly the safer world of pro wrestling gave Lesnar a monetary offer he couldn’t turn down to do a few more shows, a run that was scheduled to end this past Friday.

But with Reigns out with his sickness Lesnar got a new offer from McMahon to replace Reigns as his top singles champion. Lesnar agreed secretly to the new deal, and won the pro wrestling championship again. The new deal is for multiple shows, but its length of time has been kept secretive. But it is known that Lesnar is scheduled as late as April of next year for WrestleMania.

The deal does allow him to take a UFC fight, but whether Lesnar really will do that during this contractual term with WWE is a bigger question. And for Cormier, with the sands of the hourglass of his career rapidly running out, and him continuing to say he’s done in March after his 40th birthday, the Lesnar fight is far less of a sure thing than it seemed a month ago.
 

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