It’s not unusual for a UFC fighter to chop off their hair in order to save a high-profile contest, but I don’t think I’ve ever heard of anyone chopping off their toe.
Xtreme Couture coach, Neil Melanson, notwithstanding.
Newly-crowned welterweight champion, Belal Muhammad, briefly considered amputating one of his infected toes in order to preserve his UFC 310 title defense opposite undefeated contender Shavkat Rakhmonov, but the infection had already spread to his foot.
Fortunately, “Remember the Name” has been cleared to make his Octagon return.
“I’m cleared and good to go,” Muhammad told MMA Junkie. “But now, it’s like getting back to where I was. Literally I did like 50 pushups, and I felt like I was in a war and I got hit by a truck. I’m like, ‘Bro, this is how it feels to not be in shape?’ It’s crazy. It got to the point where I was like, ‘Bro, what if you got rid of the toe? What do I need to do to get back in there as quickly as possible? But the way the doctor was saying it, it was like a bone infection. So it wasn’t like people were saying: ‘Oh, you’ve got a broken toe.’ I’m like, bro, if it was a toe, I had a broken toe for over a year.”
Broken toes are enough to stymie some UFC fighters, while others suck it up and soldier on.
“And then that toe got infected because of that, so that went directly into the bone and it was climbing up the foot,” Muhammad continued. “So he was like, ‘Bro, you’ll get your foot amputated.’ It ain’t that. So for me, it was heartbreaking, obviously, but just trusting God, trusting God has a plan for me, knowing that everything happens for a reason. And now that I look at it from the bigger picture side, I’m hoping that there’s a reason for it.”
We may know that reason in just over 24 hours.
Rakhmonov remained in the UFC 310 lineup and will face fellow undefeated welterweight phenom Ian Garry for the right to challenge Muhammad at some point in early 2025. Their five-round co-main event goes down this Sat. night (Dec. 7, 2024) at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada.
For the rest of the UFC 310 fight card and PPV lineup click here.