Author: Anton Tabuena

Steven Branscombe-USA TODAY Sports

Justin Gaethje almost pulled out of his UFC Vancouver headliner.

On Wednesday, Justin Gaethje came and spoke to the media wearing a pair of Ray-Ban sunglasses. According to the entertaining slugger, that’s from an eye infection that nearly got him pulled from his headlining bout against Donald Cerrone this weekend.

“I’ll be honest to everyone, I’m wearing these sunglasses because I almost didn’t make it to this fight,” Gaethje said. “I had an eye infection and I’m through that now and I just got off the plane about an hour and a half ago and I came straight here because I was not gonna miss this opportunity to work out and get the blood flowing and get my mind into fight week. So these lights are super bright, a little light sensitivity right now, but I’m 100 percent ready to go.

“I’ve fought blind my whole life, so unless my eyes are cut out I’m fighting,” he said, before declining to answer how long he’s been dealing with the infection. “I’ve seen many doctors. I’m cleared and I’m ready to go.”

Saturday night’s lights will be even brighter in the Octagon, and Gaethje says that wouldn’t be an issue at all.

“I’m seeing drastic improvements every day. This is just a precaution,” Gaethje said of his sunglasses.

Weili Zhang’s title win could be very profitable for the UFC.

The UFC recently crowned their first Chinese UFC champion in Weili Zhang, and the promotion is looking to immediately cash in on the historic moment for the country.

According to the New York Post, the UFC is looking to capitalize on Zhang’s accomplishment and double their current broadcast fees in China. The report notes that the company signed a five-year, $50 million deal in 2016, and they’re now looking for a new one in the range of “$100 million or $20 million a year.”

The original agreement has yet to expire, but the report states that the UFC is already negotiating with their current partner in PPTV Sports, as well as other tech giants with streaming services in Alibaba and Tencent.

To give an idea on how profitable the sports market is in China, Tencent and PPTV recently struck lucrative deals with other sports organizations in the NBA ($1.5 billion) and the English Premier League ($700M), respectively.

The UFC has also invested in the Chinese market by opening a UFC Performance Institute in Shanghai. The 93,000 square foot facility is about three times bigger than its counterpart in Las Vegas, and it hosts not only MMA fighters, but also Chinese Olympic athletes.

Zhang knocked out then strawweight champion Jessica Andrade in just 42 seconds as the main event for UFC Shenzhen last August.

Photo by Jeff Bottari/Zuffa LLC/Zuffa LLC via Getty Images

Conor McGregor actually won in 106 seconds.

Shortly after dropping his title fight at UFC 242, Dustin Poirier already has a name in mind for his next bout. After both have now lost to the current champion in Khabib Nurmagomedov, Poirier says that a rematch with Conor McGregor “makes a lot of sense at this point.”

The former interim lightweight champion then went on to say he’s even willing to face McGregor in a different sport.

McGregor has since responded, taking to twitter like he usually does these days.

McGregor beat Poirier by TKO five years ago, when they were still both at featherweight. Technically, he won in 106 seconds, not 90.

Both men have since gone up in weight, where each have won — and lost — a lightweight title in the process. Poirier went to lightweight immediately after his 2014 loss to McGregor, and has gone 9-2-1. McGregor, on the other hand, stayed a bit longer at featherweight before eventually going 2-2 at lightweight and welterweight since moving up in 2016.

Poirier vs McGregor 2 wouldn’t be the worst match up the UFC can set up right now, but I personally prefer fresh bouts for these two action fighters instead. BE’s Zane Simon may have a different booking in mind, but I think McGregor vs Gaethje and Poirier vs Felder could be extremely fun, regardless of what happens this weekend.

This is pretty nasty. You have been warned.

The Bellator 226 main event ended with an eye (or nose?) poke that halted the heavyweight title bout prematurely. Shortly after the headliner concluded, there was a much worse injury that happened.

(Yes, there were bouts after the main event.)

The said incident happened during one of the Bellator post-lims, where Albert Gonzales faced Tyson Miller. In the first round of their contest, Gonzales threw an inside leg kick that was checked, and his just shin gave out. The leg was shattered from the impact, and like many of these freak injuries, it moved around like jello.

Due to Gonzales’ injury, Miller was officially awarded a TKO win at the 1:18 mark of the first round.

You can check out the video below, but once again, you have been warned. It is the stuff of nightmares.

Since you’re still here, I guess you’re the type who would be interested in seeing photos of the gruesome break as well.

Photo by Jeff Bottari/Zuffa LLC/Zuffa LLC via Getty Images

Dustin Poirier spoke about the BMF belt shortly after his UFC 242 bout.

Nate Diaz vs Jorge Masvidal has been made official for UFC 244, and word came from Dana White himself that the UFC is indeed making that “baddest motherf—ker” belt that Diaz called for.

Poirier, who has been known for putting on violent fights himself, says he’s uninterested in competing for that BMF title as he feels it belongs to his teammate. He spoke about it shortly after his UFC 242 bout.

“Jorge (Masvidal) is a buddy of mine. I don’t sell out like f—king Colby Covington,” Poirier said at the post-fight press conference. “I don’t talk bad about people who I roll with.

“Jorge is a buddy of mine. I won’t fight him. He’s a training partner, He’s a good guy. If anything, I’ll go out to Florida and help him for that fight.”

As for what is next for him, Poirier says his goal is still to become world champion, and this heartbreaking loss to Khabib Nurmagomedov will be tough to take.

“I thought honestly the past 10 weeks of training camp and preparing for this fight, I thought the stars were aligning and thought this was going to be my night. I thought this was destiny,” he said. “I don’t want to keep crying, but this just means a lot to me.

“I just thought tonight I was going to fly back home to the United States undisputed world champ, so this really hurts. I have a lot of tread left on the tires, I feel. I’m not fighting just to fight. I’m fighting to be the world champ. So these opportunities don’t come that often.”

Photo by Michael S. Schwartz/Getty Images

Joe Rogan says that with UFC not giving fighters much of a choice in matchmaking, a lot of prospects’ careers have been ruined.

Joe Rogan recently had former boxing champion Andre Ward as a guest in his podcast, and it’s where the two discussed the difference between the sweet science and mixed martial arts. According to Rogan, one of the things that boxing does well and MMA doesn’t, is with properly handling prospects and building up big fights.

He says that with UFC fighters not getting much of a choice in matchmaking and their career paths, a lot of promising prospects aren’t properly handled.

“(In boxing) managers dictate who the fighters fight, and they do build their fighters up correctly. One of the things that bother me about MMA, is I think there’s some really good young fighters that get ruined,” Rogan said. (HT: LazyLefty) They get thrown to the wolves too quickly, they wind up getting their confidence shattered, they get knocked out when they shouldn’t be, they’re fighting a caliber of fighter they’re not prepared for.

“There’s always the argument for a guy like Jon Jones, youngest ever UFC champion,” Rogan said. “For every Jon Jones, there’s a guy who is coming up that maybe could have been a world champion, but didn’t get managed correctly. The UFC doesn’t give you options. They say ‘hey, you want to fight Kamaru Usman? Okay, here’s your fight. This is it.’

Ward responded to discuss the difference in business models for the two combat sports.

“It’s a trade off right?” Ward asks. “Fans get the big fights, but in the wake of how many careers?”

Is that still even the case in MMA now? Rogan then went on to say that while UFC fans get a lot of big fights, they’re usually not at an optimal time in their careers.

“The fans get the big fights, but I don’t think we necessarily see the highest caliber of fighter fight the highest caliber of fighter, with the best case scenario at all times. Do you know what I’m saying? I don’t think we get to see the most out of some of these guys.

“If there was a ton of different promoters around, and you weren’t locked into any specific organization like the UFC has, I think you can see more managers saying ‘Hey man you’re not ready for Robbie Lawler, you’re not ready for this guy. We’re going to take this fight on a regional level. We’re going to build you up and get you to 15, 16-0, then we’re going to start to challenge some top 10 contenders.’

“This way, you will have seen all the looks. You’ll have seen a great wrestler, a great striker. You’ve fought a Muay Thai champion, you’ve fought a jiujitsu guy, you know how to handle all these different scenarios.”

The UFC certainly has a lot of power and control over the sport, and a lot of what Rogan discussed have been those issues either brought up by those pushing the Ali Act into MMA or the on going antitrust lawsuit against the promotion.

As for all the talk the UFC supposedly besting boxing at booking fights that fans want, it’s the sweet science which has had a lot of legitimate super fights between the best of the best as of late, while there has been numerous disgruntled MMA stars sidelined and match ups that have failed to materialize. Anecdotally, if you look at today’s front page, there’s multiple articles relating to failing (or failed) UFC negotiations involving fighters such as Georges St-Pierre, Cris Cyborg, Tony Ferguson, Jorge Masvidal, Nate Diaz, Colby Covington, and Kamaru Usman.

I understand the history and where this idea came from, but with recent events, it’s actually a narrative that could be worth revisiting.