Author: Hunter Homistek

Diego Sanchez Drops to Featherweight, Will Face Ricardo Lamas in Mexico

Diego Sanchez is shedding weight again. 
UFC.com’s Thomas Gerbasi reported Wednesday that Sanchez will drop from lightweight to featherweight for his next bout, a Nov. 21 tilt with the No. 4-ranked Ricardo Lamas in Monterrey, Mexico. 

For Sa…

Diego Sanchez is shedding weight again. 

UFC.com’s Thomas Gerbasi reported Wednesday that Sanchez will drop from lightweight to featherweight for his next bout, a Nov. 21 tilt with the No. 4-ranked Ricardo Lamas in Monterrey, Mexico. 

For Sanchez, moving weight classes is nothing new. 

On Season 1 of the UFC’s hit reality show The Ultimate Fighter, Sanchez took home gold, winning the middleweight tournament by defeating Alex Karalexis, Josh Rafferty, Josh Koscheck and Kenny Florian in succession. 

After taking home the show’s 185-pound crown, Sanchez fought at welterweight nine times from August 2005 to June 2008, posting a 7-2 record during that stint. 

He then tried his luck at lightweight, quickly ascending to a title fight with then-champion BJ Penn at UFC 107, where he lost via TKO due to a cut in Round 5. 

Since then, Sanchez has bounced between welterweight and lightweight, but he’s fought his last four fights at 155, setting up his current drop to featherweight. 

Should he get through the weight cut without issue, Sanchez still has a formidable task in front of him for his 145-pound debut in Lamas. 

A former title challenger himself, Lamas is 7-3 in his last 10 contests, defeating fighters such as Cub Swanson, Erik Koch and Dennis Bermudez. 

His most recent outing resulted in defeat, however, as he was knocked out by another top-five featherweight, Chad Mendes, at UFC Fight Night 63 in April. 

Despite this, there’s no question Lamas is a top-tier featherweight, and he presents challenges for Sanchez wherever the fight may go. 

With a win, Sanchez would catapult himself into the 145-pound title conversation, where he could then make a run at champion Jose Aldo or interim champion Conor McGregor. 

Already one of the most exciting divisions in the UFC, the featherweight class just got a little more interesting with the addition of the Greg Jackson dynamo. 

Read more MMA news on BleacherReport.com

Myles Jury Drops to UFC’s Featherweight Division, Moves Camp to Power MMA

Myles Jury is making changes. 
After spending the entirety of his seven-fight UFC career in the lightweight division, the 26-year-old Jury will shed 10 pounds and test his luck at featherweight, according to a recent report on his personal we…

Myles Jury is making changes. 

After spending the entirety of his seven-fight UFC career in the lightweight division, the 26-year-old Jury will shed 10 pounds and test his luck at featherweight, according to a recent report on his personal website. 

In addition, Jury will move his fight camp from San Diego’s Alliance MMA to Arizona’s Power MMA and Fitness. Along with Jury, Alliance MMA teammates Johnny “Hollywood” Case, Michael Chandler and Luis Saldana will head east for future fight camps. 

“Myles was tested a little over 16-percent body fat and not exactly eating the best,” Jury’s manager, Ryan Hass, told Fox Sports’ Damon Martin. “One of his great changes this year was finally getting his nutrition intake at the highest level by starting with George Lockhart at FitnessVT.com.

“Now he’s held onto his size while dropping the bad weight and ready to take over the featherweight division.”

For Jury, these changes come on the heels of his first professional loss, a January defeat via decision to current lightweight top contender Donald “Cowboy” Cerrone at UFC 182. 

In that fight, Jury found success early by taking Cerrone to the ground and securing dominant position, but Cerrone quickly reversed the maneuver and took over, outpointing and outclassing Jury everywhere the fight went. 

Still, Jury is young, he’s talented and his 5’11” frame could make him a real threat at 145 pounds. 

While his striking developed quickly at Alliance MMA and became a primary tool of attack against the likes of Diego Sanchez and Takanori Gomi, Jury is a lifelong wrestler with black-belt Brazilian jiu-jitsu credentials. Combined with his physical size, this grappling talent could make a dangerous foil to the strikers—champion Jose Aldo and interim champ Conor McGregor—at the top of the featherweight division. 

Stay tuned to Bleacher Report as news of Jury’s first opponent at 145 pounds is announced. 

Read more MMA news on BleacherReport.com

Chris Weidman on Michael Bisping: ‘I’d Literally Beat Him Sleepwalking’

UFC middleweight Michael Bisping notched an impressive victory over Thales Leites at UFC Fight Night 72 on July 18, but the division’s champion, Chris Weidman, remains unmoved. 
While Weidman recognizes several challenges in the 185-pound division…

UFC middleweight Michael Bisping notched an impressive victory over Thales Leites at UFC Fight Night 72 on July 18, but the division’s champion, Chris Weidman, remains unmoved. 

While Weidman recognizes several challenges in the 185-pound division moving forward, Bisping is not among them. 

The champ feels he could take Bisping, and he wouldn’t even have to wake up to do it. Weidman said during a recent Periscope session (h/t MMA Mania’s Adam Guillen Jr.):

Bisping is a joke. I would love for him to fight for the title because I’d literally beat him sleepwalking. I think I could beat him while I’m sleepwalking. He has no punching power, so I can literally fall asleep while he’s punching me, just get a hold of him and throw him on the floor. If he doesn’t get knocked out when he falls on the floor, I’ll just submit him.

Weidman wasn’t done:

I can submit him with my eyes closed, 100-percent. That’s not me talking any junk. That’s just me being honest. That poor guy, he’s just such an easy fight. I don’t even think you have to get in shape for it. I hope to God that he somehow gets his way to the top. Right now he is so far from it, but I really hope he can get there. I know he’d talk trash back and it would be exciting, but I don’t have the full confidence that he can get to the top.

Beneath the obvious exaggerations, Weidman has a point. Bisping really poses no threat to him inside the Octagon. 

The brash British fighter makes his living through volume striking, picking apart his opponent and avoiding serious damage in the process. Since January 2012, Bisping has posted a modest 5-4 record, with four of his wins coming via decision. 

When he received a top-shelf opponent—Vitor Belfort, Chael Sonnen, Luke Rockhold, Tim Kennedy—during that stretch, he failed, and Weidman is undoubtedly in their class (or above). 

A former All-American wrestler at Hofstra with devastating knockout power, Weidman has shown virtually no holes in his game since coming to the UFC in March 2011. After beating the consensus greatest middleweight of all time, Anderson Silva, twice in back-to-back bouts to capture and defend the UFC Middleweight Championship, Weidman has only gotten better. 

He’s since defeated Lyoto Machida and Vitor Belfort; the former is a karate expert with powerful and pinpoint striking, and the latter is a powerhouse of a man with knockout capability in every limb. 

Weidman disposed of them with relative ease. 

Currently, the Long Islander has a tentative date with Rockhold lined up for his next title defense. Perhaps Bisping can work his way up to a title shot in the meantime, but for now, the likes of Yoel Romero, Ronaldo “Jacare” Souza and Gegard Mousasi are ahead of him in the rankings and seemingly present greater challenges. 

When looking at Weidman vs. Bisping, there’s only one area in which you could definitively give the edge to Bisping, and that’s in the cardio department. The Brit is a cardio machine, and Weidman, a massive middleweight who makes a dramatic cut to the 185-pound limit, has faded in fights before. 

Still, that’s not enough to even remotely favor Bisping. Weidman has the power and the game plan, and his grappling is perhaps the most effective in the entire organization.

He’d need to be awake to be certain, but Weidman beats Bisping nine out of 10 times and suffers a freak injury in the 10th bout. 

Read more MMA news on BleacherReport.com

Chris Weidman on Michael Bisping: ‘I’d Literally Beat Him Sleepwalking’

UFC middleweight Michael Bisping notched an impressive victory over Thales Leites at UFC Fight Night 72 on July 18, but the division’s champion, Chris Weidman, remains unmoved. 
While Weidman recognizes several challenges in the 185-pound division…

UFC middleweight Michael Bisping notched an impressive victory over Thales Leites at UFC Fight Night 72 on July 18, but the division’s champion, Chris Weidman, remains unmoved. 

While Weidman recognizes several challenges in the 185-pound division moving forward, Bisping is not among them. 

The champ feels he could take Bisping, and he wouldn’t even have to wake up to do it. Weidman said during a recent Periscope session (h/t MMA Mania’s Adam Guillen Jr.):

Bisping is a joke. I would love for him to fight for the title because I’d literally beat him sleepwalking. I think I could beat him while I’m sleepwalking. He has no punching power, so I can literally fall asleep while he’s punching me, just get a hold of him and throw him on the floor. If he doesn’t get knocked out when he falls on the floor, I’ll just submit him.

Weidman wasn’t done:

I can submit him with my eyes closed, 100-percent. That’s not me talking any junk. That’s just me being honest. That poor guy, he’s just such an easy fight. I don’t even think you have to get in shape for it. I hope to God that he somehow gets his way to the top. Right now he is so far from it, but I really hope he can get there. I know he’d talk trash back and it would be exciting, but I don’t have the full confidence that he can get to the top.

Beneath the obvious exaggerations, Weidman has a point. Bisping really poses no threat to him inside the Octagon. 

The brash British fighter makes his living through volume striking, picking apart his opponent and avoiding serious damage in the process. Since January 2012, Bisping has posted a modest 5-4 record, with four of his wins coming via decision. 

When he received a top-shelf opponent—Vitor Belfort, Chael Sonnen, Luke Rockhold, Tim Kennedy—during that stretch, he failed, and Weidman is undoubtedly in their class (or above). 

A former All-American wrestler at Hofstra with devastating knockout power, Weidman has shown virtually no holes in his game since coming to the UFC in March 2011. After beating the consensus greatest middleweight of all time, Anderson Silva, twice in back-to-back bouts to capture and defend the UFC Middleweight Championship, Weidman has only gotten better. 

He’s since defeated Lyoto Machida and Vitor Belfort; the former is a karate expert with powerful and pinpoint striking, and the latter is a powerhouse of a man with knockout capability in every limb. 

Weidman disposed of them with relative ease. 

Currently, the Long Islander has a tentative date with Rockhold lined up for his next title defense. Perhaps Bisping can work his way up to a title shot in the meantime, but for now, the likes of Yoel Romero, Ronaldo “Jacare” Souza and Gegard Mousasi are ahead of him in the rankings and seemingly present greater challenges. 

When looking at Weidman vs. Bisping, there’s only one area in which you could definitively give the edge to Bisping, and that’s in the cardio department. The Brit is a cardio machine, and Weidman, a massive middleweight who makes a dramatic cut to the 185-pound limit, has faded in fights before. 

Still, that’s not enough to even remotely favor Bisping. Weidman has the power and the game plan, and his grappling is perhaps the most effective in the entire organization.

He’d need to be awake to be certain, but Weidman beats Bisping nine out of 10 times and suffers a freak injury in the 10th bout. 

Read more MMA news on BleacherReport.com

Chris Weidman on Michael Bisping: ‘I’d Literally Beat Him Sleepwalking’

UFC middleweight Michael Bisping notched an impressive victory over Thales Leites at UFC Fight Night 72 on July 18, but the division’s champion, Chris Weidman, remains unmoved. 
While Weidman recognizes several challenges in the 185-pound division…

UFC middleweight Michael Bisping notched an impressive victory over Thales Leites at UFC Fight Night 72 on July 18, but the division’s champion, Chris Weidman, remains unmoved. 

While Weidman recognizes several challenges in the 185-pound division moving forward, Bisping is not among them. 

The champ feels he could take Bisping, and he wouldn’t even have to wake up to do it. Weidman said during a recent Periscope session (h/t MMA Mania’s Adam Guillen Jr.):

Bisping is a joke. I would love for him to fight for the title because I’d literally beat him sleepwalking. I think I could beat him while I’m sleepwalking. He has no punching power, so I can literally fall asleep while he’s punching me, just get a hold of him and throw him on the floor. If he doesn’t get knocked out when he falls on the floor, I’ll just submit him.

Weidman wasn’t done:

I can submit him with my eyes closed, 100-percent. That’s not me talking any junk. That’s just me being honest. That poor guy, he’s just such an easy fight. I don’t even think you have to get in shape for it. I hope to God that he somehow gets his way to the top. Right now he is so far from it, but I really hope he can get there. I know he’d talk trash back and it would be exciting, but I don’t have the full confidence that he can get to the top.

Beneath the obvious exaggerations, Weidman has a point. Bisping really poses no threat to him inside the Octagon. 

The brash British fighter makes his living through volume striking, picking apart his opponent and avoiding serious damage in the process. Since January 2012, Bisping has posted a modest 5-4 record, with four of his wins coming via decision. 

When he received a top-shelf opponent—Vitor Belfort, Chael Sonnen, Luke Rockhold, Tim Kennedy—during that stretch, he failed, and Weidman is undoubtedly in their class (or above). 

A former All-American wrestler at Hofstra with devastating knockout power, Weidman has shown virtually no holes in his game since coming to the UFC in March 2011. After beating the consensus greatest middleweight of all time, Anderson Silva, twice in back-to-back bouts to capture and defend the UFC Middleweight Championship, Weidman has only gotten better. 

He’s since defeated Lyoto Machida and Vitor Belfort; the former is a karate expert with powerful and pinpoint striking, and the latter is a powerhouse of a man with knockout capability in every limb. 

Weidman disposed of them with relative ease. 

Currently, the Long Islander has a tentative date with Rockhold lined up for his next title defense. Perhaps Bisping can work his way up to a title shot in the meantime, but for now, the likes of Yoel Romero, Ronaldo “Jacare” Souza and Gegard Mousasi are ahead of him in the rankings and seemingly present greater challenges. 

When looking at Weidman vs. Bisping, there’s only one area in which you could definitively give the edge to Bisping, and that’s in the cardio department. The Brit is a cardio machine, and Weidman, a massive middleweight who makes a dramatic cut to the 185-pound limit, has faded in fights before. 

Still, that’s not enough to even remotely favor Bisping. Weidman has the power and the game plan, and his grappling is perhaps the most effective in the entire organization.

He’d need to be awake to be certain, but Weidman beats Bisping nine out of 10 times and suffers a freak injury in the 10th bout. 

Read more MMA news on BleacherReport.com

Chris Weidman on Michael Bisping: ‘I’d Literally Beat Him Sleepwalking’

UFC middleweight Michael Bisping notched an impressive victory over Thales Leites at UFC Fight Night 72 on July 18, but the division’s champion, Chris Weidman, remains unmoved. 
While Weidman recognizes several challenges in the 185-pound division…

UFC middleweight Michael Bisping notched an impressive victory over Thales Leites at UFC Fight Night 72 on July 18, but the division’s champion, Chris Weidman, remains unmoved. 

While Weidman recognizes several challenges in the 185-pound division moving forward, Bisping is not among them. 

The champ feels he could take Bisping, and he wouldn’t even have to wake up to do it. Weidman said during a recent Periscope session (h/t MMA Mania’s Adam Guillen Jr.):

Bisping is a joke. I would love for him to fight for the title because I’d literally beat him sleepwalking. I think I could beat him while I’m sleepwalking. He has no punching power, so I can literally fall asleep while he’s punching me, just get a hold of him and throw him on the floor. If he doesn’t get knocked out when he falls on the floor, I’ll just submit him.

Weidman wasn’t done:

I can submit him with my eyes closed, 100-percent. That’s not me talking any junk. That’s just me being honest. That poor guy, he’s just such an easy fight. I don’t even think you have to get in shape for it. I hope to God that he somehow gets his way to the top. Right now he is so far from it, but I really hope he can get there. I know he’d talk trash back and it would be exciting, but I don’t have the full confidence that he can get to the top.

Beneath the obvious exaggerations, Weidman has a point. Bisping really poses no threat to him inside the Octagon. 

The brash British fighter makes his living through volume striking, picking apart his opponent and avoiding serious damage in the process. Since January 2012, Bisping has posted a modest 5-4 record, with four of his wins coming via decision. 

When he received a top-shelf opponent—Vitor Belfort, Chael Sonnen, Luke Rockhold, Tim Kennedy—during that stretch, he failed, and Weidman is undoubtedly in their class (or above). 

A former All-American wrestler at Hofstra with devastating knockout power, Weidman has shown virtually no holes in his game since coming to the UFC in March 2011. After beating the consensus greatest middleweight of all time, Anderson Silva, twice in back-to-back bouts to capture and defend the UFC Middleweight Championship, Weidman has only gotten better. 

He’s since defeated Lyoto Machida and Vitor Belfort; the former is a karate expert with powerful and pinpoint striking, and the latter is a powerhouse of a man with knockout capability in every limb. 

Weidman disposed of them with relative ease. 

Currently, the Long Islander has a tentative date with Rockhold lined up for his next title defense. Perhaps Bisping can work his way up to a title shot in the meantime, but for now, the likes of Yoel Romero, Ronaldo “Jacare” Souza and Gegard Mousasi are ahead of him in the rankings and seemingly present greater challenges. 

When looking at Weidman vs. Bisping, there’s only one area in which you could definitively give the edge to Bisping, and that’s in the cardio department. The Brit is a cardio machine, and Weidman, a massive middleweight who makes a dramatic cut to the 185-pound limit, has faded in fights before. 

Still, that’s not enough to even remotely favor Bisping. Weidman has the power and the game plan, and his grappling is perhaps the most effective in the entire organization.

He’d need to be awake to be certain, but Weidman beats Bisping nine out of 10 times and suffers a freak injury in the 10th bout. 

Read more MMA news on BleacherReport.com