Former Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) flyweight contender Ian McCall recently entered the RIZIN FF bantamweight grand prix, which takes place Dec. 29, 2017 inside Saitama Super Arena in Saitama, Japan, streaming live in North America on FITE TV.
The oft-injured McCall (13-5-1) was granted his release from the world’s largest mixed martial arts (MMA) promotion after failing to come to terms on a new (and rather lucrative) fight contract (more on that here).
“Uncle Creepy” has not competed since a unanimous decision loss to John Lineker in early 2015. The decision to compete in December is a bit surprising, considering it isn’t that long ago he was undergoing transcranial magnetic stimulation in San Diego, Calif., to battle “bouts of rage, bi-polar symptoms, and out-of-nowhere crying.”
Kape (7-1) is the winner of five straight, including last weekend’s technical knockout win over Erson Yamamoto at RIZIN FF 7 (full results here). “Prodigio” has six finishes in seven wins, speed evenly across knockouts and submissions.
Here’s how the brackets are shaping up:
Kyoji Horiguchi vs. TBA
Manel Kape vs. Ian McCall
Takafumi Otsuka vs. Khalid Taha
Shintaro Ishiwatari vs. Kevin Petshi
See you in December.