Tag: TUF 25

Jesse Taylor Reacts To USADA Drug Test Failure

The MMA world was dealt a disheartening blow to one of 2017’s most heartwarming comeback stories when The Ultimate Fighter (TUF) 25 winner Jesse Taylor was found to have been flagged for a potential violation by USADA in an out-of-competition drug test. The news was such a shock because it derailed a comeback that took […]

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The MMA world was dealt a disheartening blow to one of 2017’s most heartwarming comeback stories when The Ultimate Fighter (TUF) 25 winner Jesse Taylor was found to have been flagged for a potential violation by USADA in an out-of-competition drug test.

The news was such a shock because it derailed a comeback that took several years to realize, as Taylor was previously removed from the TUF 7 Finale after a well-documented drunken escapade in Las Vegas. Taylor was removed from his scheduled upcoming bout with Belal Muhammad at November 18’s UFC Fight Night 121 from Sydney, Australia, and his exact fighting future now hangs in the balance.

Taylor recently released a statement on the matter on Instagram, apologizing to Australian fans before reminding everyone to let his due process play out before judging him:

The truth will come to Light! I am just as shocked and surprised by this tragedy. Our Team is looking into this matter. Let due process do it work before judging on the matter. Those that know me know this is wrong. We will Fight this and I will be back. I am sorry to Aussie friends and fans but that fight is off due to to this matter I am very bummed but we will get to bottom of this. I’ll Be BaCk

Like the many other fighters who have been flagged by USADA since their testing partnership began with the UFC over two years ago, Taylor is of course afforded his full due process as his team attempts to formulate a feasible reason for the possible violation.

But it’s the same response we hear from nearly every fighter who is flagged by USADA, as really only Lyoto Machida and Chad Mendes have owned up to the mistake and taken their suspensions. Nearly every other fighter uses some sort of tainted supplement reply, and while Taylor didn’t exactly do that, saying the truth will come to light implies he was wronged just like every MMA athlete claims they were.

That’s not to say Taylor is guilty or not guilty; however, only Tim Means and Yoel Romero have gotten a reduced suspension for having a supplement actually found to have been unknowingly tainted.

Either way, let’s hope Taylor’s suggestion proves true, because if he was found to be on performance-enhancing drugs, the comeback he worked the majority of his MMA career for might be over before it even started.

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Jesse Taylor Flagged By USADA, Removed From Upcoming Bout

Jesse Taylor’s feel-good comeback story could be stopping in its tracks before it really even had a chance to begin rolling. The UFC announced on their official website today that Taylor, who just recently won the aptly-named The Ultimate fighter (TUF) 25: Redemption in July after squandering his chance in the finals of TUF 7 […]

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Jesse Taylor’s feel-good comeback story could be stopping in its tracks before it really even had a chance to begin rolling.

The UFC announced on their official website today that Taylor, who just recently won the aptly-named The Ultimate fighter (TUF) 25: Redemption in July after squandering his chance in the finals of TUF 7 years ago after he went on a drunken rampage in Las Vegas, had been flagged for a potential USADA violation in an out-of-competition test and would be removed from his upcoming bout with Belal Muhammad at UFC Fight Night 121.

Read their full statement here:

“The UFC organization was notified today that the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) has informed Jesse Taylor of a potential Anti-Doping Policy violation stemming from an out-of-competition sample collected on August 22, 2017. Because of the proximity to Taylor’s upcoming scheduled bout in Sydney, Australia on November 18, 2017, against Belal Muhammad, Taylor has been removed from the card and the UFC is currently seeking a replacement.

USADA, the independent administrator of the UFC Anti-Doping Policy, will handle the results management and appropriate adjudication of this case involving Taylor. Under the UFC Anti-Doping Policy, there is a full and fair legal process that is afforded to all athletes before any sanctions are imposed. Additional information will be provided at the appropriate time as the process moves forward.”

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Mickey Gall Finally Booked For UFC Return

After beating two of the UFC’s more famous names (though not necessarily the best fighters) in 2016, undefeated welterweight prospect Mickey Gall has been out of action for the entirety of this year. That will all change at the upcoming UFC 217, however. Word broke from Newsday (via MMA Fighting) today that Gall will face […]

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After beating two of the UFC’s more famous names (though not necessarily the best fighters) in 2016, undefeated welterweight prospect Mickey Gall has been out of action for the entirety of this year.

That will all change at the upcoming UFC 217, however.

Word broke from Newsday (via MMA Fighting) today that Gall will face Randy Brown at the anticipated pay-per-view (PPV) event this November 4 from Madison Square Garden in New York, New York.

The bout will join a quickly forming card which features three title fights when Michael Bisping faces a returning Georges St-Pierre for the middleweight championship, Cody Garbrandt finally defends his bantamweight title against TJ Dillashaw, and strawweight champ Joanna Jedrzejczyk battles Rose Namajunas.

Gall has performed well in his short UFC tenure thus far, submitting Mike Jackson, Punk, and Northcutt via rear-naked choke in all three of his octagon bouts. He sits at a promising-but-still-unproven 4-0 in his professional mixed martial arts career after finding the opportunity to compete in the UFC on Dana White’s “Looking For A Fight” online series.

Brown was also found on the show and currently sits at 3-2 in the UFC. He was most recently handed a decision defeat by Belal Muhammad.

Not that it needed it, but UFC 217 has added yet another potentially exciting bout to possibly the most jam-packed lineup of 2017 – at a time when they need just that more than ever. Check out the full updated card right here:

Michael Bisping vs. Georges St-Pierre
Cody Garbrandt vs. T.J. Dillashaw
Joanna Jedrzejczyk vs. Rose Namajunas
Aiemann Zahabi vs. Ricardo Ramos
Johny Hendricks vs. Paulo Borrachinha
Aleksei Oleinik vs. Curtis Blaydes
Gadzhimurad Antigulov vs. Ion Cutelaba
Corey Anderson vs. Patrick Cummins
Stephen Thompson vs. Jorge Masvidal

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Cody Garbrandt Reveals He’s Fighting TJ Dillashaw At UFC 217

One of the summer’s most awaited fights that never was has reportedly been rescheduled for November 4’s UFC 217 from Madison Square Garden in New York. Bantamweight champion Cody Garbrandt was headed for a championship match-up with hated rival and former champion TJ Dillashaw in the main event of July 8’s UFC 213 after the two […]

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One of the summer’s most awaited fights that never was has reportedly been rescheduled for November 4’s UFC 217 from Madison Square Garden in New York.

Bantamweight champion Cody Garbrandt was headed for a championship match-up with hated rival and former champion TJ Dillashaw in the main event of July 8’s UFC 213 after the two built up a significant amount of hype as coaches of The Ultimate Fighter (TUF) 25, but the fight fell apart when Garbrandt was unfortunately forced out with a back injury.

The MMA world has been anticipating “No Love’s” first title defense since he won the gold with a rousing decision win over legendary champion Dominick Cruz at UFC 207, and the Team Alpha Male star tweeted they would get it at UFC 217 today:

If and when the huge title bout is confirmed, it will join the long-rumored Michael Bisping vs. Georges St-Pierre middleweight title fight, for which St-Pierre recently posted a picture of him signing the official bout agreement for.

So UFC 217 is set to be huge and could get even bigger in the coming few months. Jon Jones has expressed interest in actually avoiding the card due to the high rate of taxes placed on fighters’ purses in the state, even though he’s a native of Upstate New York.

Regardless, with Bisping vs. St-Pierre and now reportedly Garbrandt vs. Dillashaw, UFC 217 is shaping up to challenge July 29’s UFC 214 as the best UFC pay-per-view event of the year.

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Report: Justin Gaethje vs. Eddie Alvarez In The Works For This Year

The ink had barely dried on former WSOF lightweight champion Justin Gaethje’s electric UFC debut win over Michael Johnson in the main event of last week’s (July 7, 2017) The Ultimate Fighter (TUF) 25 Finale from Las Vegas when the entire MMA world began their own version of fantasy matchmaking for ‘The Highlight.’ There were those […]

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The ink had barely dried on former WSOF lightweight champion Justin Gaethje’s electric UFC debut win over Michael Johnson in the main event of last week’s (July 7, 2017) The Ultimate Fighter (TUF) 25 Finale from Las Vegas when the entire MMA world began their own version of fantasy matchmaking for ‘The Highlight.’

There were those who want to see Gaethje face off with top-ranked Tony Ferguson, a bout that he called out for himself, and others deemed a striking-based showdown with Edson Barboza or Anthony Pettis as the next logical choice for the UFC’s newest hot commodity. Of course a fight versus Khabib Nurmagomedov was thrown out there, but it’s unlikely ‘The Eagle’ will return – if and when he does return – to face a newer opponent like ‘The Highlight.’

And then of course was the potential dream match-up with UFC lightweight champion Conor McGregor, who will face Floyd Mayweather Jr. in their spectacle of a boxing match on August 26 before supposedly fighting in the octagon before the end of the year. It’s an unlikely prospect for Gaethje to get that fight, however, as Nate Diaz or possibly Nurmagomedov are the front-runners for the next “red panty night.”

Kyle Terada for USA TODAY Sports

That’s okay, of course, as the 18-0 Gaethje clearly has plenty of time to work his way up the packed lightweight ranks, and all of the aforementioned bouts are huge ones. However, the UFC is reportedly planning on something else entirely, as Ariel Helwani revealed that Gaethje vs. former champ Eddie Alvarez is in the works for later this year – possibly after the two coach The Ultimate Fighter (TUF) 26:

If it were to happen, Gaethje vs. Alvarez is indeed an odd booking considering that Alvarez was and is linked to a rematch with Dustin Poirier after an anticlimactic ending to their firefight at MAy’s UFC 212, a bout in which ‘The Diamond’ rocked Alvarez only to see ‘The Underground King’ fight back by doing the same until an illegal knee caused a controversial no contest to end the bout.

In that sense, it’s kind of an odd booking from the UFC with so many potential great fights out there for Gaethje and Alvarez not being even in the conversation for the best of them. The MMA community also wants to see Poirier and Alvarez battle for a definitive ending to their first match-up, and it was no surprise to see Poirier express his disappointment at Helwani’s report:

What’s more, the fight could come at the end of yet another uniform season of TUF, a show whose ratings are tanking year by year but is still produced and shoved down the public’s throat on a set schedule two times every year.

The UFC finally has an exciting future star in Gaethje during their brutal start to 2017, and if this report proves true, they could be putting him on ice for the better part of the year just to save their struggling flagship reality show. It’s yet another questionable decision from new UFC owners WME-IMG that makes it look like they don’t really know what they’re doing in the fight game, or just implies they don’t care what their fans want.

Gaethje vs. Alvarez would be a fine fight; that much is certain. But Alvarez already has a pre-installed rivalry with Poirier to solve, and every MMA fan in the world would tune in to watch Gaethje battle Barboza or Ferguson.

And overall, at the end of the day, shelving your hottest new commodity so he can fight a former champion who isn’t exactly a fan favorite isn’t the kind of decision that’s going to help you pay back $4.2 billion.

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Conor McGregor Reacts To Justin Gaethje’s Insane UFC Debut

The dust barely settled on the awe-inspiring lightweight main event (watch full highlights here) between Justin Gaethje and Michael Johnson at tonight’s (July 7, 2017) The Ultimate Fighter (TUF) 25 Finale from T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada, when the division’s champion decided to weigh in on the action-jammed slugfest. 155-pound boss Conor McGregor, who’s fully […]

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The dust barely settled on the awe-inspiring lightweight main event (watch full highlights here) between Justin Gaethje and Michael Johnson at tonight’s (July 7, 2017) The Ultimate Fighter (TUF) 25 Finale from T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada, when the division’s champion decided to weigh in on the action-jammed slugfest.

155-pound boss Conor McGregor, who’s fully entrenched in a grueling training camp for his ultra-hyped boing match against legend Floyd Mayweather on August 26, still took a brief moment to show his respect for both warriors in the bloody, back-and-forth match. To McGregor, the bout was simply fighting at its core:

Indeed it was two fighters fighting, and the result was an instant classic that will be hard-pressed to be topped as the best fight of this year thus far, if not one of the greatest two-round fights in MMA history.

“The Menace” came into the bout ranked at number five in the deeply talented UFC 155-pound division, and even though former WSOF lightweight titleholder Gaethje was rocked on two different occasions by Johnson, he ended up eating everything he could throw, wading through huge shots like a zombie to land a fight-shifting uppercut that opened up a path for the finishing sequence full of earth-shattering elbows and knees.

The win instantly inserted “The Highlight” at the top of the stacked arena, creating conversations about matching his high-energy style opposite Tony Ferguson and Edson Barboza, in addition to the top grapplers like Khabib Nurmagomedov and Kevin Lee. If he can get past just one of those names like he did versus “The Menace,” he’d arguably be ready for a shot at “The Notorious” in a fight that could legitimately be pegged as one of the most exciting in octagon history, at least on paper.

Gaethje can obviously take a ton of damage, but could he take McGregor’s vaunted straight left and keep pressing forward?

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