Tag: UFC 205

Sorry Conor, Alvarez vs. Nurmagomedov Targeted For UFC 205

UFC lightweight champion Eddie Alvarez has currently had just four fights since joining the promotion in September 2014. Crossing over from Bellator after lengthy contract negotiations, ‘The Silent Assassin’ actually lost his UFC debut. Facing Donald ‘Cowboy’ Cerrone at UFC 178, Alvarez was shut out on the judges scorecards. Leading to his eventual title tilt

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UFC lightweight champion Eddie Alvarez has currently had just four fights since joining the promotion in September 2014. Crossing over from Bellator after lengthy contract negotiations, ‘The Silent Assassin’ actually lost his UFC debut. Facing Donald ‘Cowboy’ Cerrone at UFC 178, Alvarez was shut out on the judges scorecards. Leading to his eventual title tilt at UFC Fight Night 90, Alvarez would go on to defeat Anthony Pettis and Gilbert Melendez in a duo of split decisions. Finally meeting Rafael dos Anjos on July 7, the 32-year old from Philadelphia looked like his old self again.

‘RDA’ had looked like an unstoppable force before meeting Alvarez in the UFC octagon. ‘The Silent Assassin’ proved to be too much for the Brazilian though, scoring a brutal first round stoppage by strikes. As Alvarez’s hand was raised and the title wrapped around his waist, another piece of a rapidly growing puzzle fell in to place. The former Bellator champ wanted money fights, following the trend that was growing among other UFC stars. Conor McGregor arguably brought ‘red panty night’ in to the limelight, and Alvarez was on board. Shortly after came the reports of a super fight between the lightweight and featherweight champions.

MMA: UFC Fight Night-Dos Anjos vs Alvarez

Alvarez vs. McGregor

Although nothing has been confirmed yet, the rumour mill would indicate UFC 205 as the venue for this clash. The 155-pound strap would be on the line at the promotion’s first event in New York, but questions remained about McGregor’s 145-pound belt. UFC president Dana White said ‘The Notorious’ would have to leave the featherweight championship if he wanted this fight.

Ahead of what would be a massively historic fight in many ways, the promotion has remained typically quiet. Alvarez took to Twitter last night to fire off a warning shot to McGregor, stating the Irishman’s future was not bright:

What if…

The ‘what if’ factor in this fight is absolutely huge. On the one hand the Irish star could drop his belt (potentially at this stage) and end up losing to Alvarez. With McGregor’s undying fame it wouldn’t be the end of the world, but it remains a possible outcome. On the other hand, and probably much more influential, would be if ‘The Notorious’ beat ‘The Silent Assassin.’ The promotion would have their biggest draw ruling another division, leading to a plethora of possibilities in the aftermath.

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Not So Fast

With all the talk of Alvarez vs. McGregor, people seem to have forgotten about longtime number one contender Khabib Nurmagomedov. As confirmed by a report on ESPN, and the following Tweet by Khabib himself, ‘The Eagle’ is in line for the UFC 205 main event, not Conor McGregor.

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Eddie Alvarez To Conor McGregor: “I’m Ready, Your Futures Not Bright”

[embed]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IUVjC_vz9DY[/embed]

As we continue to hear rumors and reports of Eddie Alvarez-Conor McGregor headlining the upcoming UFC 205 card from Madison Square Garden, Alvarez is speaking out.

The reigning UFC lightw…

eddie-alvarez-ufc-champion

As we continue to hear rumors and reports of Eddie Alvarez-Conor McGregor headlining the upcoming UFC 205 card from Madison Square Garden, Alvarez is speaking out.

The reigning UFC lightweight champion fired off these comments on Twitter Tuesday night. No response yet from “Notorious,” who holds the featherweight belt and is almost constantly on social media to respond.

And while McGregor has been silent, his coach, John Kavanagh, responded to Alvarez:

If made official, the bout would join a welterweight title match between champion Tyron Woodley and No. 1 challenger Stephen Thompson, along with reported fights between Chris Weidman-Yoel Romero and Frankie Edgar-Jeremy Stephens.

Tyron Woodley Doesn’t Respect “Wonderboy” As A Man

Shortly after making the announcement that he will be defending his welterweight throne against Stephen ‘Wonderboy’ Thompson at UFC 205 from Madison Square Garden in New York this November, UFC 170-pound champ Tyron ‘The Chosen One’ Woodley recently joined the Anik and Florian podcast (courtesy of FOX Sports) to discuss his upcoming clash with the No. 2-ranked Thompson.

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Shortly after making the announcement that he will be defending his welterweight throne against Stephen ‘Wonderboy’ Thompson at UFC 205 from Madison Square Garden in New York this November, UFC 170-pound champ Tyron ‘The Chosen One’ Woodley recently joined the Anik and Florian podcast (courtesy of FOX Sports) to discuss his upcoming clash with the No. 2-ranked Thompson.

Woodley said that he is motivated for his contest with the undefeated kick-boxer because while he does respect him as a competitor, he doesn’t respect ‘Wonderboy’ as a man:

“The thing that motivates me about this fight is ‘Wonderboy’ I respect him as an opponent, but I really don’t respect him as a man. He knows that we committed to this fight almost six weeks ago and for him to charade around like I’m scared to fight him, retweeting and liking all these posts.”

“For someone to desperately need to that affirmation from the fans and for people to like him, like I can’t respect that,” Woodley said.

‘The Chosen One’ also stated that he isn’t buying into Thompson’s ‘fake humble’ that has gotten underneath the new champion’s skin, and come fight night he’ll use that as motivation to put ‘Wonderboy’s’ lights out quick:

“For me, I’m going to try to do the same thing to you no matter if I like you, no matter if I hate you, no matter if it pops up. You’re not going to be able to say one thing and now I really want to kick you,” Woodley said. “For some reason, he’s managed to get underneath my skin and I just don’t buy that fake humble, I just don’t buy it.

“When someone’s portraying something they’re not to get underneath my skin, I’m just going to funnel that into a great strategy and I’m going to try to get him out of there quick.”

09_1200_675958503186237061474306786.3655.jpgBefore the fight with Thompson was announced, Woodley was adamant on wanting a big ‘money fight’ with 170-pound legends such as Georges St-Pierre or Nick Diaz.

Woodley believes fans took his words the wrong way and re-phrased his statement:

“People misunderstood what I said when I said I wanted a money fight. Maybe I should re-phrase that because when people hear that it almost sounds like I don’t care about the sport anymore. When you’re watching people in non-title fights making four times the amount of money that a champion makes, it takes away the flavor of being a champion,” Woodley said. “Me getting a money fight, me getting paid the way I feel a champion should be paid. So when I fight Stephen ‘Wonderboy’ (Thompson), this will be a money fight.

“Unlike some of the other guys in the different divisions, my fight that I asked for made sense. Not only would they be money fights, but they also would be legacy fights. You can’t deny that Nick Diaz is a top 10 overall welterweight Hall of Famer. Same thing with Georges St-Pierre, he’s No. 1 overall right now.”

Woodley and Thompson will meet for the welterweight title live at UFC 205 on pay-per-view (PPV), from the Madison Square Garden arena in New York City on November 12, 2016.

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Jim Miller Steps Up To Fight Thiago Alves In New York

Originally, New York native and No. 13-ranked lightweight Al Iaquinta was slated to meet former welterweight title challenger Thiago “Pitbull” Alves at November 12’s UFC 205 from Madison Square Garden in New York. Yesterday (September 19, 2016), however, Iaquinta announced that he was pulling out of the bout due to contract disputes with the promotion.

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Originally, New York native and No. 13-ranked lightweight Al Iaquinta was slated to meet former welterweight title challenger Thiago “Pitbull” Alves at November 12’s UFC 205 from Madison Square Garden in New York. Yesterday (September 19, 2016), however, Iaquinta announced that he was pulling out of the bout due to contract disputes with the promotion.

The UFC has quickly found a replacement for Iaquinta as MMAJunkie has reported that veteran Jim Miller has stepped up to take on Alves.

The New Jersey native has gotten back to his winning ways in recent memory, picking up back-to-back to victories over the likes of Takanori Gomi and Jou Lauzon.

Alves, on the other hand, will be making his 155-pound debut in this bout. The “Pitbull” is coming off of a brutal loss to former interim 170-pound champion Carlos Condit, but prior to that he had won two straight over Seth Baczynski and Jordan Mein.

UFC 205 is still searching for a main event, but it was recently announced that welterweight champion Tyron Woodley will defend his title against Stephen Thompson on the card. Former middleweight champion Chris Weidman will also face off with surging contender Yoel “The Soldier of God” Romero.

A lightweight title tilt between champion Eddie Alvarez and 145-pound king Conor McGregor has been rumored as a possible headliner, but nothing has been finalized just yet.

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Floyd Mayweather Moving On From Conor McGregor Fight

The circus that took the combat sports world by storm months ago has finally come to a close. After subsequently ‘retiring’ from the Octagon and being removed from his UFC 200 main event bout against Nate Diaz for bumping heads with UFC brass over media obligations, UFC featherweight champion Conor McGregor appeared to have a

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The circus that took the combat sports world by storm months ago has finally come to a close.

After subsequently ‘retiring’ from the Octagon and being removed from his UFC 200 main event bout against Nate Diaz for bumping heads with UFC brass over media obligations, UFC featherweight champion Conor McGregor appeared to have a date in the boxing ring with boxing legend Floyd Mayweather Jr. in the near future.

The news took the MMA and Boxing worlds by storm, but the bout was temporarily put on ice as UFC President Dana White said no fight against Mayweather would take place unless it was made through him.

McGregor would go on to defeat Diaz in a five round war at UFC 202 this past August, and is now rumored to be stepping into the Octagon with UFC lightweight champ Eddie Alvarez for the 155-pound crown; attempting to become the first dual-weight champion in UFC history.

During a recent interview with Fight Hype, courtesy of Bloody Elbow, ‘Money’ revealed that after vigorous attempts to make the big money fight happen, he was unfortunately unsuccessful in luring the Irish MMA star into the boxing ring against himself:

“I tried to make the fight happen between me and Conor McGregor,” Mayweather said. “We wasn’t able to make the fight happen, so we must move on.”

So there you have it fight fans, the bout is off and leaves the lingering question if the boxing match even had a serious shot at happening in the first place.

You can check out Mayweather’s comments to Fight Hype here:

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Tyron Woodley Opens As Early Underdog Against Stephen Thompson

New UFC welterweight champion Tyron Woodley may have been aiming for a ‘money fight’ against Georges St. Pierre or Nick Diaz after he won the belt by knocking out Robbie Lawler in late July, but most MMA fans’ wishes were fulfilled at last Friday’s UFC Fight Night 94 weigh-ins when ‘T-Wood’ confirmed he would be

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New UFC welterweight champion Tyron Woodley may have been aiming for a ‘money fight’ against Georges St. Pierre or Nick Diaz after he won the belt by knocking out Robbie Lawler in late July, but most MMA fans’ wishes were fulfilled at last Friday’s UFC Fight Night 94 weigh-ins when ‘T-Wood’ confirmed he would be facing consensus No. 1 contender Stephen ‘Wonderboy’ Thompson at November 12’s monumental UFC 205 from New York.

Most regard ‘Wonderboy’ as the greatest threat to Woodley’s crown, as the general thinking is that Thompson will be able to keep out of Woodley’s early power range while picking him apart in the mid to later rounds where ‘T-Wood’ tends to fade. Apparently oddsmakers agree with this sentiment as well, as Thompson is a -150 favorite with Woodley a +120 underdog according to early numbers from MMAOddsbreakers’ Nick Kalikas, who explained his thinking for setting the line:

“Tyron Woodley is a deserving and dangerous champion, having knocked out Robbie Lawler to claim the welterweight crown, but he may have his hands full in Stephen Thompson. Thompson has proven himself as the best striker at 170 pounds. Woodley has explosive power and is an excellent wrestler, but he’s had major difficulty against technical strikers with excellent takedown defense like Rory MacDonald. Thompson uses distance expertly and recently proved he can push a solid pace for five rounds with his last win. I’m opening the title challenger Thompson as a -150 betting favorite because I feel as long as he survives Woodley in the first round and settles in, he’ll be able to control almost every dynamic of the fight.”

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It’s far from the first time Woodley has been in this position, however. Despite his position as champion and arguably the hardest hitter in the talented UFC welterweight division, MMA Junkie pointed out that Woodley has opened as the betting dog in an alarming six straight fights against Carlos Condit, Rory MacDonald, Dong Hyun Kim, Kelvin Gastelum, Lawler, and now Thompson.

He only lost to MacDonald, but many believe that fight will paint the picture of why he will lose to Thompson as ‘The Red King’ was a lanky, technical striker whom ‘Wonderboy’ thoroughly out-struck in their meeting at UFC Fight Night 89 this June.

So it’s a role that Woodley has relished, mainly silencing his doubters with a mix of high-powered knockouts amongst a controversial decision win over Gastelum and his injury TKO victory over

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