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Check out the best photos from the UFC 292 official weigh-ins including Aljamain Sterling vs. Sean O’Malley and more.
Check out these photos of the UFC 292 official weigh-ins at the UFC host hotel in Boston. (Photos by Nolan King, MMA Junkie)
The best facts about UFC 292, which sees Aljamain Sterling bring a potentially GOAT-worthy resume into his title defense vs. Sean O’Malley.
The UFC returns to Boston for the seventh time in company history and the first time in nearly four years on Saturday with UFC 292, which takes place at TD Garden and has a main card that airs on pay-per-view following prelims on ESPN and ESPN+.
A championship doubleheader takes center stage on the card. In the main event, [autotag]Aljamain Sterling[/autotag] (23-3 MMA, 15-3 UFC) will seek his fourth consecutive bantamweight title defense when he takes on [autotag]Sean O’Malley[/autotag] (16-1 MMA, 8-1 UFC), while the co-main event sees strawweight champ [autotag]Zhang Weili[/autotag] (23-3 MMA, 7-2 UFC) look for the first defense of her second title reign against dangerous Brazilian challenger [autotag]Amanda Lemos[/autotag] (13-2-1 MMA, 7-2 UFC).
For the numbers behind both title bouts, as well as the rest of the card, check below for MMA Junkie’s pre-event facts about UFC 292.
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All the UFC and Bellator fight announcements that were first reported or confirmed by MMA Junkie in the past week.
MMA fight announcements are hard to follow. With so many outlets and channels available, it’s nearly impossible to organize.
But here at MMA Junkie, we’ve got your back.
Each week, we’ll compile all the newly surfaced fights in one spot. Every Monday, expect a feature listing everything you might have missed from the UFC or Bellator.
Here are the fight announcements that were broken or confirmed by MMA Junkie or officially announced by a promotion from June 5-11.
Rising UFC women’s flyweight Karine Silva has booked her next assignment within a week of her last fight.
Rising UFC women’s flyweight [autotag]Karine Silva[/autotag] has booked her next assignment.
Silva (16-4 MMA, 2-0 UFC) meets [autotag]Maryna Moroz[/autotag] (11-4 MMA, 6-4 UFC) at UFC 292 on Aug. 19 from TD Garden in Boston. A person with knowledge of the situation confirmed the booking to MMA Junkie on Friday after an initial report by MMA Fighting.
Brazil’s Silva is coming off a knee-popping submission of Ketlen Souza in this past Saturday’s UFC on ESPN 45 event at the UFC Apex. The Dana White’s Contender Series alum has finished all 16 of her professional wins.
Moroz saw her three-fight winning streak snapped by former title challenger Jennifer Maia this past November at UFC Fight Night 215. Prior to that, the 31-year-old scored wins over Sabina Mazo, Mayra Bueno Silva, and a Performance of the Night submission of Mariya Agapova.
With the addition, the current UFC 292 lineup includes:
For more on the card, visit MMA Junkie’s event hub for UFC 292.
UFC Fight Night 215 fighters took home UFC Promotional Guidelines Compliance pay, a program that continued after the UFC’s deal with Venum.
LAS VEGAS – Fighters from Saturday’s UFC Fight Night 215 event took home UFC Promotional Guidelines Compliance pay totaling $80,000.
The program, a comprehensive plan that includes outfitting requirements, media obligations and other items under the fighter code of conduct, replaces the previous payments made under the UFC Athlete Outfitting Policy.
UFC Fight Night 215 took place at the UFC Apex. The entire card streamed on ESPN+.
The full UFC Fight Night 215 UFC Promotional Guidelines Compliance payouts included:
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[autotag]Kennedy Nzechukwu[/autotag]: $6,000
def. [autotag]Ion Cutelaba[/autotag]: $11,000
[autotag]Waldo Cortes-Acosta[/autotag]: $4,000
def. [autotag]Chase Sherman[/autotag]: $11,000
[autotag]Muslim Salikhov[/autotag]: $6,000
def. [autotag]Andre Fialho[/autotag]: $4,500
[autotag]Jack Della Maddalena[/autotag]: $4,000
def. [autotag]Danny Roberts[/autotag]: $11,000
[autotag]Charles Johnson[/autotag]: $4,000
def. [autotag]Zhalgas Zhumagulov[/autotag]: $6,000
[autotag]Jennifer Maia[/autotag]: $6,000
def. [autotag]Maryna Moroz[/autotag]: $6,000
[autotag]Miles Johns[/autotag]: $6,000
def. [autotag]Vince Morales[/autotag]: $6,000
[autotag]Ricky Turcios[/autotag]: $4,000
def. [autotag]Kevin Natividad[/autotag]: $4,000
[autotag]Vanessa Demopoulos[/autotag]: $4,500
def. [autotag]Maria Oliveira[/autotag]: $4,000
[autotag]Brady Hiestand[/autotag]: $4,000
def. [autotag]Fernie Garcia[/autotag]: $4,000
[autotag]Natalia Silva[/autotag]: $4,000
def. [autotag]Tereza Bleda[/autotag]: $4,000
Under the UFC Promotional Guidelines Compliance program’s payout tiers, which appropriate the money generated by Venum’s multi-year sponsorship with the UFC, fighters are paid based on their total number of UFC bouts, as well as Zuffa-era WEC fights and Zuffa-era Strikeforce bouts. Fighters with 1-3 bouts receive $4,000 per appearance; 4-5 bouts get $4,500; 6-10 bouts get $6,000; 11-15 bouts earn $11,000; 16-20 bouts pocket $16,000; and 21 bouts and more get $21,000. Additionally, champions earn $42,000 while title challengers get $32,000.
In addition to experience-based pay, UFC fighters will receive in perpetuity royalty payments amounting to 20-30 percent of any UFC merchandise sold that bears their likeness, according to officials.
Full 2022 UFC Promotional Guidelines Compliance payouts:
Year-to-date total: $7,634,500
2021 total: $6,167,500
Program-to-date total: $13,812,000
For more on the card, visit MMA Junkie’s event hub for UFC Fight Night 215.
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Check out all the facts and figures from UFC Fight Night 215, which featured a number of notable feats.
The UFC closed its November schedule on Saturday with UFC Fight Night 215, a decision-heavy event at the UFC Apex in Las Vegas.
One fighter who didn’t need the judges, however, was [autotag]Kennedy Nzechukwu[/autotag] (11-3 MMA, 5-3 UFC), who made the most of his makeshift main event opportunity with a second-round TKO of [autotag]Ion Cutelaba[/autotag] (16-9-1 MMA, 5-8-1 UFC) in their light heavyweight clash.
For more on the numbers behind the headliner, as well as the rest of the card, check below for MMA Junkie’s post-event facts from UFC Fight Night 215.
Check out the numbers behind UFC Fight Night 215, where Derrick Lewis can add to his knockout record and Andre Fialho keeps busy.
The UFC returns to its home base of Las Vegas on Saturday with UFC Fight Night 215, which takes place at the UFC Apex and streams on ESPN+.
A heavyweight headliner serves atop the card. The most decorated knockout artist in UFC history returns to competition as [autotag]Derrick Lewis[/autotag] (26-10 MMA, 17-8 UFC) looks to buck his losing skid against the streaking [autotag]Serghei Spivac[/autotag] (15-3 MMA, 6-3 UFC).
For more on the numbers behind the main event, as well as the rest of the card, check below for MMA Junkie’s pre-event facts about UFC Fight Night 215.
With the situation in her home country of Ukraine worsening by the day, Maryna Moroz had plenty on her mind outside her fight at UFC 272.
LAS VEGAS – With the situation in her home country of Ukraine getting worse by the day, [autotag]Maryna Moroz[/autotag] had plenty on her mind outside her fight at UFC 272.
That Moroz (11-3 MMA, 6-3 UFC) made the walk to the cage at all at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas should be lauded. That she submitted Mariya Agapova (10-3 MMA, 2-2 UFC) with a second-round rear-naked choke as an underdog should have been trumpeted – and it was in the form of a $50,000 Fight of the Night bonus.
Moroz said her heart was heavy in the week leading up to the fight in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
“I had a lot of pressure,” Moroz said in her post-fight news conference. “I was nervous about the war in Ukraine. All this week, I felt nervous, I was crying. But I tried to focus. … It was really hard for me because I see in Ukraine how terrible the situation is. But I focused, and I won the fight.”
Moroz also had another storyline hanging over her head. She and Agapova are former teammates, and there had been some bad blood leading into the matchup. And while it never rose to the level of bad blood in the UFC 272 main event between Colby Covington and Jorge Masvidal, it was there nonetheless.
Still, Moroz seemed to bury the hatchet with Agapova after she tapped her out.
“I told her good luck in the next fight,” Moroz said. “We had a good fight, and thank you for fighting. … I’m not mad, because if I’m mad, it takes my emotions. It takes my energy, and I need my energy. So no emotions – calm, respect, and that’s it.”
Moroz said the paperwork is in place to extend her work visa, so she won’t have to return to her wartorn homeland for now. She said she’ll get an appropriate amount of rest after her win over Agapova and hopes to return in the summer against a higher ranked opponent.
But without question, her thoughts will be constantly on the developments in Ukraine, where many of her family and friends remain.
“It’s hard. My mother’s nervous, and I’m nervous about my mother,” she said. “I don’t want the Russian people to come and kill my family. Many of my friends are dying right now. The Russian army is killing (them). I feel terrible. I think if somebody comes and kills my family … I don’t want that. I want people to listen: Stop this, because I want to save my family.”
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Maryna Moroz picked up a win at UFC 272 under incredibly difficult circumstances.
Ukrainian UFC women’s flyweight [autotag]Maryna Moroz[/autotag] didn’t have an easy build-up to her octagon return, but she got the job done.
Moroz picked up a dominant submission win over Mariya Agapova on Saturday at UFC 272 in Las Vegas. Moroz (11-3 MMA, 6-3 UFC) tapped Agapova (10-3 MMA, 2-2 UFC) with an arm-triangle choke at the 3:27 mark of Round 2 in what was her first fight since March 2020.
Moroz, who’s from Vilnohirsk, Ukraine, had a very emotional preparation ahead of UFC 272 given the ongoing war being waged by Russia in her country. Moroz, 30, expressed serious concern for her family back home and that her father was building “home grenades” in aiding Ukrainian troops.
In her post-fight interview with Joe Rogan, Moroz delivered an emotional speech.
“If you know my country has war right now, and my family is in Ukraine,” Moroz said. “I had a hard week. I worried. I cried because my family right now is in a bad situation. Thank you for everyone who messaged me and supported me because this week was hard for me. I wanted to cry because of this war in my country. Thank you, everyone.”
Powerful words from an emotional Maryna Moroz competing in incredibly tough circumstances 💙💛#UFC272 pic.twitter.com/U35HcBvj3C
— UFC on BT Sport (@btsportufc) March 6, 2022
With this result, Moroz is now on a three-fight wining streak and undefeated since moving up to 125 pounds. Her last defeat came at strawweight in a decision loss to former Invicta FC champion Angela Hill back in 2018.
You can watch Moroz submission win at UFC 272 in the video below.
LOCKS IN THE SUB 🔒
Maryna Moroz with the dominant finish to end it RD 2!
[ #UFC272 | Prelims are LIVE on E+ ] pic.twitter.com/ny7MJXjccI
— UFC (@ufc) March 6, 2022
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Maryna Moroz reacts to Russia’s invasion of her home country of Ukraine ahead of her UFC 272 fight.
[autotag]Maryna Moroz[/autotag] is not mincing words when it comes to her home country of Ukraine.
Ukraine was invaded by Russian troops this past week. Russian military forces have been targeting many major cities across Ukraine, prompting everyday citizens to take up arms as part of the defense effort.
“It’s a hard time for Ukraine,” Moroz told TMZ. “There’s a big war right now. I want to support my country, my president, the army in Ukraine, and I want to say that we don’t want war. I worry about my family right now in Ukraine.
“If you see (the) news, many, many people are dying right now and I don’t want something to happen with my family because it’s dangerous.”
Moroz, who was born in Vilnohirsk, told TMZ her family in Ukraine is safe for now, but she worries about what might come. She even said her father is making “home grenades” to help in the resistance effort against Russian troops.
Moroz (10-3 MMA, 5-3 UFC) fights Saturday at UFC 272 in Las Vegas against Mariya Agapova (10-2 MMA, 2-1 UFC).
“It’s really hard (to get ready for the fight), but I want to show that my Ukraine girl heart is strong and focused,” Moroz said. “I don’t step back. I will be fighting and I will show that the Ukraine people are strong. My flag will be in the octagon.”
Moroz said she hopes the fighting will come to an end. The 30-year-old is saddened by the current situation and didn’t hold back in sending a message to Russian president Vladimir Putin.
“I want to say: ‘F*ck you, b*tch,” Moroz said. “I love my country. Don’t touch Ukraine. This is my country, and I love Ukraine.”
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