Did you miss the debut of UFC 295 “Countdown” or just want to watch it again? Check out the co-main event preview now.
Did you miss the debut of UFC 295 “Countdown” or just want to watch it again? Check out the co-main event preview now.
The segment takes a special look at the interim heavyweight title fight between [autotag]Sergei Pavlovich[/autotag] (18-1 MMA, 6-1 UFC) and [autotag]Tom Aspinall[/autotag] (13-3 MMA, 6-1 UFC), who are fighting for the interim belt after champ Jon Jones suffered an injury training for his fight with Stipe Miocic, the card’s original headliner.
UFC 295 takes place Saturday at Madison Square Garden in New York. The main card airs on pay-per-view following prelims on ESPNews and early prelims on ESPN+.
“Countdown” goes behind the scenes with the two fighters, and you can watch the full segment above. And don’t miss the entire episode in the video below.
For more on the card, visit MMA Junkie’s event hub for UFC 295.
Our “Spinning Back Clique” crew discusses the continued fallout from Francis Ngannou vs. Tyson Fury, the reshuffled UFC 295 and more.
Our “Spinning Back Clique” panel discusses the continued fallout from Francis Ngannou vs. Tyson Fury, the reshuffled UFC 295 and more.
Check out this week’s “Spinning Back Clique,” MMA Junkie’s weekly live show that takes a spin through the biggest topics in mixed martial arts.
This week’s panel of Brian “Goze” Garcia, Danny Segura and Dan Tom will join host “Gorgeous” George Garcia live at noon ET (9 a.m. PT) to discuss and debate:
It’s been more than a week, but the combat sports world still is abuzz with talk of [autotag]Tyson Fury[/autotag], who escaped [autotag]Francis Ngannou[/autotag]’s boxing debut with a split decision win in Saudi Arabia. Now it sounds like Ngannou’s first foray into boxing was successful enough he’ll have his second shot at a first win before he returns to MMA.
Daniel Cormier and Michael Bisping are regulars on the commentary desk for UFC events now that their UFC Hall of Fame careers are over. They each have a big online presence with podcasts and YouTube content, and they recently decided to lob out a few matchmaking ideas. They weren’t bad. Can we pick any holds in them, or will they stand up?
It might not have been what most were expecting, but Raquel Pennington and Mayra Bueno Silva were tapped to fight for the vacant women’s bantamweight title that Amanda Nunes gave up when she retired. We’ll break down the UFC 297 matchup.
The UFC’s return to Sao Paulo for the first time since 2019, and its second trip to Brazil in 2023, wasn’t perfect by any stretch of the imagination. Heck, it lost three fights in a 36-hour period from the weigh-ins until fight night. But what went right?
With Jon Jones on the shelf for a long while, Sergei Pavlovich faces Tom Aspinall for an interim heavyweight title. And the vacant light heavyweight title is up for grabs between Jiri Prochazka and Alex Pereira. We’ll break down UFC 295 title fights at Madison Square Garden in New York.
One week before UFC 295, Alex Pereira was inducted into the Glory Kickboxing Hall of Fame during the promotion’s Collision 6 event Saturday.
Former UFC middleweight champion [autotag]Alex Pereira[/autotag] added another accolade to his resume – exactly one week before his light heavyweight title challenge at UFC 295.
Pereira was inducted into the Glory Hall of Fame during the promotion’s Collision 6 event at GelreDome in Arnhem, Netherlands. While Pereira was not present because he’s in the final stages of preparation for his Nov. 11 title fight vs. Jiri Prochazka, he recorded an acceptance video. The video was played as part of the announcement and can be viewed below.
The Glory Hall of Fame is a limited group so far. Pereira is the third member to be inducted. He joins “Bazooka” Joe Valtellini and former UFC fighter Semmy Schilt in the Hall.
Pereira competed in Glory 15 times from March 2014 to September 2021. He held both the middleweight and light heavyweight titles for the promotion and went 8-1 in championship bouts. Pereira walked away from kickboxing in late 2021 when he signed with the UFC.
Our “Spinning Back Clique” discusses how the promotion handled UFC 295 after Jon Jones’ injury prompted an interim heavyweight title bout.
[autotag]Jon Jones[/autotag] was the source of another UFC pay-per-view overhaul.
The heavyweight champion suffered a torn pectoral muscle while in camp for his massive showdown against Stipe Miocic in New York, prompting the promotion to create an interim title fight between Sergei Pavlovich and Tom Aspinall.
Jones could be out for another year, which leaves Miocic on the sidelines as a healthy scratch. Both parties seem to only want that fight next, but Miocic said the UFC never reached out to him to offer the interim title fight.
How did the promotion handle this situation? Should Miocic have been given the opportunity to fight Aspinall or Pavlovich? Is attempting to keep Jones vs. Miocic together the right play?
We asked our “Spinning Back Clique” panel of Mike Bohn, Danny Segura and Brian “Goze” Garcia to look at the heavyweight title picture with host “Gorgeous” George Garcia.
You can watch their discussion in the video above and check out this week’s full episode on YouTube or in podcast form below.
The UFC matchmakers need a lightweight replacement.
[autotag]Nurullo Aliev[/autotag] won’t fight at UFC 295 as was previously expected.
Eight days out from the Nov. 11 pay-per-view at Madison Square Garden, lightweight Nurullo Aliev announced Friday on social media his withdrawal from his preliminary card matchup vs. [autotag]Mateusz Rebecki[/autotag] due to a leg injury.
Tajikistan’s Aliev (9-0 MMA, 0-0 UFC) only has one fight in the UFC in addition to a Dana White’s Contender Series appearance, but has already garnered a large fanbase and strong social media presence rooted in his home country. He debuted in February and defeated Rafael Alves by majority decision.
“Over the last few months due to some life circumstances, I have taken a break in my career,” Aliev wrote on Instagram in Russian. “I haven’t stopped training hard though. I never looked for a comfortable opponent. When UFC offered me a worthy opponent, I gladly agreed. … I prepared particularly hard for this battle. Everything went according to plan, the best gyms, coaches and nutritionists. … Unfortunately, a couple of days ago, I injured my leg. After the examination, the doctor from UFC was banned and did not consent for the fight.”
It’s unclear if Rebecki (18-1 MMA, 2-0 UFC) will remain on the card at this time. Also a DWCS standout, Rebecki has promotional victories over Nick Fiore and Loik Radzhabov in his UFC tenure to date.
With the change, the UFC 295 lineup includes:
Alex Pereira vs. Jiri Prochazka – for vacant light heavyweight title
Sergei Pavlovich vs. Tom Aspinall – for interim heavyweight title
Jessica Andrade vs. Mackenzie Dern
Diego Lopes vs. Pat Sabatini
Matt Frevola vs. Benoit Saint Denis
Kevin Borjas vs. Joshua Van
Stephen Erceg vs. Matt Schnell
Loopy Godinez vs. Tabatha Ricci
Jared Gordon vs. Mark Madsen
Mateusz Rebecki vs. TBA
Viacheslav Borshchev vs. Nazim Sadykhov
Dennis Buzukja vs. Jamall Emmers
John Castaneda vs. Kyung Ho Kang
For more on the card, visit MMA Junkie’s event hub for UFC 295.
Henry Cejudo doesn’t think Sergei Pavlovich and Tom Aspinall should be fighting for interim gold at UFC 295.
[autotag]Henry Cejudo[/autotag] doesn’t think [autotag]Sergei Pavlovich[/autotag] vs. [autotag]Tom Aspinall[/autotag] warrants a UFC interim heavyweight title.
Pavlovich (18-1 MMA, 6-1 UFC) and Aspinall (13-3 MMA, 6-1 UFC) have been booked for an interim title fight in the UFC 295 co-main event after a torn pectoral muscle forced heavyweight champion Jon Jones out of his title defense against Stipe Miocic on Nov. 11 at Madison Square Garden in New York.
With Jones facing an eight-month recovery timeline, Cejudo doesn’t see the need for an interim belt. He views Pavlovich vs. Aspinall as a glorified No. 1 contender fight.
“These are two guys that are up-and-coming, that are in their prime, that can potentially challenge a guy like Jones or Stipe, the winner of that,” Cejudo said on his YouTube channel. “It is exciting, but is it worth an interim heavyweight championship of the world? No, it isn’t.
“I think we’re starting to dilute a little bit of what it is to actually be a UFC champion. I think this is more of a No. 1 contender spot, and I think that’s what you call it. I think maybe the UFC, if they’re going to do that, then start creating new belts or make the interim belt silver for that matter.”
Pavlovich has knocked out his past six opponents in the first round, and Cejudo is siding with him to beat Aspinall based on his power.
“I’m going for the Russian,” Cejudo said. “I think Sergei is a lot more agile. I think he brings a lot more power. I think Tom is good, I think Tom’s footwork could be a little problematic, but there’s something about Russians that they just come from a great school of technique, of the school of combat. For that reason, I got to go with Sergei. There’s a lot of hype with him. He’s got knockout power. … For that reason at heavyweight, you got to go with power.”
Diego Lopes isn’t trying to get ahead of himself, but he hopes to cross paths with Bryce Mitchell after UFC 295.
[autotag]Diego Lopes[/autotag] is not trying to get ahead of himself, but he does want to throw certain things out in the universe.
The UFC featherweight returns to the cage Nov. 11 at UFC 295, and he has a tough test in Pat Sabatini. Yet, despite having a date and opponent on the horizon, Lopes (22-6 MMA, 1-1 UFC) is not afraid to mention other names he’d like to face as he makes his way to the UFC featherweight title. He’s by no means underestimating Sabatini (18-4 MMA, 5-1 UFC), but he wants to let the world know he’s interested in fighting [autotag]Bryce Mitchell[/autotag] down the line.
“I have a few names in the rankings that I want to fight,” Lopes told MMA Junkie in Spanish. “One of them, and I’ll mention him because I love that matchup, and that’s what I want, the toughest fights: A fight against Bryce Mitchell for me would be very good, and it would motivate me a lot. He’s a fighter that has good wrestling and jiu-jitsu. I want those type of fights. I want fights that bring out the best in me.”
Lopes is coming off a first-round submission win over Gavin Tucker in August. It was his first win in the octagon, as he had lost a decision to Movsar Evloev in his UFC debut – a fight he accepted the week of the event.
The Lobo Gym fighter hopes to get in the rankings with a win at UFC 295 and begin to target the ranked names like Mitchell.
“I plan to win my fight on Nov. 11 and hopefully get in the rankings,” Lopes explained. “I already checked the guys who are in the top 15, and a lot of these fighters are coming off losses. I’m not wishing bad on them, but maybe I can take someone’s spot in the rankings. Then, next year, do at least three fights minimum and against good, quality contenders and then towards the end of 2024 or early 2025 be considered as a title contender. That’s my plan.”
The idea of Jon Jones vs. Stipe Miocic sounds great, but does Tom Aspinall vs. Sergei Pavlovich actually make UFC 295 better?
[autotag]Daniel Cormier[/autotag] thinks UFC 295 might’ve ended up with a better heavyweight title fight.
The original title fight was scrapped after a torn pectoral muscle forced heavyweight champion [autotag]Jon Jones[/autotag] out of his first title defense against [autotag]Stipe Miocic[/autotag] on Nov. 11 at Madison Square Garden in New York. As a result, the promotion decided to book [autotag]Sergei Pavlovich[/autotag] (18-1 MMA, 6-1 UFC) vs. [autotag]Tom Aspinall[/autotag] (13-3 MMA, 6-1 UFC) for the interim belt.
With both Aspinall and Pavlovich showing tons of promise and championship potential to this point in their careers, Cormier believes their fight could end up delivering more than Jones vs. Miocic would have.
“We might have fallen in love with the idea of Jon Jones vs. Stipe Miocic for what they’ve been to the game, and we may overestimate the value of the fight,” Cormier said on his ESPN show “DC & RC.” “Because Pavlovich vs. Tom Aspinall may be a better fight.”
Cormier argues that former champion Miocic’s long layoff leaves a lot of question marks on how his fight with Jones could pan out, whereas Pavlovich and Aspinall are very much in their primes.
“You’re getting Pavlovich vs. Aspinall, two of the best heavyweights in the world,” Cormier said. “What I am implying to you is that we don’t know who Stipe is today at 41 when we haven’t seen him since 39. I’m not saying he’s not going to be the same guy. I’m just saying that now, we have two young, hungry lions fighting for a portion of the heavyweight championship.
“… Right now, I don’t know if the world is looking at the Miocic-Jones fight and thinking, ‘Boy, this is going to be amazing.’ But was it going to be amazing in 2015, 2016, or is it going to be amazing today? That’s all I’m saying. What I do know is the new (co)-main event at UFC 295 is going to be amazing today because these two young heavyweights are unbelievable heavyweights. It’s going to be an amazing fight, and it might be a better, more competitive fight than Jones vs. Miocic is.”
If the UFC has healthy undisputed and interim heavyweight champions who don’t fight each other, Chael Sonnen won’t be OK with it.
[autotag]Chael Sonnen[/autotag] doesn’t think the winner of [autotag]Jon Jones[/autotag] vs. [autotag]Stipe Miocic[/autotag] determines the real champion.
Chael Sonnen believes heavyweight champion Jon Jones’ injury creates a potentially awkward scenario for the UFC.
Jones (27-1 MMA, 21-1 UFC) withdrew from his first title defense against Miocic (20-4 MMA, 14-4 UFC) at UFC 295 after he sustained a torn pectoral tendon that required surgery. The UFC plans to reschedule Jones vs. Miocic once Jones is healthy.
In the meantime, the promotion opted to book an interim title fight between Sergei Pavlovich (17-1 MMA, 6-1 UFC) and Tom Aspinall (13-3 MMA, 6-1 UFC) to co-headline UFC 295 on Nov. 11 card at Madison Square Garden in New York. That means the interim champ will have to wait until Jones and Miocic fight before they can even book a title-unification bout, and Sonnen doesn’t see how that makes sense.
“Your problem comes tomorrow; your problem doesn’t come today,” Sonnen told MMA Junkie. “You’re going to Madison Square Garden, you have an event that’s not sold out, you have a few problems with your headlining act, and now it’s not your headlining act. Stipe and Jones wasn’t some great night of business. Now you have less than that. You’ve got to put the belt up. If you promised fans and it’s close, you’ve got to put the belt up.
When I tell you the problem comes tomorrow, there’s never been a time in the sport, and I fully understand we’re going to fiercely adhere to whatever rules we make up on the spot in the space, but we’ve never had a healthy and willing interim champion – it’s just never happened – and then you have the return of the undisputed champion, and they don’t fight each other. They always fight each other. At a minimum, if you’re looking for a precedence and history, we can all agree the interim belt makes you the No. 1 contender. What we’re talking about now is you have a healthy interim champion who sits in the front row and watches somebody else fight for the undisputed belt. Well, what happens then?
“If we stick to the script that’s out there, that (Jones vs. Miocic) is a retirement fight, which I’m here to let you know it’s not – but if we stick to the script, it’s a retirement fight. So now this guy in the front row (interim champ) isn’t getting ready to come into the ring and do a faceoff to have the undisputed belt. He instantly, as soon as the words ‘I’m retiring’ come out of this guy’s mouth, this guy is now the undisputed champion. That’s weird. That’s going to be problematic for me.”
UFC CEO Dana White said Jones is expected to be out eight months. Miocic could be 42 by the time Jones is healthy and ready to fight, which Sonnen believes naturally puts that fight in jeopardy.
With that in mind, Sonnen shared a scenario that he believes is more logical.
“You’ve got to have a belt up. It’s MSG,” Sonnen said. “You’ve got to find your interim champion, then you come out with something along the lines of, ‘We just talked to a doctor, (and) it’s worse than we thought. We’re actually going to elevate this belt to an undisputed belt, but when Jon comes back it’ll be his choice. We’ll let him fight Stipe, or we’ll let him fight the interim champion. We’ll see what he wants to do.’
“It has to be that. We can’t just have an interim champion and an undisputed champion both willing and ready and not have them fight. It just can’t happen. I’m good at storytelling. I can’t tell that story.”
Henry Cejudo warns Jiri Prochazka that he can’t be careless against Alex Pereira in their light heavyweight title fight at UFC 295.
[autotag]Henry Cejudo[/autotag] warns [autotag]Jiri Prochazka[/autotag] that he can’t be careless against [autotag]Alex Pereira[/autotag].
Former champion Prochazka (29-3-1 MMA, 3-0 UFC) meets Pereira (8-2 MMA, 5-1 UFC) for the vacant light heavyweight title in the UFC 295 main event Nov. 11 at Madison Square Garden in New York.
Prochazka has displayed a wild style in his three UFC appearances, which have resulted in spectacular finishes over Volkan Oezdemir, Dominick Reyes and Glover Teixeira. Prochazka also has the tendency to get hit, and Cejudo says he can’t afford to absorb clean shots against someone with the power of former Glory Kickboxing dual-champion, and ex-UFC middleweight champ Pereira.
“The technique, as good as you are with everything, there’s one area where I feel like you really need to get better at – two areas,” Cejudo said on his YouTube channel. “Your defense, with your hands: I don’t like seeing you get hit because that may cost you against a guy like Alex Pereira. Then the other thing, too, is your takedown defense. Your takedown defense is still a little suspect.”
Cejudo rated Prochazka’s threshold very highly, but thinks he could use some work on his technique. He praised him for not giving up when in compromising positions, but says he needs to tighten up his defense standing up and on the ground.
“If there’s an area where I feel like he really needs to get better, it’s (technique) – particularly his defense,” Cejudo said. “And the other thing is his takedown defense.”
