MMA

9:15 AM ET Any mixed martial arts fan will tell you that one of the best things about following this sport is the never ending string of storylines to follow. There is no off-season, and there is always something going on inside and outside the Octagon, and things can change instantly. Never a dull moment,

11:34 AM ET Few would dispute that UFC men’s featherweight champion Alexander Volkanovski and former champ Max Holloway are the two best 145-pounders in MMA. Right behind them? We might find out on Saturday afternoon, when Brian Ortega meets Yair Rodriguez in a matinee main event of UFC Fight Night in Elmont, New York. Ortega

12:51 AM ET LAS VEGAS — Rafael Fiziev proved to be one step ahead of Rafael dos Anjos over the course of four lightweight rounds on Saturday. And then in the fifth, he put the former champion away for good measure. Fiziev (12-1) continued his ascent of the UFC’s lightweight rankings with a blistering, left

3:12 PM ET A marquee welterweight matchup between Belal Muhammad and Sean Brady is set to take place in October, sources have told ESPN. Contracts are not yet signed but both sides have agreed to the 170-pound contest, which will take place at a UFC event Oct. 22 in Abu Dhabi. It is expected to

12:05 PM ET Alexander Volkanovski suffered a broken left thumb during last weekend’s title defense against Max Holloway, the UFC champ revealed on social media Thursday night. Volkanovski (25-1) wrote on Twitter that he will undergo surgery on the broken hand and the recovery timeline is 12 weeks. “Broke my thumb in the second round,

7:20 PM ET The UFC has booked a strawweight clash between Mackenzie Dern and Yan Xiaonan to headline an October event, multiple sources told ESPN on Friday. The five-round contest will headline a UFC Fight Night on Oct. 1 at a location to be announced. Dern (12-2) is closing in on a potential title shot

8:52 AM ET International Fight Week represents the midpoint of the UFC “season” as fight fans watched the promotion’s 22nd fight card and seventh pay-per-view of the year at UFC 276 on July 2. After this past weekend’s festivities, the upcoming schedule is marked with plenty of title fights and major cards in intriguing international

Jul 6, 2022 Shortly after former UFC lightweight champion Rafael dos Anjos dropped the belt in 2016, he moved up to welterweight, where he had an up-and-down run against the iron of the 170-pound division. He won three in a row to earn a shot at an interim championship, but a loss in that fight

8:00 AM ET Since the last update to the ESPN divisional rankings, Israel Adesanya and Alexander Volkanovski solidified their positions with victories at UFC 276. Both both fighters already were No. 1 in their respective top 10s, though, so there was nowhere for them to rise. Then there’s Alex Pereira. He also fought on the

7:45 PM ET The UFC is putting together a new co-main event for its return to the United Kingdom. Darren Till is out of the scheduled middleweight co-headliner against Jack Hermansson at UFC London on July 23 due to an undisclosed injury, sources told ESPN on Wednesday. Hermansson will remain on the card, and UFC.com

7:29 AM ET Alexander Volkanovski has won 22 straight fights, the last 12 of them in the UFC. Last Saturday at UFC 276, the featherweight champion defeated former champ Max Holloway for the third time. It was a shockingly dominant performance by the Australian fighter, one worthy of a boost in the ESPN pound-for-pound MMA

9:56 PM ET Chris Wade is unhappy with the PFL over what he said is about a 30% pay cut from his regular-season fights to the playoffs. Wade, the top seed in this year’s PFL featherweight playoffs and the featherweight runnerup in 2021, told ESPN on Tuesday that he is locked into a fixed purse

1:34 PM ET Jeff Wagenheim Bellator MMA lightweight champion Patricky Freire‘s first title defense, scheduled for July 22 against Sidney Outlaw, has been postponed because of an unspecified injury, the promotion announced. The title bout was to headline Bellator 283 in Tacoma, Washington. With Freire sidelined, Bellator is elevating a fight between former welterweight champ

8:22 AM ET LAS VEGAS — Max Holloway was walking backstage at the UFC Apex last week, just three days before he challenged Alexander Volkanovski in a trilogy bout for the featherweight title at UFC 276. When pressed with a question, the former featherweight champion — long one of the top fighters on the planet

9:52 PM ET LAS VEGAS — Donald “Cowboy” Cerrone decided it was finally time to ride off into the sunset. Cerrone (36-17) retired from the sport of mixed martial arts on Saturday, immediately following a loss to Jim Miller at UFC 276. Before the bout, Cerrone said he intended to fight two more times beyond

3:03 PM ET LAS VEGAS — Pedro Munhoz suffered a right corneal abrasion from an accidental eye poke by Sean O’Malley at UFC 276 on Saturday night, Munhoz told ESPN on Sunday. Munhoz said he was taken to the hospital after the fight, which ended in a no-contest in the second round when he could

12:19 AM ET LAS VEGAS — It’s safe to say Alexander Volkanovski has buried his rivalry with Max Holloway for good this time. Volkanovski (25-1) defended his featherweight championship for the fourth time Saturday night, defeating Holloway (23-7) via unanimous decision in their highly anticipated trilogy bout. All three judges scored the 145-pound title fight,

Jul 3, 2022 For the past year or so, to me, the debate between the best pound-for-pound fighter in the world has been between Kamaru Usman, Israel Adesanya and Alexander Volkanovski. And of course, it’s close, right? Whatever order you have those three in, it’s defensible. There had been no wrong answer to the question: