MMA

Jul 30, 2022 DALLAS — Brandon Moreno is once again a UFC champion. And once again, he appears to be on a collision course with Deiveson Figueiredo. Moreno (20-6-2) thrillingly claimed the interim 125-pound title on Saturday, as he knocked out Kai Kara-France at the 4:34 mark of the third round with a nasty left

12:17 PM ET DALLAS — One of the most anticipated rematches in women’s MMA history is now official. Julianna Peña and Amanda Nunes both successfully made weight Friday morning ahead of their UFC women’s bantamweight title fight. Peña weighed in at 134.5 pounds, and Nunes was 135. On Saturday, Peña will defend the belt against

4:45 PM ET DALLAS — Deiveson Figueiredo says he’s almost fully healthy and is targeting a return to the Octagon this winter. Figueiredo, the UFC flyweight champion, has been out since January with injuries to both hands and a bruised knee. With him out, the UFC made an interim title bout between former champ Brandon

8:21 AM ET SUNRISE, FLA. — AMANDA NUNES SAT in a chair inside her new gym, running down all of its features like an excited real-estate agent trying to woo her first buyer. The Lioness Studio has a generous stretch of mat space for training, a full-sized cage, workout equipment and a small sauna. Upstairs

1:56 PM ET The Professional Fighters League will crown a new heavyweight champion later this year. Bruno Cappelozza, the PFL’s 2021 heavyweight title winner, is out of the promotion’s 2022 playoffs because of an undisclosed injury, sources told ESPN on Thursday. Cappelozza will be replaced by Matheus Scheffel in the semifinals against Denis Goltsov on

9:16 AM ET JULIANNA PEÑA IS one of the youngest members of a long line of Peña family members who are unbothered by judgment or criticism. Her father, Ernie, left a small agricultural village in Venezuela when he was 12 in search of better opportunities. He eventually emigrated to the U.S. through a scholarship program

10:45 AM ET The Association of Boxing Commissions and Combative Sports (ABC) has passed a pair of MMA rule changes, including one that could make a major impact in fights. On Wednesday at its annual conference, the ABC approved a rule that would give fighters on the receiving end of an eye poke five minutes

7:13 AM ET KAI KARA-FRANCE WAS staying at the SO/Auckland hotel in New Zealand in the fall of 2020. The New Zealander had to quarantine there for two weeks after returning from UFC 253 in Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates. That was the reality for fighters from Australia and New Zealand for much

9:22 AM ET Jeff WagenheimESPN Dana White’s Contender Series swaggered onto the scene five years ago dangling in front of fight fans a tantalizing promise. It was right there in the show’s name. This on-ramp for developing UFC talent wasn’t simply assuring MMA followers of an influx of new names for the prelims. No, the

6:35 PM ET Brett Okamoto Close ESPN Staff Writer MMA columnist for ESPN.com Analyst for “MMA Live” Covered MMA for Las Vegas Sun Marc Raimondi What were the biggest moments at UFC Fight Night in London? Brett Okamoto and Marc Raimondi offer up their takeaways from an action-packed event in England. What does the UFC

6:24 PM ET LONDON — The UFC has hit a bad streak of luck as of late, with a second consecutive main event ruined on Saturday by freak injury. A highly anticipated heavyweight matchup between Curtis Blaydes and Tom Aspinall ended just 15 seconds into the first round, when Aspinall suffered a right knee injury.

2:30 PM ET Brett Okamoto Close ESPN Staff Writer MMA columnist for ESPN.com Analyst for “MMA Live” Covered MMA for Las Vegas Sun Marc Raimondi LONDON — The UFC is back in England for the second time this year with a UFC Fight Night card on Saturday inside the O2 Arena. The promotion went three

8:10 AM ET Sometimes you can’t change the channel. It could be the two-way greatness of Shohei Ohtani in baseball, the long-range excellence of Stephen Curry in basketball or the overwhelming power and quickness of Aaron Donald in football. It becomes hard to look away if they’re on your television screen. But who are those

1:31 PM ET Two of the top women’s strawweight fighters in the world have been added to one of the UFC’s deepest cards of the year. Marina Rodriguez will take on Amanda Lemos at UFC 280 on Oct. 22 in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, sources confirmed to ESPN on Thursday. The winner of the

Jul 20, 2022 The UFC is finalizing a lightweight bout between Beneil Dariush and Mateusz Gamrot for October. The 155-pound fight will take place on the Oct. 22 UFC 280 pay-per-view event at Etihad Arena in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, officials told ESPN on Wednesday. Dariush (21-4-1) has been trying to figure out his

3:30 PM ET Sean O’Malley is taking a major step up in his next fight, announcing to ESPN’s Ryan Clark on Wednesday that he’ll be facing former bantamweight champion Petr Yan at UFC 280 on Oct. 22 in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates. O’Malley (15-1 1 NC), one of the sport’s most talented prospects, fought

8:57 PM ET The UFC is moving a bantamweight title fight between defending champion Aljamain Sterling and TJ Dillashaw to the co-main event slot of UFC 280 on Oct. 22, multiple sources confirmed to ESPN. The bout was originally scheduled for UFC 279 on Sept. 10, but the promotion elected to move it to the

8:25 AM ET Jeff WagenheimESPN Chris Curtis dreamed about fighting inside the Octagon for over a decade as a professional mixed martial artist. Now that his UFC debut was happening, though, it was turning nightmarish. He was in a UFC 268 prelim last November in New York, and Curtis was getting beaten to the punch