MMA

8:08 AM ET Jeff Wagenheim PFL officials speak of Kayla Harrison with reverence, as though watching her perform is the most exhilarating experience in all of MMA. Who can blame them? Harrison is 12-0 and has mauled everyone in her path to becoming a two-time champion in the PFL women’s lightweight division. She is by

3:17 PM ET Corey Anderson climbed up on the cage to celebrate. His family was going crazy in the stands. Anderson had become the Bellator light heavyweight champion, a tournament champ and the recipient of $1 million. And then, quickly, it all came crashing down Friday night at Bellator 277 in San Jose, California. Anderson

6:11 PM ET After briefly considering retirement earlier this year, legendary heavyweight Fabricio Werdum still wants to compete in the PFL. A former UFC champion, Werdum, 44, signed with PFL in 2021, but has only made one appearance for the promotion thus far. And when the promotion announced its regular-season heavyweight matchups for April 28,

12:43 AM ET UFC welterweight Belal Muhammad improved his winning streak to seven on Saturday, as he out-pointed Vicente Luque via unanimous division at UFC Fight Night at Apex facility in Las Vegas. Judges awarded Muhammad (21-3) the win in the 170-pound bout via scores of 49-46, 49-46 and 49-47. Luque (21-8-1) entered the contest

12:55 AM ET “Pitbull” is not ready to pass the torch just yet. Patricio Freire, Bellator’s franchise fighter, gutted out a unanimous decision win (49-46, 48-47, 4-847) over previously undefeated prodigy AJ McKee to win back the featherweight title in the main event of Bellator 277 on Friday night in San Jose, California. McKee beat

1:54 PM ET A heavyweight matchup between Alexander Volkov and Jairzinho Rozenstruik will headline a UFC Fight Night card on June 4, UFC president Dana White said Friday. The UFC has not officially announced a location for the event, although the majority of Fight Night events in 2022 have taken place at the Apex facility

Apr 13, 2022 LAKEWOOD, Calif. — AJ McKee remembers being in Southern California gyms as a kid almost every day. His father, Antonio McKee, was one of the toughest fighters on the MMA regional scene, frequently training with some of the sport’s biggest stars — names such as Tito Ortiz, Quinton “Rampage” Jackson and Randy

3:29 PM ET Marlon Moraes, long one of the best bantamweight fighters in MMA, is retiring from the sport, his manager, Ali Abdelaziz, told ESPN on Wednesday. Moraes, 33, held the World Series of Fighting (WSOF) bantamweight title from 2014 to 2016 before signing with the UFC, racking up five title defenses in WSOF. “Magic”

7:29 AM ET A big victory resulted in a small (but significant) move for Alexander Volkanovski. The UFC men’s bantamweight champion had his way with Chan Sung Jung on Saturday in their UFC 273 title fight, outstriking the South Korean by 152-51 on his way to a one-sided fourth-round TKO. The win, Volkanovski’s 21st in

1:09 PM ET Cain Velasquez has broken his silence for the first time since being charged with attempted murder in a shooting-related incident last month. In a statement posted to his social media, the former two-time UFC heavyweight champion thanked everyone who has given him support and said his case is “complex and slowly unraveling

Apr 10, 2022 JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Aljamain Sterling is the UFC’s undisputed bantamweight champion. Undisputed. Kind of. Sterling (21-3) got the last laugh on Petr Yan (16-3) and all his critics Saturday, as he pulled out a razor-close split decision over Yan. The 135-pound title fight, which was supposed to end any controversy left over

5:40 PM ET The UFC has decided not to re-sign Alex “Cowboy” Oliveira, an exciting fan favorite in the welterweight division, officials confirmed with ESPN on Monday. Oliveira’s contract expired with his last fight, a loss to Kevin Holland at UFC 272 on March 5. That marked Oliveira’s fourth straight defeat, and the UFC decided

10:37 PM ET Alexander Volkanovski has welcomed Henry Cejudo’s return to the USADA testing pool, but the Australian says he is instead focused on a shift to lightweight and an immediate crack at becoming a two-division UFC champion. Fresh off his domination of Chan Sung Jung at UFC 273, Volkanovski is already mapping out his

1:47 AM ET JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Alexander Volkanovski vowed to finish Saturday night, something he has yet to do to an opponent since becoming UFC featherweight champion. One of the world’s top fighters lived up to his promise. Volkanovski stopped “The Korean Zombie” Chan Sung Jung via TKO (punches) at 45 seconds of the fourth

5:04 PM ET Three weeks ago, I wrote that the current featherweight division is the most interesting weight class in the UFC — and after another thrilling event in Jacksonville, Florida, I stand by that. Alexander Volkanovski (24-1) has elevated himself into must-see TV. He has always been a good fighter, as he has just

9:59 PM ET One of the only double champions in UFC history seems on his way back to the Octagon. Henry Cejudo will re-enter himself into the USADA drug-testing pool Monday, his manager Ali Abdelaziz of Dominance MMA told ESPN on Sunday. That signifies that Cejudo, a former Olympic gold medalist in wrestling, is on

2:10 AM ET JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Khamzat Chimaev stole the show, as expected, at UFC 273 on Saturday night with a unanimous-decision win over Gilbert Burns in what Dana White called one of the greatest fights he’s ever seen. Featherweight champ Alexander Volkanovski put on a show of his own with a fourth-round stoppage of

2:46 AM ET Jeff Wagenheim The screeching sound you may have heard late Saturday night if you were anywhere near Jacksonville, Florida, was the Khamzat Chimaev hype train slowing its roll. Gilbert Burns was the one applying the brakes. Burns had been bloodied and beaten down in a brutal opening round, but he had survived.