UFC Title Fight For Saturday Off, Fight Card Set For Friday's TUF 27 Finale
- After keeping the main and co-main event set for months for UFC 226, officials were forced to scratch the planned featherweight title fight between Max Holloway and Brian Ortega late Wednesday night. Holloway suffered a concussion recently in training and was deemed medically unfit to compete from the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.
Ortega has been removed from the card, as well, which features Stipe Miocic defending his heavyweight title against Daniel Cormier. Holloway's management team provided a message to MMAjunkie:
"Max's team and UFC staff noticed Max was not normal since late last week. This became obvious to many watching his interviews and public appearances the past few days.
"He was showing concussion-like symptoms before he even started his weight cut and was rushed to the ER on Monday where they admitted him overnight. Initial scans seemed okay, and he was released Tuesday afternoon, but symptoms still continued.
"Max fought with his team to continue with the fight. He showed some improvement over the next day but was still showing obvious symptoms. After open workouts, he crashed and was very hard to wake up. When he did, he had flashing vision and slurred speech.
"He is now back in the ER for further tests."
- The fight card for Friday night's Ultimate Fighter 27 Finale event live on FOX Sports 1 is now set after the final episode of TUF aired Wednesday night. In the main event, Brad Tavares takes on Israel Adesanya in a middleweight contest.
Two new Ultimate Fighters will be crowned, as Mike Trizano faces Joe Giannetti in the lightweight final and Brad Katona takes on Jay Cucciniello in the featherweight finale.
Below is the complete card:
MAIN CARD (FOX Sports 1/10 p.m. ET)
Middleweight: Brad Tavares vs. Israel Adesanya
The Ultimate Fighter 27 Lightweight Final
Mike Trizano vs. Joe Giannetti
The Ultimate Fighter 27 Featherweight Final
Brad Katona vs. Jay Cucciniello
Featherweight: Alex Caceres vs. Martin Bravo
Female Flyweight: Roxanne Modafferi vs. Barb Honchak
Middleweight: Alessio Di Chirico vs. Julian Marquez
PRELIMINARY CARD (FOX Sports 1/8 p.m. ET)
Female Flyweight: Montana De La Rosa vs. Rachael Ostovich
Lightweight: Luis Pena vs. Richie Smullen
Lightweight: John Gunther vs. Allan Zuniga
Featherweight: Matt Bessette vs. Steven Peterson
PRELIMINARY CARD (UFC Fight Pass/7 p.m. ET)
Middleweight: Oskar Piechota vs. Gerald Meerschaert
Featherweight: Tyler Diamond vs. Bryce Mitchell