MMA

Israel Adesanya has lost once in 22 professional MMA fights and has never lost at middleweight. He’s scored 15 knockouts among his 21 wins, including a second-round TKO of Robert Whittaker at UFC 243 in 2019. He’ll meet Whittaker again in the main event of UFC 271 on Saturday in a rematch for the middleweight

Getty Images On Saturday night, the UFC returns with another big pay-per-view event as UFC 271 heads to Houston’s Toyota Center. In the main event, Robert Whittaker looks to regain the middleweight championship when he rematches titleholder Israel Adesanya. Adesanya and Whittaker met for the first time at UFC 243 in October 2019, when Adesanya,

7:49 AM ET Jeff Wagenheim After Derrick Lewis and Tai Tuivasa finish flinging menacing leather in each other’s direction on Saturday night in Houston, in the co-main event of UFC 271, it will be time for the real show. That’s not a reference to the main event between UFC middleweight champion Israel Adesanya and former

Sean Strickland won. He got his win bonus. He’ll probably jump from No. 7 to 6 in the middleweight rankings. He’s now on a six-fight winning streak But beyond that, it was mostly blah. His split decision victory Saturday over Jack Hermansson in the main event of UFC Vegas 47 at Apex was a largely

Getty Images Sean Strickland and Jack Hermansson met on Saturday night in the main event of UFC Fight Night knowing the middleweight division was in need of fresh title challengers. It was Strickland who managed to make his mark at the UFC Apex in Las Vegas, taking a split decision win to extend an impressive

1:38 PM ET Two title fights are now official for UFC 273. Alexander Volkanovski will defend his UFC featherweight title against Chan Sung Jung, “The Korean Zombie,” in the main event of the pay-per-view card April 9 in Jacksonville, Florida, UFC chief business officer Hunter Campbell confirmed to ESPN on Friday. The co-main event will

LAS VEGAS — The difference between winning and losing at the highest level of professional sport is minute. Sometimes, it’s just a minor mistake that leads to a defeat. Other times, it’s bad luck. But Jack Hermansson understands this, which is why he isn’t frustrated by his position heading into the main event of UFC

There is no better sign that a fighter is on the rise in the UFC than the ability to say “offensive s***” in public and not get cut. And that’s where middleweight Sean Strickland finds himself as he heads into his second consecutive main event on Saturday when he takes on No. 6 Jack Hermansson

LAS VEGAS – Stepping in on short notice against a UFC veteran is no problem for Brendan Allen, although the whirlwind of everything coming together so quickly has him befuddled. Allen (17-5 MMA, 5-2 UFC) will step into the cage at the UFC Apex on Saturday to face Sam Alvey, who has just as many

Francis Ngannou is not holding his breath for a long-awaited, deeply demanded fight with Jon Jones. The appetite for a UFC heavyweight championship fight matching Ngannou vs. Jones only increased following Ngannou’s victory over interim champion Ciryl Gane at UFC 270. Jones, the former UFC light heavyweight champion, has not stepped foot inside a UFC

6:54 PM ET Kevin Holland called an online troll’s bluff by choking him out in a grappling match. Holland, the loquacious UFC fighter nicknamed “Big Mouth,” said he had been getting messages from a guy on social media for months with the man, a Brazilian jiu-jitsu practitioner, claiming he could submit Holland. So Holland took

Getty Images Jon Jones has been working towards a UFC heavyweight debut since 2020. In some ways, the prospects of Jones competing for the UFC heavyweight title have never looked better. On the other hand, serious complications remain. Jones vs. champion Francis Ngannou appears to be on the tip of everyone’s tongues in the aftermath

LAS VEGAS — It’s easy to forget that in the 1970s, if you wanted to watch an NBA playoff game on television on a weeknight, you had to stay up after the late local news and watch it on tape delay. Then, along came Larry, Magic and Michael and the league changed forever. Larry Bird,

9:59 PM ET UFC president Dana White says him not putting the heavyweight title belt on Francis Ngannou after UFC 270 last weekend had nothing to do with “disrespect.” White addressed the postfight situation in a fan Q&A on Wednesday night with interviewer Laura Sanko on ESPN+. White did not put the belt on Ngannou

ANAHEIM, California — There was a sense of foreboding among the heavily pro-Brandon Moreno sellout crowd of 17,387 inside the Honda Center each time Deiveson Figueiredo landed a punch. Figueiredo lost his flyweight title to Moreno in June at UFC 263 and said later he blamed himself for not devoting 100 percent of his energies

Getty Images As fewer and fewer states have made fighter pay publicly available, the subject of fight purses has remained a hot topic in the combat sports world. UFC 270 was different, however, with the event taking place in California, which still releases official purse figures. And, as the UFC — and company president Dana

3:13 AM ET Jeff Wagenheim Francis Ngannou has built a championship fighting career by unleashing blows with earth-shattering impact. Prior to Saturday night, the UFC heavyweight champion had finished his five most recent fights by knockout, three in less than a minute. Ngannou’s UFC 270 main event in Anaheim, California, ended with challenger Ciryl Gane

ANAHEIM, Calif. — What Francis Ngannou did Saturday in defeating Ciryl Gane with his grappling would be like Usain Bolt setting a world record in the 100 meters running on his hands, or Tom Brady rushing for 250 yards to lead the Buccaneers to another Super Bowl title. Exactly no one saw that coming, though