International Fight Week Crapshoot

UFC 226 is now available on Amazon Prime.

It is that time of year when fight fans flock to Las Vegas for a lot of mixed martial arts that consist of “The Ultimate Fighter Finale” and the huge pay-per-view event that is the highlight of International Fight Week. This year, UFC 226 features a champion vs. champion headliner with a featherweight title bout as the co-main event in a pretty well-stacked card. However, one thing that seems to come with IFW are the bouts we lose leading up to the big fight card by the end of the week.

Rewind back to 2015 IFW, at UFC 189 when Conor McGregor was to face Jose Aldo for the featherweight title on July 11. Weeks before the fight, Aldo suffered a rib injury that had him removed from the bout and had Chad Mendes come in as a late notice replacement. While the event produced one of the most memorable fights between Robbie Lawler and Rory MacDonald, it also could be considered the event that put McGregor in the driver’s seat of how well the UFC does when he shows up, and when he does not.

The 2016 IFW was a milestone event with UFC 200 and the promotion wanted to come big for their 200th event. Being a monumental affair, the original idea was to bring McGregor back to Las Vegas for his rematch with Nate Diaz, but that fight was scrapped months before due to McGregor being pulled for failing to meet his media obligations. That was fine because Jon Jones and Daniel Cormier would fill the main event slot on July 9, but as fans know now, nothing is certain until the first bell of fight night. Three days before UFC 200, it was announced that Jones was flagged by the US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) for a potential doping violation and Cormier almost found himself without an opponent. Anderson Silva stepped in on very late notice to face Cormier in a three round non-title bout and Amanda Nunes against Miesha Tate was the new main event. Nunes became the new women’s bantamweight champion. Both Jones and Brock Lesnar had alleged doping violations connected to UFC 200.

A new ownership group and a different IFW in 2017 had UFC 213 headlined by reigning women’s bantamweight champion Nunes set to face Valentina Shevchenko. The UFC Fan Expo was changed to the “UFC Fan Experience” and was moved from event space to the area outside of T-Mobile Arena but so far the fights were good to go, until the day of UFC 213. The morning of the fight, Nunes was hospitalized with chronic sinusitis which had her removed from the card, canceling the main event. Yoel Romero and Robert Whittaker were named as the new headliners. Shevchenko and Nunes would face each other eventually but three years in a row of cards having troubles so close to fight night can make the paranoid fans worried about cards staying together the closer we get to July 7 and UFC 226.

So far, Cormier and Stipe Miocic look more than ready to throw down and neither man seems to do anything that would put them on USADA’s radar or anything unbecoming of the champions they already are, but the fight is still a few days away and history shows anything can happen on International Fight Week.

Edward Carbajal serves as the lead MMA analyst for Frontproof Media and holds a black belt in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu and a brown belt in Ishin Ryu Karate. He has covered combat sports since 2014 and has been a fan of MMA since UFC 1. You can follow him on Twitter @Carbazel or at his website TheBlogBoardJungle.com.

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