MMA buzz: Kasanganay and Wilkinson shine bright at PFL 2
As the year rolls forward, news and rumors will commence with updates on potential matchmaking, promotion news and fight locations across UFC, PFL, Bellator and more. As such, we’ll have it all covered right here, with analysis and insight from our reporters and writers.
Check out our latest updates now and refresh often for the latest as the year unfolds.
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April 12: Light heavyweights put on a show at PFL 2
Brett Okamoto: There was a lot to like during PFL’s second regular season card of 2024 on Saturday. Here are a few observations from Las Vegas’s event, which featured the light heavyweight and lightweight divisions.
Light heavyweight is loaded
205 is absolutely stacked. Five first-round finishes, which might suggest lopsided matchmaking — but that wasn’t the case. It was more about elite performances from some of the top names. Impa Kasanganay has truly blossomed in the PFL. He might have lost his last fight, a middleweight bout against Bellator MMA champ Johnny Eblen, but he represented himself well, and he’s the man to beat in 2024. Robert Wilkinson was phenomenal. Antonio Carlos Jr. is a problem for anyone. And Dovletdzhan Yagshimuradov has intriguing confidence about him.
With all the first-round finishes from Saturday, the second round will be full of drama.
Rob Wilkinson answered some questions
Wilkinson was the biggest question mark of the night going in. He looked like a monster in 2022, just smashing his way to the finals. Then he popped a drug test in 2023 and, if we’re being honest, came into 2024 with a noticeably smaller physique. Once the fight against Tom Breese started though, he looked like the same Wilkinson — which, for the PFL, is a great thing. This division is better with Wilkinson looking like a monster, as is the case with Antonio Carlos Jr., who returned from knee surgery.
A new BMF emerges in PFL
There will be a lot of interest in Justin Gaethje and Max Holloway this weekend as the UFC’s BMFs. Clay Collard isn’t in the UFC, but he’s also a BMF. I expect him to headline a PFL card in June in the second round of the regular season, and whoever he fights, I promise it’ll be worth circling your calendars.
April 10: Holm not giving credence to Rousey’s concussion issues
Andreas Hale: As Holly Holm prepares to face the debuting Kayla Harrison at UFC 300, she was blindsided by Ronda Rousey‘s recent remarks regarding their 2015 encounter. Billed as one of the biggest upsets in UFC history, Holm knocked the then-undefeated Rousey out cold for the Women’s Bantamweight Championship.
“My mouth guard was bad,” Rousey said in an interview on Valeria Lipovetsky’s YouTube channel. “I literally came into that fight concussed from slipping down some stairs already after all these years of concussions.”
Following the loss, Rousey vanished from the public eye for a year and resurfaced in 2016 for a clash with then-champion Amanda Nunes. Rousey was stopped in 48 seconds and called it a career as a mixed martial artist. The lauded judoka transitioned to pro wrestling, where she settled in as a WWE Superstar in 2018 and departed in 2023. Rousey had remained relatively quiet about her loss to Holm, but she addressed her health issues in recent interviews to promote her autobiography.
“I was the better fighter that night,” Holm said in response to Rousey’s comments. “Everyone who has made a career out of fighting has had a concussion at some point… I’ve definitely had some concussions. I’ll never sit here and use that as an excuse for any loss.”
Holm has had a bumpy road since defeating Rousey, going 5-6 with one no contest in 12 matches. She’ll look to turn back an opponent in Harrison, who ironically has some similarities to Rousey. The 42-year-old hopes to get back into the title picture with a win but refuses to allow anyone to take away from arguably the greatest night in her MMA career.
“I think that it’s just hard for her to admit that I was just the better fighter,” Holm continued. “Was she dominant and a good champion? One hundred percent. I’ll give her that. But she wasn’t better than me. And especially not on that night.”
April 9: WWE stars with MMA ties giddy for UFC 300
Eddie Maisonet: Four of WWE’s biggest stars just finished their work at WrestleMania 40, but their past work in MMA has them ready for another stacked fight card Saturday night. CM Punk, Bobby Lashley, Shayna Baszler and Big E — all current WWE superstars with MMA ties — sat down to give their viewpoints on a historic UFC 300 card.
“A monster … I like to watch [Alex] Pereira,” Lashley said, who went 15-2 in MMA with a 5-0 mark in Bellator. “I like his striking. His striking is very smooth. But he hits hard, and he’s a scary person to fight.”
Punk — who fought under his real name Phil Brooks in the UFC and amassed a 0-1 record with one no-contest — is surprised by the feedback some fans have given on the top fight on the card.
“I hear criticism about, ‘Oh, this isn’t a big enough main event for UFC 300,’ and I think people are absolutely insane,” Punk said. “Obviously, I think people want Jon Jones and Stipe [Miocic], they want a heavyweight title. But if you can’t have the heavyweight title, what’s the second-best one? Light heavyweight title.”
“The division feels very wide open still to me,” Big E said, who wrestled collegiately at the University of Iowa. “I think Pereira has a great shot at going on a run here at 205 [pounds].”
Shayna Baszler, who competed in 26 MMA matches (15-11), including a loss to Amanda Nunes at UFC Fight Night in Rio de Janeiro in 2015, was curious about Pereira’s focus.
“A month or so back when Pereira was asking to also be on the [UFC] 301 card a month after [UFC] 300,” Baszler said. “So is he maybe looking past Hill a little bit?”
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Dakota Ditcheva remains undefeated with first-round TKO
Dakota Ditcheva secures a Quick 6 with a dominating first-round TKO against Lisa Mauldin.
Later, during the conversation, the panel was asked about the parallels between MMA and pro wrestling and noted that the evolution of one profession wouldn’t have been possible without the progression of the other.
“In order to make a baby face, you got to have a heel. And that’s the same way an MMA,” Lashley said. “When you have that antagonist where you have the good guy and the bad, and people are more drawn to it, it’s storylines … We do storylines in our business, and their storylines are starting to develop in their business.”
“MMA currently, as we know, it wouldn’t exist if it wasn’t for professional wrestling,” Punk said. “Conversely, a fun flip side of the coin is, I know so many people that if MMA was a viable option like it is today, to make a living and get paid, never would’ve got into professional wrestling.
“A guy like Ken Shamrock was a pro wrestler maybe before he was a fighter. Right? Ken went where the money was at the time. Look at him now. You know, a guy like Kurt Angle, I look at, and I go, ‘Kurt never would’ve been a professional wrestler.’ Kurt would’ve been scouted and drafted into a MMA super gym.”
April 8: Adesanya shares with Hill ‘how to approach’ Pereira at UFC 300
Jeff Wagenheim: As a former light heavyweight champion with an opportunity to recapture the title Saturday, Jamahal Hill looks up and down the UFC 300 fight lineup and sees so many champs that he starts thinking about a sport other than MMA.
“The best way I can describe it is like in basketball whenever you show up to, like, the All-Star Game, right?” Hill said about a fight card on which he is one of 12 current or former UFC champs. “All-Star Weekend, everybody wants to show their skills.”
Hill — who will be competing for the first time in nearly 15 months after tearing an Achilles tendon while playing basketball and vacating the title he’d just won — will challenge Pereira in the main event. To help prepare, Hill talked to another ex-champ, one not on the UFC 300 card.
Preparation for Pereira, Hill revealed on last Saturday night’s UFC Post Show, has included a conversation with ex-middleweight titlist Israel Adesanya, who spent more than 25 minutes in the cage with Pereira throughout two title fights — one a Pereira knockout, the other an Adesanya knockout.
What did Adesanya offer?
“Just giving me some advice and some insights on what he’s seen in his experience of being in there fighting Alex,” Hill said.”How to approach [Pereira] and things like that.”
Of course, Pereira will likely tap into similar advice about Hill from his coach and mentor, Glover Teixeira, whom Hill dethroned in his most recent fight in January 2023.
April 4: Dakota Ditcheva a standout at PFL’s season-opening event
Brett Okamoto: It is so hard to stand out in mixed martial arts. It’s actually ironic that in a sport that is somewhat defined by viral knockout moments, it often takes something truly special to cut through the noise in a significant way.
Dakota Ditcheva has all of the qualities to do just that. Her coach, Conan Silveira of American Top Team, described her to me before Thursday’s PFL regular-season debut as “vicious as f—.” She is technically skilled, for sure. She’s charismatic. She’s just very likable. But on top of that, she seems built for big moments. Silveira believes that comes from her upbringing, as her mother was a multiple-time kickboxing champion. Ditcheva is at her best when the lights are brightest.
I remember thinking in 2010 that Jon Jones was different when he threw Brandon Vera to the floor like a rag doll and finished him with strikes in three minutes. I remember thinking Conor McGregor was different when he knocked out Dustin Poirier in 2014. Just the way they carried themselves, the way they moved. They stood out.
I am IN NO WAY putting Ditcheva in the same category as those two yet, but I am saying that watching her on Thursday, she feels different. She scored a first-round TKO over Lisa Mauldin, and did so in under four minutes — faster than any other women’s flyweight winner, which gives Ditcheva an early lead in the season standings. Beyond this night’s result, Ditcheva showed she has legitimate star potential mixed with real skill and mental makeup. Her chances of winning the PFL women’s flyweight tournament this year, with names like Liz Carmouche and Taila Santos involved, are not exceedingly high. But maybe she’ll arrive ahead of schedule and get it done. She seems special enough for it to be possible.
April 2: Mark Coleman to present BMF belt at UFC 300
ESPN Staff: Max Holloway said he wanted to see UFC Hall of Famer Mark Coleman back in the Octagon at UFC 300, but in a different role.
Holloway, the former featherweight champion who will challenge BMF champ Justin Gaethje for his title at the April 13 pay-per-view event, called for Coleman to wrap the belt around the winner of the fight. And, according to Coleman’s most recent post on Instagram, the UFC obliged. Coleman said the UFC has offered him and his daughters tickets to UFC 300 in Las Vegas.
Coleman, who in 1997 became the first UFC heavyweight champion, recently was hospitalized after saving his parents from a house fire, though unfortunately he could not save his family dog, Hammer. Following Coleman’s apparent recovery, Holloway sees no better candidate to present the belt to whichever fighter gets their hand raised. In the previous two BMF title fights, the belt was presented by Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson and Jorge Masvidal, respectively.
When asked who should present the title — prior to Coleman announcing he will be at the event — Holloway told MMA Junkie, “The only correct answer is Mark Coleman.”
“Especially with what he went through recently with his dog and his dog waking him to go save his stuff and he goes in there and runs for his dog? The guy’s a G. That’s a real-life BMF. That would be sick if he did it. It would be an honor to get him to do it.”
