Klose diagnosed with concussion, neck sprain after Stephens’ shove cancels UFC bout

A hard shove during the UFC Vegas 24 weigh-ins on Friday led to the last-minute cancellation of the supposed co-headliner between Jeremy Stephens and Drakkar Klose. Klose suffered an injury, which wasn’t immediately disclosed.

As it turned out, the 33-year-old competitor was badly compromised. ESPN’s Ariel Helwani posted a photo of the doctor’s diagnosis, stating it was a “brain concussion” and a “sprain of cervical neck.”

Klose later released a statement, detailing what he went through after the incident.

After I was pushed by Jeremy at UFC faceoffs, I immediately felt my hand go numb and neck tighten up. Sean Shelby and the UFC officials sent me to the PI to get worked on by the UFC PT staff for 2 hours.

I spent the night eating, rehydrating, stretching, and even saw the PT staff later that night. I woke up early this morning with a migraine/headache, nausea and the only thing that made me feel better was laying in the dark.

UFC got me medicine and I rested for a couple of hours before getting up and vomiting. It was at that point we called the UFC doctor and he made the decision to send me to the hospital.

I’m sorry to everyone who was excited for this fight. I tried to do everything I could to stay in this fight, but these issues are out of my control.

UFC Vegas 24 was supposed to be Stephens’ return fight after his second-round elbow KO loss to Calvin Kattar last May.