Fights on Tap is a weekly roundup of all the fights booked in the UFC, Bellator and other promotions.
UFC 285 on Saturday was a great pay-per-view event! Jon Jones became the new heavyweight champion with a quick submission of Ciryl Gane. Alexa Grasso stunned Valentina Shevchenko to claim the flyweight championship. Shavkat Rakhmonov and Geoff Neal put on a show in their ‘Fight of the Night’ awarded appearance. And Bo Nickal had a successful debut. With that event now over, let’s take a look at what we have ahead of us on the upcoming schedule.
The UFC either announced or finalized 7 fights this week, and a top-10 strawweight clash is set.
With her time at flyweight coming to an end, Jéssica Andrade is shifting her focus to strawweight. For her next UFC appearance, ‘Bate Estaca’ is sharing the Octagon with Xiaonan Yan at UFC 288, the upcoming pay-per-view event scheduled for May 6 at the Prudential Center in Newark, New Jersey.
Though she split time at 115 and 125 pounds, Andrade decided to focus on the former after suffering a second-round submission loss to Erin Blanchfield at UFC Vegas 69 in February. At strawweight, the Brazilian is 8-3, with wins over Karolina Kowalkiewicz, Rose Namajunas and Amanda Lemos. After a 6-0 start to her UFC career, Yan dropped consecutive fights to Carla Esparza and Marina Rodriguez at UFC Vegas 27 and UFC 272, respectively. Recently, ‘Fury’ rebounded with a majority decision over Mackenzie Dern at UFC Vegas 61 this past October.
UFC San Antonio — March 25
- Manuel Torres vs. Trey Ogden — lightweight (First rep. by Iridium Sports Agency)
UFC Vegas 71 — April 22
- Rani Yahya vs. Montel Jackson — bantamweight (First rep. by Iridium Sports Agency)
UFC Vegas 72 — April 29
- Cody Durden vs. Charles Johnson — flyweight (First rep. by Alex Behunin of MMA Mania)
- Julian Erosa vs. Fernando Padilla — featherweight (First rep. by Carlos Contreras Legaspi of ESPN Deportes)
UFC 288 — May 6
- Andre Petroski vs. Armen Petrosyan — middleweight (First rep. by Marcel Dorff of Eurosport Nederland)
- Devin Clark vs. Kennedy Nzechukwu — light heavyweight (First rep. by Nolan King and Mike Bohn of MMA Junkie)
- Jéssica Andrade vs. Xiaonan Yan — women’s strawweight (First rep. by Marcel Dorff of Eurosport Nederland)
Announced Bellator fights:
Bellator 294 — April 21
- Kenneth Cross vs. Killys Mota — lightweight (First rep. by Twitter user BookieChamp)
- Danny Sabatello vs. Marcos Breno — bantamweight (First rep. by Nolan King of MMA Junkie)
Announced Professional Fighters League (PFL) fights:
PFL 2 (2023 Regular Season) — April 7
- Ante Delija vs. Yorgan De Castro — heavyweight
- Larissa Pacheco vs. Julia Budd — women’s featherweight
- Bruno Cappelozza vs. Matheus Scheffel — heavyweight
- Renan Ferreira vs. Rizvan Kuniev — heavyweight
- Olena Kolesnyk vs. Aspen Ladd — women’s featherweight
- Biaggio Ali Walsh vs. TBA — lightweight
- Martina Jindrova vs. Amber Leibrock — women’s featherweight
- Marcelo Nunes vs. Maurice Greene — heavyweight
- Denis Goltsov vs. Michal Andryszak — heavyweight
- Amanda Leve vs. Karolina Sobek — women’s featherweight
- Marina Mokhnatkina vs. Yoko Higashi — women’s featherweight
Announced Cage Warriors fights:
Cage Warriors 152 — April 15
- Luke Riley vs. Alexander Lööf — featherweight
Announced Invicta FC fights:
Invicta FC 52 — March 15
- Fatima Kline vs. Natalia Kuziutina — women’s strawweight
- Ramona Pascual vs. Kaylee Vos — women’s featherweight
- Minna Grusander vs. Shauna Bannon — women’s strawweight
Announced KSW fights:
KSW 80 — March 17
- Robert Ruchała vs. Lom-Ali Eskijew — featherweight
- Tom Breese vs. Bartosz Leśko — middleweight
- Kacper Koziorzębski vs. Borys Borkowski — welterweight
KSW 81 — April 22
- Adrian Bartosiński vs. Artur Szczepaniak — welterweight
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