UFC 303 will go down as one of the most logistically chaotic cards in the promotion’s history, with the mess no clearer than Diego Lopes punching a man fighting with roughly four hours’ notice.
The rising featherweight star defeated his last-minute opponent Dan Ige by unanimous decision on Saturday (29-28, 29-28, 29-28), the culmination of a co-main event that had to be reworked four times different.
Lopes gained a decisive advantage with a strong first and second round, but Ige made a valiant effort in the third, catching the Brazilian with several hard shots and winning the round.
The fight only became possible when Ige stepped in on short notice to replace Brian Ortega in the co-main event. Ortega, who was not part of the card until June 13, was officially announced as withdrawing during the preliminary card due to an illness that left him with a 103-degree fever, forcing the UFC to turn to Ige to face Lopes and salvage the card.
The fight, which took place at a fixed weight of 165 pounds, was only possible because Ige was already scheduled to fight in Las Vegas in three weeks. Nevada State Athletic Commission executive director Jeff Mullen told ESPN that the fact that Ige’s medical exams were up to date in the system allowed the body to legally approve the fight.
It’s hard to think of a fight set at a later point in UFC history. Ige told ESPN that he was receiving a massage when he started receiving calls from UFC executive Hunter Campbell, manager Ali Abdelaziz and more.
“Eight weeks, six weeks, four weeks, four hours. It doesn’t matter. This is what I live for. This is my dream. I can wake up and do what I love. I was literally getting a massage and I got a call from Hunter, Ali and a group of people who said to me, ‘Hey, do you want to fight tonight?’ I thought, ‘Man, this is a chance to become a legend.’ This is a story I want to tell my grandchildren.
“I couldn’t be happier with my performance.”
The loss can hardly be attributed to Ige, who probably earned as many points with UFC president Dana White as possible just by showing up at the arena. The gate for the event was $15.9 million. fourth highest in UFC history.
The experience was also not an easy ride for Lopes, who was initially supposed to face Ortega in a featherweight fight before the veteran requested that he move up to lightweight. Then a new opponent stepped in and raised the number to 165. Like Ige, Lopes said the chaos didn’t matter through an interpreter:
“However, it doesn’t matter who it is, when it is. I’ll fight anyone. I thought ‘Hey, 145.’ Then I got the news at 4 in the morning: ‘It’s going to be 155.’ And today, at 4 in the afternoon , I found out that this fight was changing. “It doesn’t matter.”
Both fighters now have maximum points with the UFC, and both said they wanted to use them to join the UFC 306 card at The Sphere in September.
Conor McGregor, Jamahal Hill and others have withdrawn from UFC 303
Retirements were a recurring theme for UFC 303. The card was initially announced with a main event featuring the return of Conor McGregor to the Octagon against Michael Chandler, with a co-main event between former light heavyweight champion Jamahal Hill and Khalil Rountree Jr.
A contaminated supplement caused Rountree to pull out of the co-main event, with Carlos Ulberg stepping in instead. McGregor and Hill then had to pull out with injuries, leaving the UFC in trouble. The end result was a new main event between light heavyweight champion Alex Pereira and former champion Jiří Procházka and the co-main event between Lopes and Ortega.
Ulberg stayed with Anthony Smith, until Ulberg also pulled out and was replaced by Roman Dolidze. So the three main fights on the card have now seen a total of six withdrawals.
And that’s not all, as fights between Gillian Robertson and Michelle Waterson-Gomez, Cody Durden and Carlos Hernández, and Andrei Arlovski and Martin Buday were scheduled and subsequently postponed or altered.
Simply put, it was a busy few weeks for White, who also had to deal with Khamzat Chimaev’s withdrawal from his fight against Robert Whittaker the week before. Whittaker quickly managed to replace Ikram Aliskerov.