The UFC has found their main event for UFC 206: the semi-main event.
In a weird turn of events, the UFC announced they were stripping Conor McGregor of his UFC Featherweight Championship. They then announced that the UFC 206 fight between Anthony Pettis and Max Holloway would be for the interim UFC Featherweight Championship, replacing the cancelled main-event of Cormier vs. Johnson.
While I did not see an explicit mention that Jose Aldo is now the official UFC Featherweight Champion, it only stands to reason that is now the case.
I doubt that McGregor is very happy about this news but it was also somewhat of a formality. That all having been written, this is pretty fucking stupid. They’re literally just admitting that they’re creating a title simply so they can say they have a Championship fight. You do not have a Championship fight just because you call it a Championship fight.
This is perhaps the most egregious abuse of the term “interim champion” in MMA history. This serves to undermine the long-standing credibility of UFC championships. Between Jon Jones never losing his title, but then being stripped of a second title, and now this, there are a growing number of illegitimate champions within the UFC itself. This was an issue that pro wrestling and boxing always have had, not one that the UFC found burdensome. But it appears they are now setting fire to the very rope they climbed to success. The company better hope it can out-climb the flames.
UFC 206 Card (click for coverage!)
Daniel Cormier (c) vs. Anthony Johnson – UFC Light Heavyweight Championship- Max Holloway vs. Anthony Pettis – Interim UFC Featherweight Championship
- Zach Makovsky vs. John Moraga – Flyweight
- John Makdessi vs. Lando Vannata – Lightweight
- Olivier Aubin-Mercier vs. Drew Dober – Lightweight
- Rustam Khabilov vs. Jason Saggo – Lightweight
- Valérie Létourneau vs. Poliana Botelho – Women’s Strawweight
- Nikita Krylov vs. Misha Cirkunov – Light Heavyweight
- Chad Laprise vs. Li Jingliang – Welterweight
- Cub Swanson vs. Doo Ho Choi – Featherweight
- Mitch Gagnon vs. Matthew Lopez – Bantamweight
Tim Kennedy vs. Rashad Evans – Middleweight
UFC 206 products you can actually buy!
I feel bad for the fighters here. The winner will have to prance around with this thing knowing full well it was created out of bullshit to try to save a PPV buyrate.
I guess this was just created so their UFC 206 main event had a belt to present. Yes, that makes it a joke title at this point. Yuk.
Should have just said this fight is for the title match with Aldo and leave it at that.
I doubt adding a prop belt will make much of a difference in business. People who want to see this fight were already going to buy the show, and those who didn’t are likely informed enough to know it is a worthless belt on the line and still not buy the show